“'Like men?'
“'Well, at least men know what they are going after, and when they have done a certain thing, they don't waste time regretting it or insisting that they meant to do something else.'
“'You think women are hypocrites?'
“'Yes.'
“'If women are hypocrites, if women are afraid to tell the truth about sentimental things, it is because you men have made them so,' I replied with feeling.
“Kendall answered good-naturedly that he held no brief for his own sex, he acknowledged that men treat women abominably—lie to them, abandon them, and so on; but he kept to his point that women create many of their troubles by drifting back and forth aimlessly on the changing tide of their emotions instead of establishing some definite goal for their lives.
“'Women yield to every sentimental impulse—that is why they weep so easily. Watch them at a murder trial—they weep for the victim, then they weep for the murderer. Half their tears are useless. If women would put into constructive thinking some of the vital power they waste in weeping and talking they could revolutionize the world.'
“'Could they reform the men?' I retorted, but when he tried to answer I stopped him. What was the use? I knew what he would say about this, and I really wanted to get his ideas on the other point.
“'Come back to the question,' I said. 'Take the case of a well-bred woman surrounded by stifling, conventional influences of family and friends, who sees lonely years slipping by while nothing comes that satisfies her womanhood. She may have money enough, comforts, even luxuries, but she longs for the companionship of a man. What is she to do?'
“He answered with his usual positiveness: