“'She must take the initiative. She must go after what she supremely wants, just as a man would, using her power—I assume that she is reasonably attractive. She must break through restraints, and drive ahead towards the particular kind of emotional happiness that suits her. That is what God created her for, to achieve by her own efforts this emotional happiness. If she wants it enough she can get it. We can all of us do anything, have anything on condition that we want it enough to pay the price for it. The price is usually the elimination of other things that interfere.'
“'Suppose a woman wants a husband? Suppose she is forty—and not rich? Do you mean to say she can get a husband?'
“Here my poet, blazing with conviction, leaned towards me, pointing an emphatic forefinger.
“'I tell you, Penelope Wells, it is possible for any reasonably attractive woman up to forty-five to get a reasonably satisfactory husband if she will work to get him as a man works to make money. She can't sit on a chair and twirl her thumbs and wait for a husband to drop into her lap out of the skies like a ripe plum. She must bend destiny to her purposes. She must make sacrifices, create opportunities, move about, use the intelligence that God has given her. The world is full of men who are half ready to marry—she must turn the balance!
“'Listen! If I were a lonely woman yearning for matrimony I would pick out one of these eligible males and make him my own. I would make him feel that the thing he wanted above all other things was to have me for his wife. How would I do this? I would study his desires, his needs, his weaknesses; I would make myself so necessary to him—as necessary as a mother is to a child—that he couldn't get along without me. I tell you it can be done, Pen, by the resistless power of the human will. The trouble with most of us is that we don't want things hard enough. If a woman wants a husband hard enough she will get him—nothing can prevent it!'
“I smiled at these fantastic views, although I admit, that we women ought to be more masters of our fates than we are. In my own case I suppose it would have been better if I had left Julian of my own volition, because it was right to leave him, instead of waiting for an automobile accident to separate us.
“'Please be sensible, Kendall,' I protested. 'Give me thoughts that apply to the world as it is, not extravagant fancies. You know perfectly well that there are thousands, tens of thousands, of fairly attractive women in all classes of society, especially in the wage earning class, who have no chance to marry the kind of man they wish to marry. Besides, there are a million more women than men in American. They can't all get husbands, can they? There aren't enough men to go around. And there are other thousands of wretched women tied to husbands who will not consent to a divorce. What are all these unhappy women to do?'
“'Can't they get along without men?' he laughed.
“'Can men get along without women?' I answered, rather annoyed. Kendall saw that I was serious and changed his tone.
“'Let me get this straight, Pen. If a woman longs for the companionship of a man—you mean the intimate companionship? You are not talking about platonic friendship?'