"You speak like a—like a——" He searched his imagination to find what she did speak like, and she finished for him:
"Like an enemy!"
"No, not quite so bad as that, but you are morbid, dear. This isn't a meeting of suffragists, this is a sacrament. You and I are alone before the altar of love. We must not deny one another this sweet bread of life!"
"You said something just then about suffragists. Do you believe in suffrage for women, for your wife, for example?"
He sat up and looked at her. He began to smile teasingly, as if she were a little girl and he a patient elder person with a beam in his eye.
"So that's it, hey? You want to be a suffragist and with the suffragists stand! Of course I believe in it. I believe in letting every woman have what she wants. Now kiss me, Selah, like the dear little suffering suff you are!"
"No, I must be sure you mean that. Men say things to women they do not believe, just to humour them, just to get——"
"A kiss, yes! I'd vote for you for coroner, Selah, for one kiss to-night!"
"Well, you won't get it, Mr. Sasnett, not until I am sure, absolutely sure, you are for us, not against us."
"Us! One at a time, Selah, I say. You wouldn't have me be for all women, would you? A man loves one woman, but he can't stand 'em en masse. He'd romp like a four-year-old in a crowd of men, but a crowd of women, a commonwealth of women! Good Lord! it would be awful. Don't ask me to kiss them all, dear!"