She flushed, but looked across at him smilingly:
"I want to talk about that!"
"Then let's get rid of Dale first. If I read the signs, you've got in that chap a creature of limitless self indulgence. He's crazy to learn, and I've no doubt that already he is studying like a steam engine; but when he wants to do other things he'll do 'em with the same zeal. I gather from the Colonel that he doesn't give a rap for anybody or anything just so he gets to a book. Self control? He doesn't know any more about it than water coming down a rain pipe!"
"Don't you think the desire to study is commendable?"
"Certainly, but it requires no self control. He studies just as he would scratch his hand if it itched. I should call it natural, rather than commendable; or fortunate, if you choose. Jane," he now looked her fully and seriously in the eyes, "there are lots of people who go through life with tense lines about their mouths, saying nothing, never getting into devilment, and the world tiptoes behind them whispering: 'What wonderful self control!' It's all rot! Self control is a thing we unconsciously cultivate from the moment our minds begin to coordinate. It's like building a dam across our hidden river of tendency; and a hit or miss sort of structure it is, too. In one man the current of this tendency may be like a trickling stream, and a handful of materials are enough to keep it in check. In another, it may be a raging torrent, and he may slave night and day, gathering stone and sand, and sealing them with his very blood. But suppose in the end the torrent gets away from him! He fails, you say. Yet is he weaker after that herculean task than the other chap who dammed up his stream of tendency with the side of his boot? He publicly goes under,—yes! But may he not still be finer than his two-by-four brother whose temperament ran only from the ice-box to family prayers and back to the ice-box? I want to tell you," he concluded in the same low, even voice, "that in the Big Summing Up, the Celestial Clearing House will show many a poor gutter-runner more entitled to wear medals for having made a game fight for respectability than some of his anemic superiors who all their days walked slowly, and were called by their fellows examples of great character. Don't be too quick to size up a chap's pace, Lady Jane, until you know how red his blood is, and how much weight he's carrying. I must go now!"
While he had been speaking, the moon, full and mellow, climbed high above the house and shed a mere suggestion of light—a sort of luminous radiance—into the thickly sheltered circle. He stood up quickly with the air of one who had said too much, reached for a cigarette, and then for a match which he could not at once find. She saw that his face was very white and drawn in this ghost-like gloaming.
"I wish you wouldn't," she hesitated. "I like to talk to you tonight."
He turned and looked down at her, as she added:
"You're a curious make-up;—and have some really fine things in you!"
"That starts out well," he laughed, lighting the cigarette and sinking back on the bench.