"Hugo would as soon think of going in the street in a—in a—I don't know what."
"Hugo is the finest flower of American gentleman. That is, he's the quintessence of everything that's nice—and 'nasty.' I wish I were married to him for a week. I love Hugo, but he gives me the creeps." She rose and tramped restlessly about the room. "You both give me the creeps. Everything conventional gives me the creeps. If I'm not careful I'll dress myself in a long shirt, let down my hair and run wild."
"What nonsense you do talk," said Martha composedly.
Jane sat down abruptly. "So I do!" she said. "I'm as poor a creature as you at bottom. I simply like to beat against the bars of my cage to make myself think I'm a wild, free bird by nature. If you opened the door, I'd not fly out, but would hop meekly back to my perch and fall to smoothing my feathers.... Tell me some more about Victor Dorn."
"I told you he isn't fit to talk about," said Martha. "Do you know, they say now that he is carrying on with that shameless, brazen thing who writes for his paper, that Selma Gordon?"
"Selma Gordon," echoed Jane. Her brows came down in a gesture reminiscent of her father, and there was a disagreeable expression about her mouth and in her light brown eyes. "Who's Selma Gordon?"
"She makes speeches—and writes articles against rich people—and—oh, she's horrid."
"Pretty?"
"No—a scrawny, black thing. The men—some of them—say she's got a kind of uncanny fascination. Some even insist that she's beautiful." Martha laughed. "Beautiful! How could a woman with black hair and a dark skin and no flesh on her bones be beautiful?"
"It has been known to happen," said Jane curtly. "Is she one of THE Gordons?"