"Certainly. Loosen these straps in the back of my waistcoat—the upper ones, won't you?"
As she fussed with the buckles she said: "But you don't know that they say you're going to pieces—neglecting your cases—keeping away from your office—wasting about half of your day with your lady love. They say that you have gone stark mad—that you are rushing to ruin."
"A little looser. That's better. Thanks."
"And everyone's wondering when Josephine will hear and go on the rampage. She's so proud and so stuck on herself that they're betting she'll give you the bounce."
"Well—" getting into his coat—"you'd delight in that. For you don't like her."
"Oh—so—so," replied Ursula. "She's all right, as women go. You know we women don't ever think any too well of each other. We're 'on.' Now, I'm frank to admit I'm not worth the powder to blow me up. I can't do anything worth doing. I don't know anything worth knowing—except how to dress and make a fool of an occasional man. I'm not a good house-keeper, nor a good wife—and I'd as lief go to jail for two years as have a baby. But I admit I'm n. g. Most women are as poor excuses as I am, yet they think they're grand!"
Norman, standing before his sister and smiling mysteriously, said: "My dear Urse, let me give you a great truth in a sentence. The value of anything is not its value to itself or in itself, but its value to some one else. A woman—even as incompetent a person as you——"
"Or Josephine."
"—or Josephine—may seem to some man to be pricelessly valuable. And if she happens to seem so to him, why, she is so."