“I wish to God I hadn’t,” cried she with an energy that startled me. There was a fierce look of pain in her eyes. “I thought you understood. But I see you don’t.”
“What do you mean, Polly Ann?” said I gently.
“The real unhappiness isn’t an unhappy marriage,” replied she. “It’s being not married at all—not having any children. You know what I am—an old maid. You think that means the same thing as old bachelor. Well, it don’t.”
“Why not?”
“An old bachelor—nine times out of ten that means simply an old, selfish, comfortable man. But an old maid— The nature of woman’s different from the nature of man. A woman’s got to have a home—her home—her nest, with her children in it. And I’m an old maid. If I’d been a man—” She turned on me. “I’m ugly, ain’t I? You know I am. I know it. Dress me up in men’s clothes and I’d be a good-looking person—as a man. But as a woman I’m ugly. If I’d have been a man I could have got a mighty nice, mighty nice-looking wife—one that’d have been grateful to me for taking her and would have cared for me. But as a woman I couldn’t get a husband.”
“You can get a very good one,” said I. “Money—what would have bought you a wife as a man—what buys most men their wives—will buy you a husband. And he’ll be grateful and loving, so long as you manage the purse strings well—just as most wives are loving and grateful if their husbands don’t treat them too indulgently.”
“It’s different, and you know it is,” retorted she. “Custom has made it different. And I’m ugly—and that’s fatal in a woman.”
“Charm will beat beauty every time,” said I.
“I’ve got no charm—none on the outside. And that’s where a woman’s charm has to be. No, I’ve thought out my case. It’s hopeless. I’m a born old maid. No man ever asked me to marry him. No man ever said a word of love to me. Do you know what that means, Godfrey?”
I was silent. A choke in my throat made speech impossible.