"The right kind of a woman today gives other women a chance for their lives—their happiness. That is real piety. She makes allowances. She's slow to condemn."
"You don't have to tell me that loose standards prevail."
Sue did not seem to hear. "All these years you've talked to me about the home—the home with a capital H. Your home—which you'd 'kept together'—the American home—wave the flag! And I've always believed that you meant what you said. But today I understand your real attitude. First, because you weren't willing to give that poor cornered girl a chance at one. You intruded into her room and deliberately drove her away."
"She ran away once from a good home with a good man." She paid Farvel the compliment unconsciously—and unintentionally.
"Then consider my case,"—it was as if Sue were speaking to herself. "Why haven't you given me a chance? For all these years, if a man looked cross-eyed at me, was he ever asked to call on us?"
"Such nonsense!"
"If he did, somehow or other there was trouble. You would cry, and say I didn't love you—or you pretended to find something wrong with him, and he didn't come again. And once—once I remember that you claimed that you were ill—though I think I guessed that you weren't—and away we went for a change of air. Oh, peace at any price!"
Mrs. Milo grew scarlet. "Ha!" she scoffed. "So I'm to blame for your not being married! I've stood in your way!"
"Just think how you've acted today—the way you acted over this dress—you can't bear to see me look well? Why?—Yes, you've stood in my way from the very first."
"I deny it! You'd better look in the mirror." She picked it up and held it out to Sue. "You know, you're not a sweet young thing."