"Oh, dear me," retorted Kate, "what would you have us do with peace? You can get that in any garlanded sepulcher. Peace is like perfection, it isn't desirable. We should perish of it. As long as there is life there is struggle and change. But when we have our inner faith, when we can see what the thing is for which we are to strive, then we shall cease to be so spasmodic in our efforts. We'll not be doing such grotesque things. We'll come into new dignity."
"What you're trying to say," said Wander, "is that it is ourselves who are to be our best achievement. It's what we make of ourselves that matters."
"Oh, that's it! That's it!" cried Kate, beating her gloved hands together like a child. "You're getting it! You're getting it! It's what we make of ourselves that matters, and we must all have the right to find ourselves--to keep exploring till we find our highest selves. There mustn't be such a waste of ability and power and hope as there has been. We must all have our share in the essentials--our own relation to reality."
"I see," he said, pausing at the door, and looking into her face as if he would spell out her incommunicable self. "That's what you mean by universal liberty."
"That's what I mean."
"And the man you marry must let you pick your own way, make your own blunders, grow by your own experience."
"Yes."
Honora opened the door and looked at them. She was weak and she leaned against the casing for her support, but her face was tender and calm, and she was regnant over her own mind.
"What is the matter with you two?" she asked. "Aren't you coming in to dinner? Haven't you any appetites?"
Kate threw her arms about her.