'Why?'

'Oh, the men will never let it come to the point.'

'It's interesting to hear you say that. You justify the militant women, you know.'

'That is perhaps not to hit the bull's eye!' he said, a little grimly. Then dropping his unaccustomed air of chill disapproval, he appealed to his friend's better taste. A confession of sheer physical loathing crept into his face as he let fall two or three little sentences about these women's offence against public decorum. 'Why, it is as hideous as war!' he wound up, dismissing it.

'Perhaps it is war.' Her phrase drew the cloud of menace down again; it closed about them. It seemed to trouble her that he would not meet her gaze. 'Don't think——' she prayed, and stumbling against the new hardness in his face, broke off, withdrew her eyes and changed the form of what she had meant to say. 'I think I like good manners, too, but I see it would be a mistake to put them first. What if we have to earn the right to be gentle and gracious without shame?'

'You seriously defend these people!'

'I'm not sure they haven't taken the only way.' She looked at her friend with a fresh appeal in her eyes. But his were wearing their new cold look. She seemed to nerve herself to meet some numbing danger of cowardice. 'The old rule used to be patience—with no matter what wrong. The new feeling is: shame on any one who weakly suffers wrong! Isn't it too cheap an idea of morals that women should take credit for the enduring that keeps the wrong alive? You won't say women have no stake in morals. Have we any right to let the world go wrong while we get compliments for our forbearance and for pretty manners?'

'You began,' said Borrodaile, 'by explaining other women's notions. You have ended by seeming to adopt them as your own. But you are a person of some intelligence. You will open your eyes before you go too far. You belong to the people who are responsible for handing on the world's treasure. As we've agreed, there never was a time when it was attacked from so many sides. Can't you see what's at stake?'

'I see that many of the pleasantest things may be in eclipse for a time.'

'My dear, they would die off the face of the earth.'