“But,” burst from honest Harry, “you don’t mean—? No man who could work would stand his wife having to grind!”
“Why not?” she demanded. “If the woman has learnt her business, why on earth shouldn’t she grind, as you call it, as well as her husband?”
“Why? Well, simply, he would be a cad if he allowed it, unless it was absolutely necessary.”
Claudia sat up straight, and turned her bright face upon him.
“Ah, these are the behind-hand ideas which we have to live down. Don’t you understand that we hold there ought not to be the social differences which have hitherto existed? We maintain that idleness is a sin, and that we ought all to be working men and women. Of course while different degrees of culture and education handicap some of us, the work cannot be alike, but by decrees that will right itself—By degrees? I believe it is coming by leaps and bounds. I suppose, now,” she added, “you think there is a difference between me and—say a charwoman?”
“By Jove, yes!” blurted out Harry, with a laugh.
“Well, I expect if we could project ourselves fifty years or so, you wouldn’t find much. That difference is something we have to be ashamed of, and to rectify. We must give the people our opportunities and the chance of reaching a higher level. I dare say that horrifies you?”
“Oh, not at all,” he said, struggling between admiration and a sense of the ludicrous. “I am only a little puzzled.”
“Yes?” she said graciously; for to puzzle her hearers and then enlighten them, was a fascinating process. “Yes?”
“I was wondering who would do the washing?”