With that the girl handed him a dainty, lace-edged mouchoir, for which she had paid half a hundred francs in Paris, and which she had carried at the Tuileries.
“It is just in celebration of my home-coming,” she said to Arthur in explanation, “and because we are going to have one of our old ‘soon in the morning’ rides together.”
As she mounted, Dorothy turned to Dick and commanded:
“Turn the hounds loose, Dick, and put them on our track.” Then to Arthur:
“It is a glorious morning, and I want the dogs to enjoy it.”
The horses were full of the enthusiasm of the morning. They broke at once into a gallop, which neither of the riders was disposed to restrain. Five minutes later the hounds, bellowing as they followed the trail, overtook the riders. Dorothy brought her mare upon her haunches, and greeted the dogs as they leaped to caress her hands. Then she cracked her whip and blew her whistle, and sent the excited animals to heel, with moans and complainings on their part that they were thus banished from the immediate presence of their beloved mistress.
“Your dogs still love and obey you, Dorothy,” said Arthur as they resumed their ride more soberly than before.
“Yes,” she answered. “They are better in that respect than women are.”
Arthur thought he understood. At any rate he accepted the remark as one implying an apology, and he saw no occasion for apology.
“Never mind that,” he said. “A woman is entitled to her perfect freedom. Every human being born into this world has an absolute right to do precisely as he pleases, so long as in doing as he pleases he does not trespass upon or abridge the equal right of any other human being to do as he pleases. It is this equality of right that furnishes the foundation of all moral codes which are worthy of respect. And this equality of right belongs to women as fully as to men.”