"You are right of course," Boyd replied, "so far at least as the principle is concerned. But how do you account for the facts?"
"It isn't my business to account for the facts. I know and you know that under the circumstances which arose in this case, Margaret Conway did not leave unanswered any letter she received from you. Either she did not receive your letters, or you did not receive her replies, or, more probably, both things happened."
"But how could that be? I—"
"I don't know. I'm not the proper person to ask. I'm going up to bed now, if you don't mind. I've said all I had in mind to say."
The conversation in the other porch was not like this, and yet in its way it was not unlike it.
"I hope you enjoyed yourself at the Magisters' to-day, Millicent," said Margaret as the two seated themselves in the porch. "I'm sorry I couldn't be with you, but you see old Judy was very low, and I really had to stay with her."
"Of course. Only it's all an astonishment to me—I mean the way in which you look after negroes who are ill."
"Why, of course we must do that—"
"Yes, I understand now, but I didn't. I thought you treated them as so many cattle. Of course I knew you looked after your own maids and other personal serving women, but I thought field negroes—"
"I know, dear. The whole system, is bad and I wish we were rid of it. But people up North always imagine that its worst possibilities are the daily facts, and we naturally resent that. We aren't angels by any means, but at least we are human beings. Never mind that now. Tell me about the dinner and the company."