“Oh!” said Aunt Phœbe.
“But she has played her part, I gather.”
“Feminine! No! She is completely a Man-made Woman. Quintessentially the Pampered Squaw. Holding her position by her former charms. A Sex Residuum. Relict. This last outrage. An incident—merely. Her course of action was dictated for her. A Man. A mere solicitor. One Grimes. The flimsiest creature! An aspen leaf—but Male. Male.”
Stern thoughts kept Aunt Phœbe silent for a time. Then she remarked very quietly, “I shook him. I shook him well.”
“I hope still to have the benefit of your advice,” said Oswald gravely.
“Nay,” she said. But she was pleased. “A shy comment, perhaps. But the difference will be essential. Don’t expect me to guide you as you would wish to be guided. That phase is over between men and women. We hand the children over—since the law will have it so. Take them!”
And then addressing the Weald, Aunt Phœbe, in vibrating accents, uttered a word that was to be the keynote of a decade of feminine activities.
“The Vote,” said Aunt Phœbe, getting a wonderful emotional buzz into her voice. “The Vo-o-o-o-o-te.”
§ 11
So it was that Oswald found himself fully invested with his responsibilities.