"Why?" asked Lauzoon; the laugh irritated him.
"Oh, it's plain common sense to be with her, instead of against her, when she gets fully awake. Her kind goes well enough in harness if the other one pulls a fair share—if he doesn't—why, the chances are—she'd break the traces and—clip it alone."
"Alone, hey?" It was Jude's turn to laugh now. "You ain't got the lay of the country yet, Mr. Gaston, not so far as the women is concerned. How in thunder is a woman to go alone, I'd like to know, in St. Angé? Once she's married, she's married, and she knows it. Go alone? I'd like to know where she'd go to?"
A breeze was now stirring outside. Gaston felt it and he shivered slightly.
"Jude," he continued after a moment, "they sometimes go to the devil, you know. Even St. Angé's ideals do not prevent that, judging from things I've heard."
"Not her kind," Jude muttered. He was harking back to Lola Laval. How the girl rose and haunted him to-night! "Not her kind, Mr. Gaston."
"No, you're right, Jude—not her kind as she is now. That's just the point. It's poor work, though, to draw on your bank account without noting how your balance stands. If you do, you'll get a surprise some day. Joyce wants the best she can get out of life. She's had a vision, poor little girl, and she's making for that vision, believing it a reality. We all do that, old man, and it's up to you to give her as much of what she wants as you can. She's been building a place for her soul"—Gaston was thinking aloud. Jude had vanished from his horizon—"and she's going up to take possession some day. God, how that woman is going to love—something!"
And just then Jude shifted into view again upon the line of Gaston's perceptions. He had risen to his feet and was glaring at his companion. There was an ugly look on his face, and his hands trembled with the effort he made to restrain himself.
"Say, Mr. Gaston," he blurted out, "all that talk is damned moonshine, and I ain't such a fool but what I know it. Such gaff ain't nourishing. Now as to Joyce, I'm going to do the square thing by her. Her book-learning is all right if she keeps it to herself, and don't let it get mixed up with her duties 'long of me. And right here, Mr. Gaston," Jude choked miserably, "I guess her and me don't want no coaching from you. No harm intended, understand, but just a clean showing."
Indignation and a realization of his own insignificance, had hurled Jude along up to this point, but he was suddenly landed high and dry by the calm, amused look in Gaston's eyes.