Mr. Mix picked up his cue, and gave thanks for the diversion. “Dear lady, I am a citizen. As a citizen, I help to make the laws; they’re made by all of us for our own good. Show me 72 a man who doesn’t believe in enforcing the laws, and I won’t argue with him––I couldn’t count on his sincerity.”
“It’s a pleasure to talk to a man like you,” she said. “I wonder if you agree with our other ideals. Er––what do you think about dancing?”
He had a good phrase which he had been saving up for six weeks. “Dancing,” he said, “is popular because it’s so conspicuously innocent, and so warmly satisfactory to the guilty.”
“Good! Good! How about tobacco?”
This, too, he side-stepped. “It’s a poison, so the doctors say. Who am I to put any opinion against theirs?”
She was regarding him earnestly, and a little perplexedly.
“How is it, when in spirit you’re one of us, you’ve never joined the League?”
“I-I’ve never been invited,” said Mr. Mix, somewhat taken aback.
“Then I invite you,” she said, promptly. “And I know you’ll accept. It’s men like you we need––men with some backbone; prominent, useful citizens. You sit right there. I’ve got 73 an application blank in my desk. Read it over when you get home, and sign it and mail it to me.”
“I appreciate the distinction of your asking me,” said Mr. Mix, with supreme deference. “And if you have time, I wish you’d tell me what your aims are. I am very deeply interested.”