“Before long,” said Lily suddenly, “there will be no state. There will be enough for everybody, and nobody will have too much.”
Howard smiled at her indulgently.
“How do you expect to accomplish this ideal condition?”
“That's the difficulty about it,” said Lily, thoughtfully. “It means a revolution. It would be peaceful, though. The thing to do is to convince people that it is simple justice, and then they will divide what they have.”
“Why, Lily!” Grace's voice was anxious. “That's Socialism.”
But Howard only smiled tolerantly, and changed the subject. Every one had these attacks of idealism in youth. They were the exaggerated altruism of adolescence; a part of its dreams and aspirations. He changed the subject.
“I like the boy,” he said to Grace, later, over the cribbage board in the morning room. “He has character, and a queer sort of magnetism. It mightn't be a bad thing—”
Grace was counting.
“I forgot to tell you; I think she refused Pink Denslow the other day.”
“I rather gathered, from the way she spoke of young Cameron, that she isn't interested there either.”