“None whatever,” she laughed. “I just thought of it as an experience.”
“Rather like studying a bug under glass, is that it?”
“Yes, something of the sort. But—you were speaking of your wife.”
“Well,” he said with a smile; “my being married is not a confidential matter; nothing to hide or be ashamed of. My wife is a very charming woman. You’d probably fall under her spell if you knew her; people frequently do. And I think she’d probably like you.”
“Not if she knew I had met you at a party like this.”
“Bless you, that wouldn’t make a particle of difference in her liking you or not liking you! She’s broad-minded—very much so! And it’s one of her many good points that she isn’t jealous. If she came in here and found me talking to you she wouldn’t scream and break up the furniture; she’d join in the conversation and make herself interesting—say startling things just to make us sit up. After a fashion she’s a philosopher, very much entertained by what the world’s doing. She sees in me only one of the many millions, a queer specimen for the microscope. She actually puts me into the books she writes!”
Grace bent her head, lifted it quickly and exclaimed: “Is she Mary Graham Trenton? I’ve read her ‘Clues to a New Social Order’ but I never imagined——”
“No, you wouldn’t connect me with anything so daring! I need hardly repeat that she’s a broad-minded woman. I’d be interested to know how you come to know about that book.”
“Oh, that’s easy enough. We had a lecture on it in our sociology course at the university. The head of the department didn’t approve of Mrs. Trenton’s views and warned us against the book, so of course I read it!”
“Naturally!”