She became silent as she thought of that foundation again, and presently Katie rose.
“I suppose I couldn’t see him in his cot?” she said wistfully.
Dorothy smiled. Katie meant the youngest Bit.
“Well ... I’m afraid he’s in our room, you see...,” she said.
Katie had been thinking of The Witan. She coloured a little.
“Sorry,” she murmured; and then she broke out emphatically.
“I like coming to see you, Dorothy. I don’t feel so—such a fool when I’m with you.... And do tell me where you got that frock, and how much it was; I must have another one as soon as I can raise the money! I do wish I could make what Britomart Belchamber makes! Two-twenty a year! Think of that!... But of course Prince Eadmond teachers do come expensive——”
More and more it was coming to seem to Dorothy that the whole thing was terrifically expensive.
[1] I have been charged with the invention of these facetiæ. Here is the Synthetic Protoplasm idea:—
“The dream of creating offspring without the concurrence of woman has always haunted the imagination of the human race. The miraculous advances which the chemical synthesis has accomplished in these latter days seem to justify the boldest hopes, but we are still far from the creation of living protoplasm. The experiences of Loeb or of Delage are undoubtedly very confounding. But in order to produce life these scientists were obliged, nevertheless, to have recourse to beings already organized. Thousands of centuries undoubtedly separate us from any possibility of realizing the most magnificent and most disconcerting dream ever engendered in the human brain. In the meantime, as the Torch of Life must be transmitted to the succeeding generations, woman will continue gloriously to fulfil her character of mother.”—“Problems of the Sexes,” Jean Finot; 12s. 6d. net; p. 352.