"You seem more natural here," she said, glancing at his ruffled hair and careless tie. "I'd like to see you at work."
He rose to get a copy of the editorial sheet for the day, and handed it to her.
"You inspired that."
She took the editorial, which was entitled "Waste," and ran down its heavily leaded phrases, smiling to herself at these moralizations of the devil turned friar. He saw her amusement, and took the editorial abruptly.
"You won't understand—that's what I believe!"
He drew a chair opposite and flung into it; then, with an erect stiffening of his body, clasped his hands eagerly between his knees, releasing them in sudden flights, returning them always to their tenacious grip. There was something in the combustibility of the gesture that was significant of the whole man.
"By George!" he said suddenly, without relevancy, "why haven't I the right to stretch out my hand and take you?"
Doré burst out laughing, immensely flattered.
"What a nuisance you are!" he continued savagely. "What good do you do in the world? All you women do is to interfere! And to think that this sentimental civilization—idiotic civilization—is going to experiment for a few hundred years with pretending that women are made to share the progress of the world with men!"
"So you're not a woman's—"