She laughed. "You never approve of anything I say, so perhaps silence is a blessing in disguise."
"Oh, rot! Joan, look at my brother making an ass of himself over Elizabeth. Shall I start looking at you like that? I'm much more in love than he is, you know."
"Richard dear, you're not going to propose again in the middle of dinner, are you?"
"No; but it's only putting off the evil day, I warn you."
He was not going to lecture her any more, he decided. Elizabeth had written him a letter which was almost triumphant in tone; Joan was making up her mind, it seemed; perhaps after all she would show some spirit. In any case he found her adorable, with her black, cropped hair, her beautiful mouth, and her queer, gruff voice. Her flanks were lean and strong like a boy's; they suggested splendid, unfettered movement. She looked all wrong in evening dress, almost grotesque; but to Richard she appeared beautiful because symbolic of some future state—a forerunner. As he looked at her he seemed to see a vast army of women like herself, fine, splendid and fiercely virginal; strong, too, capable of gripping life and holding it against odds—the women of the future. They fascinated him, these as yet unborn women, stimulating his imagination, challenging his intellect, demanding of him an explanation of themselves.
He dropped his hand on Joan's where it lay in her lap. "Have you prayed over your sword?" he asked gravely.
She knew what he meant. "No," she said. "I haven't had the courage to unsheathe it yet."
"Then unsheathe it now and put it on the altar rails, and then get down on your knees and pray over it all night."
Their eyes met, young, frank and curious, and in hers there was a faint antagonism.