As that was exactly what Desboro told himself he had always meant, he winced and remained silent.
"Oh, you—the lot of you!" she said with smiling contempt. "I'll equip that girl to take care of herself before I'm through with her. Watch me."
"It is part of your business. Equip her to take care of herself as thoroughly as anybody you know. Then it will be up to her—as it is up to all women, after all—and to all men."
"Oh, is it? You've all the irresponsibility and moral rottenness of your Cavalier ancestors in you; do you know it, James? The Puritan, at least, never doubted that he was his brother's keeper."
Desboro said doggedly: "With the individual alone rests what that individual will be."
"Is that your mature belief?" she asked ironically.
"It is, dear lady."
"Lord! To think of a world full of loosened creatures like you! A civilised society swarming with callow and irresponsible opportunists, amateur Jesuits, idle intelligences reinfected with the toxins of their own philosophy! But," she shrugged, "I am indicting man himself—nations and nations of him. Besides, we women have always known this. And hybrids are hybrids. If there's any claret in the house, tell Farris to fetch some. Don't be angry, James. Man and woman once were different species, and the world has teemed with their hybrids since the first mating."
Mrs. Barkley leaned across the table toward him: