“A girl may change her mind.” She lifted her head and looked with sad humour at her husband, whom she also had kept dangling for a while. Then:
“James, dear, our son is as fine as we think him. But he’s just a splendid, wholesome, everyday, unimaginative New York business man. And he’s fallen in love with his absolute antithesis. Because this girl is all ardent imagination, full of extravagant impulses, very lovely to look at, but a perfectly illogical fanatic!
“Mrs. Vance has told me all about her. She really belongs in some exotic romance, not in New York. She’s entirely irresponsible, perfectly unstable. There is in her a generous sort of recklessness which is quite likely to drive her headlong into any extreme. And what sort of mate would such a girl be for a young man whose ambition is to make good in the real estate business, marry a nice girl, have a pleasant home and agreeable children, and otherwise conform to the ordinary conventions of civilisation?”
“I think,” remarked her husband grimly, “that she’d keep him guessing.”
“She would indeed! And that’s not all, James. For I’ve got to tell you that the girl entertains some rather weird and dreadful socialistic notions. She talks 241 socialism––a mild variety––from public platforms. She admits very frankly that she entertains no respect for accepted conventions. And while I have no reason to doubt her purity of mind and personal chastity, the unpleasant and startling fact remains that she proposes that humanity should dispense with the marriage ceremony and discard it and any orthodox religion as obsolete superstitions.”
Her husband stared at her.
“For heaven’s sake,” he began, then got frightfully red in the face once more. “What that girl needs is a plain spanking!” he said bluntly. “I’d like to see her or any other girl try to come into this family on any such ridiculous terms!”
“She doesn’t seem to want to come in on any terms,” said Helen.
“Then what are you worrying about?”
“I am worrying about what might happen if she ever changed her mind.”