What did the girl sit there for, thinking her own thoughts? Young women at her time of life blushed and fluttered and plumed themselves when a man came near who was of the right age to love and marry. And so they ought, so they ought! Neckart was used to see women of any age plume themselves when he was in sight. It was simple admission of his position. They knew their own capital of beauty or wit, and showed him the best of every point, just as a pheasant turns every golden feather to the sun when a passer-by comes near. He liked these radiant, self-asserting women, to be sure, very much as he did the silly fowl or a Skye terrier conscious of its beauty in every hair. But beauty was so much wasted material on this daughter of Swendon's, who did not seem to know she had it.
Besides, Mr. Neckart had always been thrown into contact with women who had careers and aims. Each one of them wished she had been born a man, and did what she could to snatch a man's prerogatives. One wrote, another painted, a third sang; this one strove for political power in the lobbies of Congress, that for money, the majority for husbands: they were wits, littérateurs, society women. But for a young girl to jog on from year to year striving neither for knowledge nor lovers, making her world of the whims and wants of a weak-minded old man, composedly building up every day models which she knew would prove failures to-morrow,—here was a most inane life.
Any eye which had grown used to the flash and flutter of brilliant tropical birds in a cage would be apt to find the little dull-breasted swallow sitting motionless by her nest a very insipid subject of study. Probably no other man, as active and busy in the world as Neckart, would have wasted so much thought on a chance young girl sitting on a log. But women being forbidden fruit to him, he was morbidly curious about them all. Old Chrysostom, barred into his cave by an impassable line, was much more inquisitive about the princess asleep outside than if he had been a hearty young fellow free to go out and kiss and make love to her.
Miss Swendon came up presently, the dog marching alongside. "Father," she said, "you are spending the whole day with Mr. Neckart. You have not told Sutphen the town news. I am afraid the old man will be hurt."
"That's a fact: I'll go over directly. You will like to be alone a while, Neckart, at any rate.—Come, Jane."
Neckart rose: "You are not going over to those rough fellows, Miss Swendon? There are no women there."
Jane laughed. "I am a woman," with an arch little nod. "One queen-bee makes the whole hive proper, conventionally."
"Of course. But really those men are vulgar and fishy to such a degree—Nothing but a missionary spirit can take you to them?"
"On the contrary," gravely, "they are the best-bred men I know. Their talk is fuller of adventure and sincerity than any book I ever read."
"Still, stay with me. I have feelings to consider as well as Sutphen."