“Is your house open,” Catherine asked, “to men and women alike?”
He was eager to speak with her on a subject more interesting to him even than his Home. Answering her question, in this frame of mind, his thoughts wandered; he drew lines absently with his walking-stick on the soft earth under the trees.
“The means at my disposal,” he said, “are limited. I have been obliged to choose between the men and the women.”
“And you have chosen women?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Because a lost woman is a more friendless creature than a lost man.”
“Do they come to you? or do you look for them?”
“They mostly come to me. There is one young woman, however, now waiting to see me, whom I have been looking for. I am deeply interested in her.”
“Is it her beauty that interests you?”