"My sworn enemy!" he cried. "Don't you think you'd better set me down? I warn you, you are bringing a traitor into your camp. I am a rabid socialist of the dangerous and most disreputable type."
"You are nothing so romantic," retorted Mary. "You are quite a young boy with a bad cold who has just been sick in the middle of the road, and you are coming home with me. Evidently you are quite unfit to be wandering about the wolds by yourself. I don't care whether you're a socialist or not. If you're rabid, it just shows that you're not capable of looking after yourself."
"I'm not a boy. I'm twenty-four, and I take myself and my politics very seriously. It's the prerogative of mediocrity. And I'm out to smash your rotten social system into little bits." Then he sneezed three times. "And I warn you that I will never break bread in the house of a declared enemy of society."
"I never asked you to," Mary replied. Her pulses were beating furiously. A queer excitement caught her by the throat. She forced herself to be very matter-of-fact. "I think you will be very silly to smash anything. It's so wasteful. I think socialism and all that very silly. So does my husband."
For the life of her, Mary could not think why she had dragged John into it.
"I read a book," she continued, "about a month ago. A very silly book called The Salvation of Society by David Rossitur. He thought he was so clever and modern because he prophesied that England was going to the dogs. My sister-in-law, Sarah, came to exactly the same conclusion long ago, though she hasn't been to college."
Mary spoke with heat. She felt annoyed because she could not talk more cleverly, though it was silly to be excited about a book, when the boy beside her, socialist or no socialist, was cold and wet and needing a hot drink.
"I'm glad you didn't like the book. It shows your sound judgment. I think it's rotten. Pessimism is the refuge of the unimaginative. I've outgrown all those destructive ambitions long ago, though when I wrote it——"
"When you—what?"
"When I wrote it I thought it was rather clever."