“Carley Burch, you don’t know yourself,” he declared, enigmatically.
“What woman knows herself? But do you know me?”
“Not I. Yet sometimes I see depths in you—wonderful possibilities—submerged under your poise—under your fixed, complacent idle attitude toward life.”
This seemed for Carley to be dangerously skating near thin ice, but she could not resist a retort:
“Depths in me? Why I am a shallow, transparent stream like your West Fork! ... And as for possibilities—may I ask what of them you imagine you see?”
“As a girl, before you were claimed by the world, you were earnest at heart. You had big hopes and dreams. And you had intellect, too. But you have wasted your talents, Carley. Having money, and spending it, living for pleasure, you have not realized your powers.... Now, don’t look hurt. I’m not censuring you. It’s just the way of modern life. And most of your friends have been more careless, thoughtless, useless than you. The aim of their existence is to be comfortable, free from work, worry, pain. They want pleasure, luxury. And what a pity it is! The best of you girls regard marriage as an escape, instead of responsibility. You don’t marry to get your shoulders square against the old wheel of American progress—to help some man make good—to bring a troop of healthy American kids into the world. You bare your shoulders to the gaze of the multitude and like it best if you are strung with pearls.”
“Glenn, you distress me when you talk like this,” replied Carley, soberly. “You did not use to talk so. It seems to me you are bitter against women.”
“Oh no, Carley! I am only sad,” he said. “I only see where once I was blind. American women are the finest on earth, but as a race, if they don’t change, they’re doomed to extinction.”
“How can you say such things?” demanded Carley, with spirit.
“I say them because they are true. Carley, on the level now, tell me how many of your immediate friends have children.”