Kitty turned her back and intimated so plainly a dismissal that the obedient mother felt constrained to go. “It _is_ young Holyoke,” she thought, with a sigh that was meant to soften her obdurate daughter’s heart. She poured her troubles in her tired husband’s ear that night: “Kate shall marry whom she likes,” said that unimaginative person. “I guess her half million will be worth any beggarly marquis of them all. You weren’t a countess, when I married you.” And Mrs. Farnum had to cry in silence. Poor humanity! How much trouble do you give yourselves. As for Kitty Farnum, she had been asked in marriage by the Earl already; and had refused him twice. CHAPTER XXVI. FLOSSIE ENJOYS HERSELF. Flossie Gower lay idly upon her couch; it was her reception-day. She was waiting for the monotonous round of callers; and, while she waited, she gave herself to reminiscences. It was not usual for her to ply her memory so hard; but to-day, thinking of her whole life, and planning her campaign to Russia, all the events of her career passed in review before her. Her dainty morning dress curled away from the throat, and rippled gracefully, in a cascade of laces, over to the ground; simple and pure as any Endymion might clothe his dream in. The neck was white as ever; but the face had a wearied look the world had never seen, a pout of unheroic discontent, like any other woman’s who was old and out of humor. And yet our heroine was telling to herself her triumphs, like beads. She had early learned that she was rich, and thus had quickly found that riches were, alone, unsatisfying. No pedant moralist was more sure of this than she. But there they parted; while the moralist might prate of other worlds, or the love of humanity, Flossie was a positivist. No unknown world should drag her, Saturn-like, from her chosen orbit, and bid her leave her balls, her troops of male admirers, for nunneries or the domestic fireside. Unknowables might be disregarded: she knew no other world than this; and as for the love of humanity, she sought it for herself. Of course we men do not understand the keen delight that Flossie took in swaying from his balance every man she met. We are not pleased when a pretty woman shows her sensibility to us. It may even rather shock us; we do not expect that sort of thing; moreover, if obvious to us, it is perhaps seen by others and that cheapens the conquest. But it is a woman’s _carrière_ to work her will and worth through men. And what else is her whole training, her education, the lessons we read to her of history? You may talk, and raise statues, in your female colleges, of Princess Idas and Corinnes; but it is Helen, Cleopatra, Heloise, who have left their woman’s mark upon the world; and they are women enough, yet, these Vassar girls, to know it.