He would have opposed Mr. Hayes's theories at any time, but they cut him to the quick just then, when he had felt the grace of womanhood, when a woman had passed into his life and transformed it. The old man was airily disposing of the destinies of the race in centuries to come, the young man was fighting for his own little future. He could not rule the world. Let it roar and hurry as it would, but never dare to touch his wife and home. What did the man mean by uttering his hateful doctrines in Barbara's hearing? Her bright eyes came and went between the speakers, and Reynold longed to order her away, to shut her up in some safe place apart, where only he might approach her. He need not have been anxious. There was no touch of ambition in the girl's tender feminine nature to respond to her uncle's arguments. She did not want to vote, and wondered why women should ever wish to be doctors or--or--anything. Her eager glances betokened uneasiness rather than interest. Indeed the inferior being, scenting danger, had tried to turn the conversation before the terrible question of Woman's Rights had been mentioned at all. She had endeavoured to talk about a lawn-tennis ground rather than the aspect of Irish affairs. Harding did not know much about lawn-tennis, but he was quite ready to talk about it, just as he would have talked about crewel-work, if she had seemed to wish it. Mr. Hayes, however, pooh-poohed the little attempt at peace. "What is the good of planning the ground now?" he said. "And who cares for lawn-tennis?" "I do," said the girl. "It's much more amusing than talking about Mr. Gladstone and Mr. Parnell." "That's all you know about it," her uncle retorted. "Now if you had been educated--" "Oh yes, of course," she replied, with desperate pertness. "You are always talking about the woman of the future--I dare say she will _like_ to see people make themselves hot and disagreeable, arguing about Ireland." She made a droll little face of disgust. "Well, she may, but I don't!" "Perhaps the woman of the future will be hot and disagreeable too," Harding suggested. "_You_ might not find her agreeable," said Mr. Hayes drily. "She would be able to expose the fallacy of your views pretty clearly, I fancy." "Well," Barbara struck in hurriedly, amazed at her own boldness, "we get hot enough over tennis sometimes, but nobody is ever so cross over that, as men are when they argue." "Good heavens!" said Mr. Hayes. "To think that women, who rightfully should share man's most advanced attainments and aspirations--" and off he went at a canter over the beaten ground of many previous discussions.