"It sounds cannibalistic," Tallente rejoined. "Have I any cause for alarm?" "Not so far as I am concerned," Susan assured him. "I have really found my man, only he doesn't know it yet. I am trying to get it into his brain by mental suggestion." "You wouldn't think Susan would be so much luckier than I, would you?" Nora observed, studying her friend reflectively. "I am really much better-looking, but I think she must have more taking ways. You needn't be nervous, Mr. Tallente. You are outside the range of our ambitions. I shall have to be content with some one in a humbler walk of life." "Aren't you a little over-modest?" he asked. "You haven't told me much about the social side of this new era which you propose to inaugurate, but I imagine that intellect will be the only aristocracy." "Even then," Norah sighed, "I am lacking in confidence. To tell you the truth, I am not a great believer in my own sex. I don't see us occupying a very prominent place in the politics of the next few decades. The functions of woman were decided for her by nature and a million years of revolt will never alter them." Tallente was a little surprised. "You mean that you don't believe in woman Member of Parliament, doctors and lawyers, and that sort of thing?" "In a general way, certainly not," she replied. "Women doctors for women and children, yes! Lawyers--no! Members of Parliament--certainly not! Women were made for one thing and to do that properly should take all the energy they possess." "You are full of surprises," Tallente declared. "I expected a miracle of complexity and I find you almost primitive." She laughed. "Then considering the sort of man you are, I ought to have gone up a lot in your estimation." "There are a very few higher notches," he assured her, smiling, "than the one where you now sit enthroned." Nora glanced at her wrist watch. "Susan dear, what time do you have to join your friends?" she asked. Susan shook her head. "Nothing doing. I've got my seat. I am going when I've had my dinner comfortably. There's fried chicken coming and no considerations of friendship would induce me to hurry away from it." Nora sighed plaintively. "There is no doubt about it, women do lack the sporting instinct," she lamented. "Now if we'd both been men, and Mr. Tallente a charming woman, I should have just given you a wink, you would have muttered something clumsy about an appointment, shuffled off and finished your dinner elsewhere." "Our sex isn't capable of such sacrifices," Susan declared, leaning back to enable the waiter to fill her glass. "There's the champagne, too." The meal came to a conclusion with scarcely another serious word. Susan departed in due course, and Tallente called for his bill, a short time afterwards, with a feeling of absolute reluctance. "Shall we try and get in at a show somewhere?" he suggested. She shook her head.