“Of course I can’t refuse to let you have any friend of yours here at the house. Only if she comes, I do wish you’d excuse me as much as possible. I do not want to be rude and I certainly shall be if she involves me in these feminist arguments.” “I don’t believe Margaret would argue with you, Gage.” She said it lightly, her insinuation that he was beyond the pale of argument flicking him with a little sting. “Possibly not. However, I should not care to waste her time. And as I said to you to-night I don’t like her effect on you.” “I am not particularly under her influence, Gage. I have my own ideas. What you probably mean is that you object to my doing the things which are interesting women all over the world.” “When have I ever objected to anything you’ve done?” “I’ve done nothing, have I? Been secretary to a few small town clubs. Kept house. Tended my babies. That’s all I’ve done except play the piano.” “Did that dissatisfy you as much as your tone implies?” “It’s not enough to satisfy women now.” He shrugged. “Well--do anything you please, my dear. I certainly won’t stop you if you run for office.” She was very cold. “You’re sneering at me, Gage.” He tossed away his cigarette and came up to her where she stood, still muffled in the cloak she had worn. She was fast in his embrace and it gave her the moment of relief she had sought. She closed her eyes and lay relaxed against his shoulder. And then came the creeping little fear. He had managed her like that. He couldn’t respect her. “Darling Helen--” Her thought spoke. “Margaret would never have let herself go off the point like this--” “Oh, damn Margaret!” said Gage, letting her go, angrily. Helen looked at him in disgust and went upstairs. * * * * * It wasn’t, thought Gage, pacing up and down the living room, as if he were a reactionary. Helen knew that. He had no objection to women doing anything. He’d said so. He’d shown it. He’d put women on his local Republican committee. And sized them up pretty well too, he told himself. They worked well enough on certain things. Some of them had good minds. But the issue with him and Helen had nothing to do with granting women a concession here and there. That was all right. The trouble was with this woman, these women who made Helen so restless, so unsettled for no particular reason, with no particular object. He hated, as he had said, the self-consciousness of it all. He hated this self-conscious talk, this delving into emotions, this analysis of psychical states and actions, this setting of sex against sex. It ate into emotions. It had made women like that Margaret. He measured his dislike of her, bitterly. Even on their wedding trip she had interfered. He remembered the first flagging in Helen’s abandonment to her love for him. That letter from Margaret, outwardly kind, he felt, outwardly all right, but suggesting things had brought it about. Helen had shown it to him.