“You can’t work it out,” said Gage, impatiently, “by just having children. It doesn’t end the chapter.” “It’s a difficult time.” “It’s a rotten time. You know I can’t help feeling, Walter, that the women of this generation are potentially all that they claim to be actually. It isn’t that I’d deny them any chance. But to let them be guided by fakirs or by their own inexperience will land them in a worse mess than ever. Look at some of them who have achieved prominence-pictures in the New York Times anyway. Their very pictures show they are neurasthenic. Look at the books written about them that they feed on. Books which won’t allow a single natural normal impulse or fact of sex to go unanalyzed. Books which question every duty. Books which are merely tracts in favor of barrenness. Books written almost always by people who live abnormally. After a diet of that, can any woman live with a man wholesomely--can she keep her mind clear and fine?” Walter shook his head--then laughed. “Well--what are you going to do about it?” “I’m not going to do a damned thing but growl about it, I suppose. As a matter of fact I don’t care what most women do. But when I see the fakirs lay their hands on Helen--Helen, who is about as perfect a woman--” he stopped abruptly, and then went on. “I’m not a very good person to talk to on this woman question. I’m balled up, you see. I only know that the trend is dangerous. They got their inch of political equality. Now they want an ell. They don’t want to be women any longer.” “It’s all interesting,” answered Walter. “Of course, it’s difficult not to think in terms of one’s own experiences. Now I never have seen a woman like Miss Duffield. Of course I haven’t an idea that she’ll have me. But personally I’d be quite willing to trust to her terms if she did. I’ve never seen a woman of more essential honesty.” They were disinclined to talk further. Gage, after a few trivialities, left Walter to his dream, conscious that what he had said had produced no disturbance or real question in the other’s mind. It was easy for one to transcend generalities with the wonderful possibilities of any particular case, Gage knew. He’d done it himself. III Unconsciously as he went toward his home, he was doing it again. He had never lost the magic of going home to his wife. Entering the still hall, where the single lamp cast tiny pools of light through the crystal chandelier, he was pervaded by her presence. Somewhere, awake or asleep, above that stairway, was Helen. The gentle fact of it put him at peace. Her door was closed and he went softly past it to his own room. Then, in a dressing gown, he settled himself in an easy chair by a reading lamp, no book before him, cherishing that mental quiet which surrounded him. Down the hall he heard her door open quietly and her footfall on the soft rug. She had heard him come in and was come to say good night. With a quick motion he turned out the light beside him and waited.