And when Susan was busy at the mirror, Mabel lounged on a seat near by smoking a before-breakfast cigarette. "I wish to God I had your hair," said she. "I never did have such a wonderful crop of grass on the knoll, and the way it up and drops out in bunches every now and then sets me crazy. It won't be long before I'll be down to Vi's three hairs and a half. You haven't seen her without her wigs? Well, don't, if you happen to be feeling a bit off. How Burlingham can--" There she stopped, blew out a volume of smoke, grinned half amusedly, half in sympathy with the innocence she was protecting--or, rather, was initiating by cautious degrees. "Who was it raised the row last night?" she inquired. "I don't know," said Susan, her face hid by the mass of wavy hair she was brushing forward from roots to ends. "You don't? I guess you've got a kind of idea, though." No answer from the girl. "Well, it doesn't matter. It isn't your fault." Mabel smoked reflectively. "I'm not jealous of _him_--a woman never is. It's the idea of another woman's getting away with her property, whether she wants it or not--_that's_ what sets her mad-spot to humming. No, I don't give a--a cigarette butt--for that greasy bum actor. But I've always got to have somebody." She laughed. "The idea of his thinking _you'd_ have _him_! What peacocks men are!" Susan understood. The fact of this sort of thing was no longer a mystery to her. But the why of the fact--that seemed more amazing than ever. Now that she had discovered that her notion of love being incorporeal was as fanciful as Santa Claus, she could not conceive why it should be at all. As she was bringing round the braids for the new coiffure she had adopted she said to Mabel: "You--love him?" "I?" Mabel laughed immoderately. "You can have him, if you want him." Susan shuddered. "Oh, no," she said. "I suppose he's very nice--and really he's quite a wonderful actor. But I--I don't care for men." Mabel laughed again--curt, bitter. "Wait," she said. Susan shook her head, with youth's positiveness. "What's caring got to do with it?" pursued Mabel, ignoring the headshake. "I've been about quite a bit, and I've yet to see anybody that really cared for anybody else. We care for ourselves. But a man needs a woman, and a woman needs a man. They call it loving. They might as well call eating loving. Ask Burly." CHAPTER XIV