"Men--American men, anyhow--are really the funniest things in the world. Even intellectual men are absurd in their patronizing attitude toward the cleverest of women; but when it conies to mere masculine arrogance ... don't you really respect any woman's brains?" "I never denied that some women were clever and all that, but the best of them cannot compare with men. You must admit that." "I admit nothing of the sort, but I know your type too well to waste any time in argument--" "My type?" She longed to reply: "The smaller a man's brain the more enveloping his mere male arrogance. Instinct of self-defense like the turtle's shell or the porcupine's quills or the mephitic weasel's extravasations." But she never quarreled with Morty, and to have shared with him her opinion of his endowments would have been to deprive herself of a good deal of secret amusement. "Oh, you're all alike," she said lightly, and added: "Don't be too sure that Alexina hasn't intellect-the real thing. When she emerges from this beatific dream of youth she has almost hugged to death for fear it might escape her, and begins to think--" "I'll do her thinking." "All right, dear. You have my best wishes. But keep on the job.... I'll clear out; you want to dress--" "Wait a moment." He sat down to draw on his socks. "I'm really cut up over Mrs. Groome's death. She was my only friend in this damn family, and I coveted her money so little that I wish she could have lived on for twenty years." "I wondered how you liked them as time went on." He brought his teeth together and thrust out his jaw. "I hate the whole pack of superior patronizing condescending snobs, and it is all I can do to keep it from Alexina, who thinks her tribe perfection. But, by God!"--he brought down his fist on his knee--"I'll beat them at their own game yet. I simply live to make a million and build a house at Burlingame. They really respect money as much as they think they don't; I've got oil to that. When I'm a rich roan they'll think of me as their equal and forget I was ever anything' else." "Well, don't speculate," said Gora uneasily. "Remember that luck was left out of our family." "My luck changed with that legacy. I am certain of it. I have only to wait until this period of dry rot passes--" "But you're not speculating?" He looked at her with eyes as cold as her own. "I answer questions about my private affairs to no one." "They are my affairs to the extent of half your capital." "You have received your interest regularly, have you not?" "Yes." "Then you have nothing to worry about. I understand business, as well as the man's opportunities, and you do not." "I did not ask out of curiosity, but because I shall be glad when you are doing well enough to let me have my eight thousand--" "What do you want of it? Where could you get more interest?" "Nowhere, possibly. But some day I shall want to take a vacation, a fling. I shall want to go to New York and Europe."