52. [After the marriage of a brilliant man who had flirted with her but never mentioned marriage] she went on the stage, and was immoral in an unhappy sort of way. She met a young artist whose struggles for success aroused her pity and motherly instinct. With the memory of her faithless lover uppermost she plunged into a passionate realization of sex, more to drown her feelings than anything else. She roused the best in this boy, made a man of him, and steadied him. With her sexual tempests there came an after-calm when she forbade any familiarity. This was not studied but an instinct. She hated men, yet they fascinated her, and she them. She studied stenography and worked as private secretary in a theatrical company. She tried to face life with work as her only outlet, but the restlessness of her grief made her crave excitement. She made friends easily, but her sexual appeal made it difficult for her to fit into a commonplace social atmosphere. She married the artist to the girl he loved, after a terrible struggle to make him realize it was not herself he loved. Later he came and thanked her. “The quiet women make the best wives,” he said, “but my wife would not have loved me if you had not made me into a man. She cannot, however, give me what I get from you. I wish I could come to you once in a while?” She said yes, and he came. That was five years ago and that is why she calls herself a prostitute. Her women friends have no idea she is not the quiet, dignified woman she appears to be, and men, many of them married men, want her for their own. She has no use for the man about town; only the man with brains or talent fascinates her at all. She says, “I suppose every one would think me a sinner; I am. I deliberately let a married man stay with me for a time. It is an art. I have learned to know their troubles. They tell me they are unhappy with their wives, wish to go away, are desperate with the monotony of existence. It is generally that they are not sexually mated, or the wife has no sex attraction. Of course she loves him, and he her. I give them what they need. It is weary for the brain to understand men, it is harder on me mentally than physically. I control them only because I have self-restraint. I send them away soon. They are furious; they storm and rage and threaten they will go to some other woman. What do I care? They know it and I send them back to their wives. They will go to her; they would not go to any other woman. That is where I do good. This sex business is a strange thing. I am a missionary prostitute. I only do this once in a while, when I think a man needs me and he is one who will come under my influence. I know I have managed to avert the downfall of several households. If the wives knew? Never mind; they don’t. I am not coarse; I can be a comrade to a man and doubt if I harm him. I make