It was a soft yet cool spring night. The little frogs in mountain rain pools kept up a croaking like rusty wheels; the pungent smells of earth and leaf mould came through the window. Fire burned quietly and soft lamplight fell on books and rugs and flickered over the cast of the Winged Victory, over the dingy chimneypiece. Watts' eyes, through the smoke of his pipe, went to this. "Nice girl," he grunted in approval, "nice girl--afraid of nothing--ready for anything, yet somehow all woman, true to type but not crystallized by type." The man, rising, walked up and down the rather bare room where one or two fine rugs caught the warm fire colors. "I can say this for the Greeks, they, themselves, fastened nothing upon civilization but healthy ideals for men and women; harvest making, home keeping, child bearing, strong bodies, imaginative minds, it wasn't until their æsthetics and the Roman plutocrats got hold of all they gave the world that their philosophies were debased." The lawyer's eyes, sombre in strength and depth, looked fixedly at the gracious woman figure; he compared it with the figures on Fifth Avenue, tripping in affected coquettishness or striding in callous mannishness. "Not clever of you, ladies, to find no middle path," he considered. "Who made you as you are to-day, Paris--the war? That's what you and the newspapers and magazines say, but come now, didn't you make yourselves? You wanted to be 'popular,' you want to be 'in' things, behold the result." Watts' mouth curled with slow mockery on his pipe. "The Winged Victory didn't want to be popular," he decided. "She didn't want to be in things. "She wanted to live. Who fastened the modern woman on us, anyway?" Watts demanded sternly of his dog. "Why have we got to stand for her?" The silken-haired, electric-muscled beast came over to him softly. Friar Tuck, with tail tossing, laid a devoted head on the brown golf-trousered knee. Watts tousled the long ears. "Always the henchman, aren't you, you old brute--why do you play that game?" The lawyer looked long and questioningly into his dog's eyes. "Why don't you get up and give me an order; how do you know I'm superior to you? You are probably equal to me." He considered the bowl of his pipe then rubbed it on Friar Tuck's head. "Just as I suppose, if men only knew it, they could be equal to Christ and the angels. Say, look here." Watts lifted the dog by his forefeet. He put the two forepaws against his breast. "How do you know I'm superior to you? Why do you play this game--do you just want to be 'popular' with me?" * * * * *