“Do you know that you really shock me?”

“It’s better to appreciate the way things are.”

“It isn’t the way things are among decent normal human beings.”

She shrugged her shoulders.  “Oh, I imagine it is,” she said, “only they’re not honest enough to admit it.”

He continued to stare at her and, strangely enough, she had never seemed to him more beautiful.

“And do you mean to tell me,” he said, “that people who have the standards that you describe will attach the slightest importance to an innocent little adventure like this of ours?”

“Of course.  They are the very people who will.”

“Nonsense.”

“Yes, because they make a point of always believing the worst, or at least of pretending to.”

“Why pretend?”

“Because it makes conversation so much more amusing.  Sometimes,” she added thoughtfully, “I have a terrible suspicion that there really isn’t an atom of harm in any of them—­that they all behave perfectly well, and just excite themselves by talking as if they didn’t.”

“And you call that suspicion terrible?”

“Well, it makes it all seem a little flat.  But then sometimes,” she went on brightly, “one does find out something absolutely hideous.”

“See here,” he said, “it’s a crime for a girl of your age to talk like this.  It’s a silly habit.  I don’t believe you’re like that at heart.”

“You talk,” said she, “like Edward Hickson.”

“In some communities that would be thought a fighting word,” he returned.  “But you haven’t yet answered my question.  You’ve told me what your friends have done; but what would you do yourself, if you fell in love with a poor man?”

“In the first place, I never should.  What makes a man attractive to me is power, preeminence, being bowed down to.  If I lived in a military country, I’d love the greatest soldier; and if I lived in a savage country, I’d love the strongest warrior; but here to-day, the only form of power I see is money.  It’s what makes you able to have everything you want, and that’s a man’s greatest charm.”

“And it seems to me that the most tied-down creatures I ever saw are the rich men I’ve met in the East.”

She was honestly surprised.  “Why, what is there they can’t do?” she asked.

He smiled.  “They can’t do anything that might endanger their property rights,” he answered, “and that seems to me to cut them off from most forms of human endeavor.  But no matter about that.  You say you would not be likely to fall in love with a poor man, but suppose you did.  Perhaps it has happened already?”

Miss Fenimer looked thoughtful.  “I was trying to think,” she said.  “Yes, there was a young artist two years ago that I was rather interested in.  He was very nice looking, and Nancy Almar kept telling me how much he was in love with her.”

“And that stimulated your interest?”