“I dislike him,” replied Margaret.  After a pause she added:  “When a woman makes up her mind to marry a man, willy-nilly, she begins to hate him.  It’s a case of hunter and hunted.  Perhaps, after she’s got him, she may change.  But not till the trap springs—­not till the game’s bagged.”

Lucia shuddered.  “Oh, Rita!” she cried.  And she turned away to bury her face in her arms.

“I suppose I oughtn’t to tell you these things,” pursued Margaret; “I ought to leave you your illusions as long as possible.  But—­ why shouldn’t you know the truth?  Perhaps, if we all faced the truth about things, instead of sheltering ourselves in lies, the world would begin to improve.”

“But I don’t see why you chose him,” persisted Lucia.

“I didn’t.  Fate did the choosing.”

“But why not somebody like—­like Grant Arkwright?  Rita, I’m sure he’s fond of you.”

“So am I,” said Rita.  “But he’s got the idea he would be doing me a favor in marrying me; and when a man gets that notion it’s fatal.  Also—­He doesn’t realize it himself, but I’m not prim enough to suit him.  He imagines he’s liberal—­that’s a common failing among men.  But a woman who is natural shocks them, and they are taken in and pleased by one who poses as more innocent and impossible than any human being not perfectly imbecile could remain in a world that conceals nothing....  I despise Grant—­I like him, but despise him.”

“He is small,” admitted Lucia.

“Small?  He’s infinitesimal.  He’d be mean with his wife about money.  He’d run the house himself.  He should have been a butler.”

“But, at least, he’s a gentleman.”  “Oh, yes,” said Margaret.  “Yes, I suppose so.  I despise him, while, in a way, I respect Craig.”

“He has such a tough-looking skin,” said Lucia.

“I don’t mind that in a man,” replied Margaret.

“His hands are like—­like a coachman’s,” said Lucia.  “Whenever I look at them I think of Thomas.”

“No, they’re more like the parrot’s—­they’re claws. ...That’s why I’m marrying him.”

“Because he has ugly hands?”

“Because they’re ugly in just that way.  They’re the hands of the man who gets things and holds on to things.  I’m taking him because he can get for me what I need.”  Margaret patted her sister on the shoulder.  “Cheer up, Lucia!  I’m lucky, I tell you.  I’m getting, merely at the price of a little lying and a little shuddering, what most people can’t get at any price.”

“But he hasn’t any money,” objected Lucia.

“If he had, no doubt you’d find him quite tolerable.  Even you—­a young innocent.”

“It does make a difference,” admitted Lucia.  “You see, people have to have money or they can’t live like gentlemen and ladies.”

“That’s it,” laughed Margaret.  “What’s a little thing like self-respect beside ease and comfort and luxury?  As grandmother said, a lady who’d put anything before luxury has lost her self-respect.”