ain--

"I do not know," said I meekly.

"And," she continued, "the power they have; the amazing power they have
to annoy other folk. All kinds of sly impertinences, vulgar evasions,
and sneering misunderstandings. Why should such women be allowed to
take men into their captivity, to sequester, and gag, and restrain them
from those whom they would naturally be eager to meet?

"What," she continued fiercely, "had my hat to do with that woman, or
my frock?"

I nodded slowly and grievously, and repeated--

"What indeed?"

"A hat," said she, "is something to cover one's head from the rain, and
a frock is something to guard one's limbs from inclement weather.--To
that extent I am interested in these things: but they would put a hat
on my mind, and a black cloth on my understanding."

We sat in silence for a little time, while she surveyed the bleak
horizon as an eagle might.

"And when I call at their houses," said she, "their servants say 'Not
at home,' a lie, you know, and they close their doors on me."

She was silent again--

"I do not know what to do," said she.

"Is that," said I, "the reason why you beat your lap with your hand,
and stare abroad like a famished eagle?"

She turned quickly to me--

"What shall I do to open those doors?" said she.

"If I happened to be you," I replied, "I would cut off my hair, I'd buy
a man's clothes and wear them always, I'd call myself Harry or Tom; and
then I'd go wherever I pleased, and meet whoever I wanted to meet?"

She stared fixedly at herself in these garments, and under these
denominations--

"They would know I was not a man," said she gravely.

I looked at her figure--

"No person in the world would ever guess it," said I.

She arose from her seat. She clutched her reticule to her breast--

"I'll do it," said she, and she stalked gauntly across the fields.

THE THREEPENNY-PIECE

When Brien O'Brien died, people said that it did not matter very much,
because he would have died young in any case. He would have been
hanged, or his head would have been split in two halves with a hatchet,
or he would have tumbled down the cliff when he was drunk and been
smashed into jelly. Something like that was due to him, and everybody
likes to see a man get what he deserves to get.

But, as ethical writs cease to run when a man is dead, the neighbours
did not stay away from his wake. They came, and they said many
mitigating things across the body with the b