es of women.

"You'd rather I did than Mike?" Freddy's eyes laughed as he watched
the blush rise to his sister's cheeks. It made her extraordinarily
attractive--indeed, fighting seemed to suit Meg. He pinched her arm;
they were close pals, tried chums. "I know your secret, Meg--I've had
eyes for other things than the tomb!"

"Do you mind, Freddy?" Meg slipped her arm through her brother's; her
eyes shone with happiness.

Freddy pressed her arm close to his side. Meg loved him for it. "If
I'd minded I shouldn't have let things go so far, should I? I could
have packed you off home."

"You've been a darling, Freddy, and I'm so happy! I never knew
anything could be so perfect. I sound silly, don't I?"

"No. Mike's one of the very best, Meg. But you'll have to look after
him a bit." Freddy's voice was graver.

"How do you mean, Freddy?" Meg at once thought of Mrs. Mervill.
Freddy read her thoughts in her voice.

"I don't mean in that way--rather not! He's as straight as a die. I
mean, you'll have to help him to walk on his two legs, Meg--stop him
standing on his head, make him practical."

"I love him for it, Freddy."

"But it doesn't pay. We're of this world and we've got to live in this
world. Mike's always trying to get beyond it, to get into touch with
the other side. It's no good meddling with that sort of thing, it
always has a disastrous effect on the human mind and human happiness,
which proves to me that we're not intended to know or to get in touch
with those who have left us. It's unwise to give up one's thoughts to
the supernatural."

"Perhaps it is," Meg said, "but why should we be contented to stand
still about all that sort of thing, while we leap ahead in science and
material progress and everything else? Mike thinks the true
understanding is coming, the darkness we have lived in is passing away."

"He may be right," Freddy said. "But for your happiness, Meg, I wish
he'd chuck it. The 'sublime truth of spiritualism' he talks about, and
the 'God-ruled world-state'--the one's dangerous to his bodily welfare,
the other's the Utopian dream of failures. I don't want you to marry a
failure, old girl. I want you to have the sort of life you're fitted
for."

"People must be what they are, Freddy, and failure isn't a failure if
it's done its bit. Rome wasn't built in a day, or the union of Italy
achieved without broken hearts--modern Italy had its failures, its
Utopian dreamer