he time that has elapsed since we had our
last--You're _not_ keeping the pact we made."

"What was that?"

"Why you promised me that your--your--love--No! I won't misuse that
word--Your friendship for me should not spoil your life, your
career, or make Linda unhappy. Yet it is doing all three. You've
lived in a continual agitation since you got into Parliament, and
now you'll be involved in more electioneering in order to be
returned once more. Meantime your science has come to a dead stop.
And it's so far more important for us than getting the Vote. All
this franchise agitation is on a much lower plane. It amuses and
interests me. It keeps me from thinking too much about you.
Besides, I am naturally rather combative; I secretly enjoy these
rough-and-tumbles with constituted authority. I also really _do_
think it is a _beastly_ shame, this preference shown for man, in
most of the careers and in the franchise. But don't you worry
_yourself_ unduly about it. If I really thought that you cared so
much about me that it was turning you away from _our_ religion,
scientific research, I'd go over to Brussels to my mother and stay
there. I really would; and I really will if you don't stop following
me about from meeting to meeting and going mad over the Suffrage
question in the House. Is it true that you struck a Cabinet minister
the other day? Mr. ----?"

_Rossiter_: "Yes, it's true, and he asked for it. If I am
unreasonable what are _they_? ----, ----, _and_ ----? Why have they
such a bitter feeling against your sex? Have they had no mothers, no
sweethearts, no sisters, no wives? If I'd never met you I should
still have been a Suffragist. I think I _was_ one, as a boy,
watching what my mother suffered from my father, and how he collared
all her money--I suppose it was before the Married Woman's Property
Act--and grudged her any for her dress, her little comforts, her
books, or even for proper medical advice. And to hear these Liberal
Cabinet Ministers--_Liberal_, mind you--talk about women, often with
the filthy phrases of the street--Well: he got a smack on the jaw
and decided to treat the incident as a trifling one ... his private
secretary patched it up somehow, but I expressed no regret....

"Well, darling, I'll try to do as you wish. I'll try to shut you out
of my thoughts and return to my experiments, when I'm not on
platforms or in the House. I think I shall get in again--it's a mere
matter of money, and thanks to