wrangling?" drawled Ethel.

"She didn't understand."

"You?" asked Ethel, in surprise.

"My thoughts! My actions!"

"How curious."

"You mean you would?"

"Probably."

"I'm sure of it." He tried to take her hand. She drew it away, and
settled herself comfortably to listen again:

"Tell me more about your wife."

"The slightest attention shown to any other woman meant a ridiculous--a
humiliating scene."

"Humiliating?"

"Isn't doubt and suspicion humiliating?"

"It would be a compliment in some cases."

"How?"

"It would put a fictitious value on some men."

"You couldn't humiliate in that way," he ventured, slowly.

"No. I don't think I could. If a man showed a preference for any other
woman she would be quite welcome to him."

"No man could!" said Brent, insinuatingly.

She looked at him coldly a moment.

"Let me see--where were you? Just married, weren't you? Go on."

"Then came the baby!" He said that with a significant meaning and
paused to see the effect on Ethel. If it had any, Ethel effectually
concealed it. Her only comment was:

"Ah!"

Brent went on:

"One would think THAT would change things. But no. Neither of us wanted
her. Neither of us love her. Children should come of love--not hate.
And she is a child of hate." He paused, looking intently at Ethel. She
looked understandingly at him, then dropped her eyes.

Brent went on as if following up an advantage: "She sits in her little
chair, her small, wrinkled, old disillusioned face turned to us, with
the eyes watching us accusingly. She submits to caresses as though they
were distasteful: as if she knew they were lies. At times she pushes
the nearing face away with her little baby fingers." He stopped,
watching her eagerly. Her eyes were down.

"I shouldn't tell you this. It's terrible. I see it in your face. What
are you thinking?"

"I'm sorry," replied Ethel simply.

"For me?"

"For your wife."

"MY WIFE?" he repeated, aghast.

"Yes," said Ethel. "Aren't you? No? Are you just sorry for yourself?"

Brent turned impatiently away. So this laying-open the wound in his
life was nothing to Ethel. Instead of pity for him all it engendered in
her was sorrow for his wife.

How little women understood him.

There was a pathetic catch in his voice as he turned to Ethel and said
reproachfully:

"You think me purely selfish?"

"Naturally," she answered quickly. "_I_ AM. Why, not be truthful about
ourselves sometimes? Eh?