he beginning to the end of dinner, though he made several remarks that
he thought might prove amusing, she never once laughed. Later, he saw
that she was a woman without laughter; exhilaration, if it ever visited
her, was dumb. Once only, in the course of his subsequent acquaintance
with her, did it find a voice; and then the sound remained in Ransom's
ear as one of the strangest he had heard.

She asked him a great many questions, and made no comment on his
answers, which only served to suggest to her fresh inquiries. Her
shyness had quite left her, it did not come back; she had confidence
enough to wish him to see that she took a great interest in him. Why
should she? he wondered, He couldn't believe he was one of _her_ kind;
he was conscious of much Bohemianism--he drank beer, in New York, in
cellars, knew no ladies, and was familiar with a "variety" actress.
Certainly, as she knew him better, she would disapprove of him, though,
of course, he would never mention the actress, nor even, if necessary,
the beer. Ransom's conception of vice was purely as a series of special
cases, of explicable accidents. Not that he cared; if it were a part of
the Boston character to be inquiring, he would be to the last a
courteous Mississippian. He would tell her about Mississippi as much as
she liked; he didn't care how much he told her that the old ideas in the
South were played out. She would not understand him any the better for
that; she would not know how little his own views could be gathered from
such a limited admission. What her sister imparted to him about her
mania for "reform" had left in his mouth a kind of unpleasant
aftertaste; he felt, at any rate, that if she had the religion of
humanity--Basil Ransom had read Comte, he had read everything--she would
never understand him. He, too, had a private vision of reform, but the
first principle of it was to reform the reformers. As they drew to the
close of a meal which, in spite of all latent incompatibilities, had
gone off brilliantly, she said to him that she should have to leave him
after dinner, unless perhaps he should be inclined to accompany her. She
was going to a small gathering at the house of a friend who had asked a
few people, "interested in new ideas," to meet Mrs. Farrinder.

"Oh, thank you," said Basil Ransom. "Is it a party? I haven't been to a
party since Mississippi seceded."

"No; Miss Birdseye doesn't give parties. She's an ascetic."

"Oh, well, we ha