myself back where I started. That's why I've put up the
S.O.S., and am trying to get help." He laid his hand on the book
beside him.

"Are you reading all the highbrows?" she asked.

"Most of 'em," he answered. "In the first place they're all so
amazingly well written that it's a pleasure to read them for that
alone; and, secondly--I'm hoping . . . still hoping. . . ." He took
out his cigarette case and offered it to her. "I feel that it's I who
am wrong--not they--that it's my lack of education that huffs me. I
expect it's those damned rats. . . ."

Joan laughed, and lit a cigarette. "They're all so frightfully clever,
Joan," went on Vane blowing out a cloud of smoke. "They seem to me to
be discussing the world of men and women around them from the pure cold
light of reason. . . . Brain rules them, and they make brain rule
their creations. Instead of stomach--stomach really rules the world,
you know." For a while they sat in silence, watching a dragon-fly
darting like a streak of light over the pond below them.

"I wouldn't bother if I were you," said the girl after a while. "After
all, if one is happy oneself, and tries to make other people happy too,
it's bound to help things along a bit, isn't it? It strikes me that
whatever people write, or say, everything will go on much the same.
Besides--it's so impertinent. You don't want to be reconstructed; nor
does anybody else. So why worry?"

"But, my dear girl," said Vane feebly, "don't you think one
ought. . . ."

"No, I don't," she interrupted. "You listen to me for a bit, my
friend; and you can take it or leave it, just as you like. It strikes
me you're a great deal too occupied about other people, and you don't
pay sufficient attention to yourself. You've got to live your own
life--not the man's next door. And you'll do most good by living that
life, as you want to live it. If you really want to reform other
people--well go and do it, and get a thick ear. . . . It's part of
your job. But if you don't want to, there's no earthly use trying to
pretend you do; you're merely a hypocrite. There's no good telling me
that everybody can be lumped into classes and catered for like so many
machines. We're all sorts and conditions, and I suppose you'd say I
was one of the supremely selfish sort. In fact, you have said so," she
said defiantly.

"All right--we'll leave it at that," she went on before he could speak.
"But I'm happy--and I'm sincer