ing comes which shall
expose them. Even now the kind of man who catches at every straw of
opinion which shall secure to him his sacred carnal rights, at no
matter what cost of degradation and disease to women, is out of date,
and we pay no attention to him."

"Oh, women!" Dan jeered. "That is all very fine! But who the devil
cares what women think?"

"Now don't be old-fashioned, Dan," Beth answered, laughing. "When
women only did what they were told, men used to vow at their feet that
there was nothing they couldn't accomplish, their influence was so
great. But now that women have proved that what they choose to do they
can do, men sneer at their pretensions to power, and try to depreciate
them by comparing the average woman with men in the front rank of
their professions. Really, men are disheartening."

The evening calm had deepened about them, a big bright star was
shining above the belt of trees, and waves of perfume from the flowers
made the air a delight to inhale.

"What a heavenly night!" Beth pursued. "Who would live in London when
they might be here?"

"Well, that's consistent!" he exclaimed, "after entreating me to leave
the place!"

"This is not the only peaceful spot in the world," she said with a
little sigh; "and I would rather live in London even than have you
here in an invidious position. Dan, give it up, there's a good fellow!
and learn to look on life from this newer, wider point of view. You
will find interests and pleasures in it you have never even suspected,
I assure you, and you will never regret it."

"For the life of me," he said again, throwing the end of his cigar
into the bushes with an irritated jerk of his arm,--"for the life of
me, I cannot see what you have to complain of; and I shall certainly
not give up any bird in the hand for two such birds in the bush as you
promise me." He rose as he spoke, and shook out first one leg and
then the other to straighten his trousers. "I'm going out," he added.
"I've a patient to see. Ta! ta! Take care of yourself."

* * * * *

Some little time after Beth's return, they were sitting at lunch
together, and Maclure was reading a daily paper.

"Matters look bad for that fellow, Cayley Pounce," he observed.

"Why, what has he been doing?" Beth asked.

"Poking a fellow's eye out with his umbrella," Dan answered. "He was
talking to a girl in the street one night, and got into a row with
some roughs, and jabbed