United States or Isle of Man ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
And perhaps she was a bit nervous, I don't know, but she got Moadine to come and stay next door to her. Also, she had a sturdy assistant detailed to accompany her in her work. Terry had his own ideas, as I've tried to show. I daresay he thought he had a right to do as he did. Perhaps he even convinced himself that it would be better for her. Anyhow, he hid himself in her bedroom one night...
Somel and Zava and Moadine were on hand; we were thankful to have them, too they seemed almost like relatives. There was a splendid procession, wreathing dances, the new anthem I spoke of, and the whole great place pulsed with feeling the deep awe, the sweet hope, the wondering expectation of a new miracle. "There has been nothing like this in the country since our Motherhood began!"
Terry put in practice his pet conviction that a woman loves to be mastered, and by sheer brute force, in all the pride and passion of his intense masculinity, he tried to master this woman. It did not work. I got a pretty clear account of it later from Ellador, but what we heard at the time was the noise of a tremendous struggle, and Alima calling to Moadine.
They listened closely, with the usual note-taking. "About one-third, then, belong to the poorest class," observed Moadine gravely. "And two-thirds are the ones who are how was it you so beautifully put it? 'loved, honored, kept in the home to care for the children. This inferior one-third have no children, I suppose?"
Jeff said he loved Zava like an aunt "only jollier than any aunt I ever saw"; Somel and I were as chummy as could be the best of friends; but it was funny to watch Terry and Moadine. She was patient with him, and courteous, but it was like the patience and courtesy of some great man, say a skilled, experienced diplomat, with a schoolgirl.
We had been urged to give, as fully as we cared to, a sort of synopsis of world history, in brief, and to answer questions. "We are so utterly ignorant, you see," Moadine had explained to us.
They did not scold or fuss about it. Calm as judges, those women were. But they made notes; Moadine read them to us. "Please tell me if I have the facts correct," she said. "In your country and in others too?" "Yes," we admitted, "in most civilized countries." "In most civilized countries a kind of animal is kept which is no longer useful " "They are a protection," Terry insisted.
"Morbid one-sided cripples," he called them, even when from his window he could see their splendid vigor and beauty; even while Moadine, as patient and friendly as if she had never helped Alima to hold and bind him, sat there in the room, the picture of wisdom and serene strength. "Sexless, epicene, undeveloped neuters!" he went on bitterly. He sounded like Sir Almwroth Wright. Well it was hard.
Moadine was close by and came at once; one or two more strong grave women followed. Terry dashed about like a madman; he would cheerfully have killed them he told me that, himself but he couldn't.
Moadine was a big woman, with a balanced strength that seldom showed. Her eye was as quietly watchful as a fencer's. She maintained a pleasant relation with her charge, but I doubt if many, even in that country, could have done as well. He called her "Maud," amongst ourselves, and said she was "a good old soul, but a little slow"; wherein he was quite wrong.
Word Of The Day