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"If a woman can't keep her head above water in Mrs. Gordon's position, she must be a feeble sort of person." "I should not dare to say that, until I had been put through the mill myself, and come out unpulverised." Miss Du Prel failed to see what there was so very dreadful in Mrs. Gordon's lot. She had, perhaps, rather more children than was necessary, but otherwise
"But they don't; they go and gorge elsewhere. Besides, the question of starvation faces me rather than them." Miss Du Prel was still disposed to find fault with the general scheme of things, which she regarded as responsible for her own woes, great and little. Survival of the fittest! What was that but another name for the torture and massacre of the unfit?
Miss Du Prel said that the book showed, if it showed anything, that one must be true to one's own standard, and not attempt to respect an ideal in practice that one despises in theory.
He seemed to understand all that she had lost in her life, all its disappointments and sacrifices. On hearing that Miss Du Prel was among the Professor's oldest friends, Mrs. Fullerton became suddenly cordial to that lady, and could not show her enough attention. The evenings were often spent in music, Temperley being sometimes of the party.
"Heredity may be a powerful friend, or a bitter enemy, according as we treat her," he said. "Then our sex must have treated her very badly!" cried Miss Du Prel. "Or our sex must have obliged yours to treat her badly, which comes to the same thing," said the Professor. They had agreed to take a walk by the river, towards Ballochcoil.
Temperley purposely misunderstood her to say "imaginary meals," and hoped that next time she came, Hadria would not have an oratorio in course of composition. Miss Du Prel expressed a fiery interest in the oratorio. "I judge the presence of oratorio by the absence of food," Temperley explained suavely. Hadria watched the encounter with a mingled sense of amusement and discomfort.
"It seems to me that they are not so much changing, as disappearing altogether," said Temperley cheerfully, "especially among women. We hear a great deal about rights, but we hear nothing about duties." "We are perhaps, a little tired of hearing about duties," said Miss Du Prel. "You admit then what I say," he returned placidly. "Every woman wants to be Mary, and no one will be Martha."
Miss Du Prel, I find on closer acquaintance, is not without certain jealousies and weaknesses, but these things just seem to float about as gossamer on a mountain-side, and one counts them in relation to herself, in about the same proportion. Mr. Temperley I don't know quite what to say about him.
"I fear you are indeed a still unchastened creature!" "Certainly; there is no encouragement to chasten oneself. People don't stand by the docile members of Society. They commend their saints, but they drink to their sinners." Miss Du Prel smiled. "It is true," she admitted. "A woman must not renounce too much if she desires to retain her influence." "Pas trop de zèle," Hadria quoted.
That perennially aggrieved young person entered almost immediately afterwards and announced a visitor, with an air that implied "She'll stay to lunch; see if she don't, and what'll you do then? Yah!" The pronunciation of the visitor's name was such, that, for the moment, Mrs. Temperley did not recognize it as that of Miss Valeria Du Prel. She jumped up joyfully. "Ah, Valeria, this is delightful!"
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