"
Mrs. Quentin rose with a sigh. "My child, in my day love was less
subtle." She added, after a moment, "Alan is a perfect son."
"Ah, that again--that makes it worse!"
"Worse?"
"Just as your goodness does, your sweetness, your immense indulgence
in letting me discuss things with you in a way that must seem almost
an impertinence."
Mrs. Quentin's smile was not without irony. "You must remember that
I do it for Alan."
"That's what I love you for!" the girl instantly returned; and again
her tone touched her listener.
"And yet you're sacrificing him--and to an idea!"
"Isn't it to ideas that all the sacrifices that were worth while
have been made?"
"One may sacrifice one's self."
Miss Fenno's color rose. "That's what I'm doing," she said gently.
Mrs. Quentin took her hand. "I believe you are," she answered. "And
it isn't true that I speak only for Alan. Perhaps I did when I
began; but now I want to plead for you too--against yourself." She
paused, and then went on with a deeper note: "I have let you, as you
say, speak your mind to me in terms that some women might have
resented, because I wanted to show you how little, as the years go
on, theories, ideas, abstract conceptions of life, weigh against the
actual, against the particular way in which life presents itself to
us--to women especially. To decide beforehand exactly how one ought
to behave in given circumstances is like deciding that one will
follow a certain direction in crossing an unexplored country.
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