.."
"Why should he be so deceitful? Why should he act to me ...?"
"Pretty, pretty, pretty--that is our business. What man hesitates in
the choice? He goes his own way, thinks his own thoughts, does his own
work ...
"His dissection is getting behind--one can see he takes scarcely any
notes...."
For a long time she was silent. Her face became more intent. She began
to bite her thumb, at first slowly, then faster. She broke out at last
into words again.
"The things he might do, the great things he might do. He is able, he
is dogged, he is strong. And then comes a pretty face! Oh God! _Why_
was I made with heart and brain?" She sprang to her feet, with her
hands clenched and her face contorted. But she shed no tears.
Her attitude fell limp in a moment. One hand dropped by her side, the
other rested on a fossil on the mantel-shelf, and she stared down into
the red fire.
"To think of all we might have done! It maddens me!
"To work, and think, and learn. To hope and wait. To despise the
petty arts of womanliness, to trust to the sanity of man....
"To awake like the foolish virgins," she said, "and find the hour of
life is past!"
Her face, her pose, softened into self-pity.
"Futility ...
"It's no good...." Her voice broke.
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