Jeff sat silent a
while, his eyes upon the field across the flats where the boys were
playing ball. Yet in the end he did begin.

"That necklace, Choate," said he, "is a regular little devil of a
necklace. Do you realise how much mischief it's already done?"

Between Esther's asseverations and Lydia's theories Choate's mind was in
a good deal of a fog. He thought it best to give a perfunctory grunt and
hope Jeff would go on.

"And after all," said Jeff, "as I said, the devilish thing isn't of the
slightest real value in itself. It can, in an indirect way, send a
fellow to prison. It can excite an amount of longing in a woman's mind
colossal enough to make one of the biggest motives possible for any sort
of crime. Because it glitters, simply because it glitters. It can cause
another woman who has done caring for glitter, to depend on it for a
living."

"You mean Madame Beattie," said Alston. "If it's her necklace and she
can sell it, why doesn't she do it? Royal personages don't account for
that."

But Jeff went on with his ruminating.

"Alston," said he, "did it ever occur to you that, with the secrets of
nature laid open before us as they are now--even though the page isn't
even half turned--does it occur to you we needn't be at the mercy of
sex? Any of us, I mean, men and women both. Have we got to get drunk
when it assaults us? Have we got to be the cave man and carry off the
woman? And lie to ourselves throughout? Have we got to say, 'I covet
this woman because she is all beauty'? Can't we keep the lookout up in
the cockloft and let him judge, and if he says, 'That isn't beauty, old
man'--believe him?"

"But sometimes," said Alston, "it is beauty."

He knew what road Jeff was on. Jeff was speaking out his plain thought
and at the same time assuring them both that they needn't, either of
them, be submerged by Esther, because real beauty wasn't in her. If they
ate the fruit of her witchery it would be to their own damnation, and
they would deserve what they got.

"Yes," said Jeff, "sometimes it is real beauty. But even then the thing
that grows out of sex madness is better than the madness itself.
Sometimes I think the only time some fellows feel alive is when they're
in love. That's what's given us such an idea of it. But when I think of
a man and woman planking along together through the dust and mud--good
comrades, you know--that's the best of it."

"Of course," said Alston stiffly, "that's the point.