o do it, but not Jane.

Jane was inclined, in her present phase, to think the Russians and the
French the only novelists. They had manner and method. But they were both
too limited in their field, too much concerned with sexual relations,
that most tedious of topics (in literature, not life), the very thought
of which made one yawn. Queer thing, how novelists couldn't leave it
alone. It was, surely, like eating and drinking, a natural element in
life, which few avoid; but the most exciting, jolly, interesting,
entertaining things were apart from it. Not that Jane was not quite
willing to accept with approval, as part of the game of living, such
episodes in this field as came her way; but she could not regard them as
important. As to marriage, it was merely dowdy. Domesticity; babies;
servants; the companionship of one man. The sort of thing Clare would go
in for, no doubt. Not for Jane, before whom the world lay, an oyster
asking to be opened.

She saw herself a journalist; a reporter, perhaps: (only the stories
women were sent out on were usually dull), a special correspondent, a
free-lance contributor, a leader writer, eventually an editor.... Then
she could initiate a policy, say what she thought, stand up against the
Potter press.

Or one might be a public speaker, and get into Parliament later on, when
women were admitted. One despised Parliament, but it might be fun.

Not a permanent Civil Servant; one could not work for this ludicrous
government more than temporarily, to tide over the Great Interruption.

7

So Jane looked with calm, weighing, critical eyes at life and its
chances, and saw that they were not bad, for such as her. Unless, of
course, the Allies were beaten.... This contingency seemed often
possible, even probable. Jane's faith in the ultimate winning power of
numbers and wealth was at times shaken, not by the blunders of
governments or the defection of valuable allies, but by the unwavering
optimism of her parent's press.

'But,' said Katherine Varick, 'it's usually right, your papa's press.
That's the queer thing about it. It sounds always wildly wrong, like an
absurd fairy story, and all the sane, intelligent people laugh at it, and
then it turns out to have been right. Look at the way it used to say that
Germany was planning war; it was mostly the stupid people who believed
it, and the intelligent people who didn't; but all the time Germany was.'

'Partly because people like daddy kep