sinister solution. But, now, having by the most
unexpected chance come upon a man, she had found another way to escape
from the world. Such world as was open to her--without shelter, without
bread, without honour. The best she could have found in it would have
been a precarious dole of pity diminishing as her years increased. The
appeal of the abandoned child Flora to the sympathies of the Fynes had
been irresistible. But now she had become a woman, and Mrs Fyne was
presenting an implacable front to a particularly feminine transaction.
I may say triumphantly feminine. It is true that Mrs Fyne did not want
women to be women. Her theory was that they should turn themselves into
unscrupulous sexless nuisances. An offended theorist dwelt in her bosom
somewhere. In what way she expected Flora de Barral to set about saving
herself from a most miserable existence I can't conceive; but I verily
believe that she would have found it easier to forgive the girl an
actual crime; say the rifling of the Bournemouth old lady's desk, for
instance. And then--for Mrs Fyne was very much of a woman herself--her
sense of proprietorship was very strong within her; and though she had
not much use for her brother, yet she did not like to see him annexed by
another woman. By a chit of a girl. And such a girl, too. Nothing is
truer than that, in this world, the luckless have no right to their
opportunities--as if misfortune were a legal disqualification. Fyne's
sentiments (as they naturally would be in a man) had more stability. A
good deal of his sympathy survived. Indeed I heard him murmur "Ghastly
nuisance," but I knew it was of the integrity of his domestic accord
that he was thinking. With my eyes on the dog lying curled up in sleep
in the middle of the porch I suggested in a subdued impersonal tone:
"Yes. Why not let yourself be persuaded?"

I never saw little Fyne less solemn. He hissed through his teeth in
unexpectedly figurative style that it would take a lot to persuade him
to "push under the head of a poor devil of a girl quite sufficiently
plucky"--and snorted. He was still gazing at the distant quarry, and I
think he was affected by that sight. I assured him that I was far from
advising him to do anything so cruel. I am convinced he had always
doubted the soundness of my principles, because he turned on me swiftly
as though he had been on the watch for a lapse from the straight path.

"Then what do you mean? Th