* * *

"Now, will you please explain to me why you look like that, and talk
like that?" said Marcella, with cutting composure, when she was once
more in the library, and Frank, crimson to the roots of his hair, and
saying incoherent things, had followed her there.

"I should think you might guess," said Frank, in reproachful misery, as
he hung over the fire.

"Not at all!" said Marcella; "you are rude to Betty, and disagreeable to
me, by which I suppose that you are unhappy. But why should _you_ be
allowed to show your feelings, when other people don't?"

Frank fairly groaned.

"Well," he said, making efforts at a tragic calm, and looking for his
hat, "you will, none of you, be troubled with me long. I shall go home
to-morrow, and take my ticket for California the day after."

_"You,"_ said Marcella, "go to California! What right have you to go to
California?"

"What right?" Frank stared, then he went on impetuously. "If a girl
torments a man, as Betty has been tormenting me, there is nothing for
it, I should think, but to clear out of the way. I am going to clear out
of the way, whatever anybody says."

"And shoot big game, I suppose--amuse yourself somehow?"

Frank hesitated.

"Well, a fellow can't do nothing," he said helplessly. "I suppose I
shall shoot."

"And what right have you to do it? Have you any more right than a public
official would have to spend public money in neglecting his duties?"

Frank stared at her.

"Well, I don't know what you mean," he said at last, angrily; "give it
up."

"It's quite simple what I mean. You have inherited your father's
property. Your tenants pay you rent, that comes from their labour. Are
you going to make no return for your income, and your house, and your
leisure?"

"Ah! that's your Socialism!" cried the young fellow, roused by her tone.
"No return? Why, they have the land."

"If I were a thorough-going Socialist," said Marcella, steadily, "I
should say to you, Go! The sooner you throw off all ties to your
property, the sooner you prove to the world that you and your class are
mere useless parasites, the sooner we shall be rid of you. But
unfortunately _I_ am not such a good Socialist as that. I waver--I am
not sure of what I wish. But one thing I _am_ sure of, that unless
people like you are going to treat their lives as a profession, to take
their calling seriously, there are no more superfluous drones, no more
idle plunderers than y