't taught music for three years in the middle-class
families of a small Western city!" She broke off to laugh an
apologetic depreciation of her own heat. "You'd think I was addressing
a meeting," she said in her usual tone. "I got rather carried away
because this is the first time I ever really spoke out about it. There
are so few who could understand. If I ever tried to explain it to
Father and Mother, I'd be sure to find them so deep in a discussion of
the relation between Socrates and Christ that they couldn't pay any
attention! Professor Kennedy could understand--but he's such a fanatic
on the other side."

Morrison looked a quick suspicion. "Who is Professor Kennedy?" he
inquired; and was frankly relieved when Sylvia explained: "He's the
head of the Mathematics Department, about seventy years old, and the
crossest, cantankerousest old misanthrope you ever saw. And thinks
himself immensely clever for being so! He just loathes people--the way
they really are--and he dotes on Mother and Judith because they're not
like anybody else. And he hates me because they couldn't all hypnotize
me into looking through their eyes. He thinks it low of me to realize
that if you're going to live at all, you've got to live _with people_,
and you can't just calmly brush their values on one side. He said
once that any sane person in this world was like a civilized man with
plenty of gold coin, cast away on a desert island with a tribe of
savages who only valued beads and calico, and buttons and junk. And
I said (I knew perfectly well he was hitting at me) that if he was
really cast away and couldn't get to another island, I thought the
civilized man would be an idiot to starve to death, when he could buy
food of the savages by selling them junk. And I thought he just wasted
his breath by swearing at the savages for not knowing about the value
of gold. There I was hitting at _him!_ He's spoiled his digestion,
hating the way people are made. And Professor Kennedy said something
nasty and neat (he's awfully clever) about that being rather a low
occupation for a civilized being--taking advantage of the idiocies
of savages--he meant me, of course--and he's right, it _is_ a mean
business; I hate it. And that's why I've always wanted to get on
another island--not an uninhabited island, like the one Father and
Mother have--but one where--well, _this_ is one!" she waved her
hand about the lovely room, "this _is_ just one! Where everything's
bea