iberately with the set purpose of
tarring him with the same brush; she would show him how his attempt on
Herr Van de Greutz might also be made to look. He would not be
convinced, of course, but at bottom the two things were so related
that it would be surprising if she did not get a few shafts home. He
would not show the wounds then, but they would be there; they would
rankle; there would be some humiliation for him, too. A curious light
crept into her eyes at the thought; she was surer of being able to
reduce him than of exalting herself, and it is good, when
circumstances prevent one from mounting, to drag a superior to the
level of one's humiliation. For a moment she understood something of
the feelings of the brute mob that throws mud.

By this time she had reached the town, though almost without knowing
it; so deep was she in her thoughts that she did not see Joost coming
towards her. He had been to escort Denah, who had thoughtfully
forgotten to provide herself with a cloak; he was now coming back,
carrying the wrap his mother had lent her.

Julia started when she became aware of him just in front of her. She
was not pleased to see him; she had no room for him in her mind just
then; he seemed incongruous and out of place. She even looked at him a
little suspiciously, as if she were afraid the fermenting thoughts in
her brain might make themselves felt by him.

He turned and walked beside her. "I have been to take home Miss
Denah," he explained. "I saw you a long way off, and thought perhaps I
might escort you; but you are angry; I am sorry."

Julia could not forbear smiling at him. "I am not angry," she said, as
she would to a child; "I was only thinking."

"Of something unpleasant, then, that makes you angry?"

"No; of something that must have been enjoyable. I was thinking how,
in the French Revolution, the women of the people must have enjoyed
throwing mud at the women of the aristocrats; how they must have liked
scratching the paint and the skin from their faces, and tearing their
hair down, and their clothes off."

Joost stared in amazement. "Do you call that not unpleasant?" he said.
"It is the most grievous, the most pitiable thing in all the world."

"For the aristocrats, yes," Julia agreed; "but for the others? Can you
not imagine how they must have revelled in it?"

Joost could not; he could not imagine anything violent or terrible,
and Julia went on to ask him another question, which, however,