hich I am myself aware; which, I gratefully acknowledge, has
saved me from one or two misadventures in my life either ridiculous or
lamentable, I am not very certain which. It matters very little. Anyhow
misadventures. Observe that I say 'femininity,' a privilege--not
'feminism,' an attitude. I am not a feminist. It was Fyne who on
certain solemn grounds had adopted that mental attitude; but it was
enough to glance at him sitting on one side, to see that he was purely
masculine to his finger-tips, masculine solidly, densely,
amusingly,--hopelessly.

I did glance at him. You don't get your sagacity recognized by a man's
wife without feeling the propriety and even the need to glance at the man
now and again. So I glanced at him. Very masculine. So much so that
"hopelessly" was not the last word of it. He was helpless. He was bound
and delivered by it. And if by the obscure promptings of my composite
temperament I beheld him with malicious amusement, yet being in fact, by
definition and especially from profound conviction, a man, I could not
help sympathizing with him largely. Seeing him thus disarmed, so
completely captive by the very nature of things I was moved to speak to
him kindly.

"Well. And what do you think of it?"

"I don't know. How's one to tell? But I say that the thing is done now
and there's an end of it," said the masculine creature as bluntly as his
innate solemnity permitted.

Mrs. Fyne moved a little in her chair. I turned to her and remarked
gently that this was a charge, a criticism, which was often made. Some
people always ask: What could he see in her? Others wonder what she
could have seen in him? Expressions of unsuitability.

She said with all the emphasis of her quietly folded arms:

"I know perfectly well what Flora has seen in my brother."

I bowed my head to the gust but pursued my point.

"And then the marriage in most cases turns out no worse than the average,
to say the least of it."

Mrs. Fyne was disappointed by the optimistic turn of my sagacity. She
rested her eyes on my face as though in doubt whether I had enough
femininity in my composition to understand the case.

I waited for her to speak. She seemed to be asking herself; Is it after
all, worth while to talk to that man? You understand how provoking this
was. I looked in my mind for something appallingly stupid to say, with
the object of distressing and teasing Mrs. Fyne. It is humiliating to
c