he foil that time, because the thrust brought
blood--a bright flush into her cheeks and a sudden brightness into her
eyes that would have induced him to relent if she hadn't followed the
thing up of her own accord.

"I wish you'd tell me something," she said. "I expect you know better
than any one else I could ask. Why is it that husbands and wives can't
talk to each other? With people who live the way we do, it isn't that
they've worn each other out, because they see no more of each other,
hardly, than they do of the others. And it isn't that they're naturally
more uninteresting to each other than the rest of the people they know.
Because then, why did they marry each other in the first place, instead
of any one of the others who are so easy to talk to afterward? Imagine
what this table would be if the husbands and wives sat side by side!
Would Eleanor ever be able to turn it so that they talked that way?"

"That's a fascinating speculation," he said. "I wish I could persuade
her some time to indulge the wild eccentricity of trying it out."

"Well, why?" she demanded.

"Shall I try to say something witty," he asked, "or do you want it, as
near as may be, absolutely straight?"

"Let's indulge," she said, "in the wild, eccentricity of talking
straight."

The cigarettes came around just then, and he lighted one rather
deliberately, at one of the candles, before he answered.

"I am under the impression," he said, "that husbands and wives can talk
exactly as well as any other two people. Exactly as well, and no better.
The necessary conditions for real conversation are a real interest in
and knowledge of a common subject; ability on the part of both to
contribute something to that subject. Well, if a husband and wife can
meet those terms, they can talk. But the joker is, as our legislative
friend over there would say," (he nodded down the table toward a young
millionaire of altruistic principles, who had got elected to the state
assembly) "the joker is that a man and a woman who aren't married, and
who are moderately attracted to each other, can talk, or seem to talk,
without meeting those conditions."

"Seem to talk?" she questioned.

"Seem to exchange ideas mutually. They think they do, but they don't.
It's pure illusion, that's the answer."

"I'm not clever, really," said Rose, "and I don't know much, and I
simply don't understand. Will you explain it, in short words,"--she
smiled--"since we're not married, y