FullReads

She was plain and therefore the coarse young men who don’t know how to appreciate a beautiful soul in an ugly body took no notice of her. But she was wealthy, and she knew that men run after women for the sake of their wealth; whether they do it because all wealth has been created by men and they therefore claim the capital for their sex, or on other grounds, was not quite clear to her. As she was a rich woman, she learned a good many things, and as she distrusted and despised men, she was considered an intellectual young woman.

She had reached the age of twenty. Her mother was still alive, but she had no intention to wait for another five years before she became her own mistress. Therefore she quite suddenly surprised her friends with an announcement of her engagement.

“She is marrying because she wants a husband,” said some.

“She is marrying because she wants a footman and her liberty,” said others.

“How stupid of her to get married,” said the third; “she doesn’t know that she will be even less her own mistress than she is now.”

“Don’t be afraid,” said the fourth, “she’ll hold her own in spite of her marriage.”

What was he like? Who was he? Where had she found him?

He was a young lawyer, rather effeminate in appearance, with broad hips and a shy manner. He was an only son, brought up by his mother and aunt. He had always been very much afraid of girls, and he detested the officers on account of their assurance, and because they were the favourites at all entertainments. That is what he was like.

They were staying at a watering place and met at a dance. He had come late and all the girls’ programmes were full. A laughing, triumphant “No!” was flung into his face wherever he asked for a dance, and a movement of the programme brushed him away as if he were a buzzing fly.

Offended and humiliated he left the ball-room and sat down on the verandah to smoke a cigar. The moon threw her light on the lime-trees in the Park and the perfume of the mignonette rose from the flower beds.

He watched the dancing couples through the windows with the impotent yearning of the cripple; the voluptuous rhythm of the waltz thrilled him through and through.

“All alone and lost in dreams?” said a voice suddenly. “Why aren’t you dancing?”

“Why aren’t you?” he replied, looking up.

“Because I am plain and nobody asked me to,” she answered.

He looked at her. They had known each other for some time, but he had never studied her features. She was exquisitely dressed, and in her eyes lay an expression of infinite pain, the pain of despair and vain revolt against the injustice of nature; he felt a lively sympathy for her.

“I, too, am scorned by everybody,” he said. “All the rights belong to the officers. Whenever it is a question of natural selection, right is on the side of the strong and the beautiful. Look at their shoulders and epaulettes….”

“How can you talk like that!”

“I beg your pardon! To have to play a losing game makes a man bitter! Will you give me a dance?”

“For pity’s sake?”

“Yes! Out of compassion for me!”

He threw away his cigar.

“Have you ever known what it means to be marked by the hand of fate, and rejected? To be always the last?” he began again, passionately.

“I have known all that! But the last do not always remain the last,” she added, emphatically. “There are other qualities, besides beauty, which count.”

“What quality do you appreciate most in a man?”

“Kindness,” she exclaimed, without the slightest hesitation. “For this is a quality very rarely found in a man.”

“Kindness and weakness usually go hand in hand; women admire strength.”

“What sort of women are you talking about? Rude strength has had its day; our civilisation has reached a sufficiently high standard to make us value muscles and rude strength no more highly than a kind heart.”