One of Our Conquerors - World eBook Library

One of Our Conquerors
She is? —ah!’
‘She is womanly, womanly.’
‘Quite one of those … ?’
‘My dear soul! You can’t shake them off in that way. She is
one of us. If we have the class, we can’t escape from it. They
are not to bear all the burden because they exist. We are the
bigger debtors. I tell you she is womanly.’
‘It sounds like horrid cynicism.’
‘Friends of mine would abuse it for the reverse.’
‘Do not make me hate your chivalry. This woman is a rod
on my back. Provided only she has not dropped venom into
Nesta’s mind!’
‘Don’t fear!’
‘Can you tell me you think she has done no harm to my
girl?’
‘To Nesta herself?—not any: not to a girl like your girl.’
‘To my girl’s name? Speak at once. But I know she has. She
induced Nesta to go to her house. My girl was insulted in
this woman’s house.’
Dartrey’s forehead ridged with his old fury and a gust of
present contempt. ‘I can tell you this, that the fellow who
would think harm of it, knowing the facts ‘s not worthy of
touching the tips of the fingers of your girl.’
‘She is talked of!’
‘A good-looking girl out riding with a handsome woman
on a parade of idlers!’
‘The woman is notorious.’ Nataly said it shivering.
He shook his head. ‘Not true.’
‘She has an air of a lady?’
‘She sits a horse well.’
‘Would she to any extent deceive me—impose on me here?’
‘No.’
‘Ah!’ Nataly moaned… .
‘But what?’ said Dartrey. ‘There was no pretence. Her style
is not worse than that of some we have seen. There was no
effort to deceive. The woman’s plain for you and me to read,
she has few of the arts; one or two tricks, if you like: and these
were not needed for use. There are women who have them,
and have not been driven or let slip into the wilderness.’
‘Yes; I know!—those ideas of yours!’ Nataly had once admired
him for his knightliness toward the weakest women
and the women underfoot. ‘You have spoken to this woman?
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