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"Has his compensations: Clean conscience—freedom
from worry—fresh air,
all the rest of it! I know. Clean conscience
granted, but so has your Malloring,
it would seem. Freedom from worry
—yes, except when a pair of boots is
wanted, or one of the children is ill; then
he has to make up for lost time with a
vengeance. Fresh air—and wet clothes,
with a good chance of premature rheumatism.
Candidly, which of those two
lives demands more of the virtues on
which human life is founded—courage
and patience, hardihood and self-sacrifice ?
And which of two men who have lived
those two lives well has most right to the
word 'superior'?"
The Freelands 157
" I am going to my clean, warm bed.
Good night, old man !"
When his brother had taken up his
candlestick and gone, Stanley, uttering
a dubious sound, sat down on the lounge,
drank deep out of his tumbler, and once
more took up his Review.
VII
THE next day Stanley's car, fraught
with Felix and a note from Clara, moved
swiftly along the grass-bordered roads
toward Joyfields. Lying back on the
cushioned seat, the warm air flying at his
face, Felix contemplated with delight his
favorite countryside. Certainly this garden
of England was very lovely, its greenness,
trees, and large, pied, lazy cattle;
its very emptiness of human beings was
pleasing.
Nearing Joyfields he noted the Mallorings'
park and their long Georgian
Stanley dropped the Review and for
fully a minute paced the room without
reply. Then he said:
"Felix, you're talking flat revolution."
Felix, who, faintly smiling, had watched
him up and down, up and down the
Turkey carpet, answered:
house, carefully fronting south. There,
"Not so. I am by no means a revolutionary
too, was the pond of what village there
person, because with all the was, with the usual ducks on it; and three
good-will in the world I have been unable well-remembered cottages in a row, neat
to see how upheavals from the bottom, and trim, of the old, thatched sort, but
or violence of any sort, is going to equalize
evidently restored. Out of the door of
these lives or do any good. But I one of them two young people had just
detest humbug, and I believe that so long
as you and your Mallorings go on blindly
emerged, going in the same direction as the
car. Felix passed them and turned to look.
dosing yourselves with humbug about Yes, it was they! He stopped the car.
duty and superiority, so long will you see They were walking, with eyes straight before
things as they are not. And until you see
them, frowning. And Felix thought:
things as they are, purged of all that sickening
cant, you will none of you really
'' Nothing of Tod in either of them; regular
Celts!"
move to make the conditions of life more The girl's vivid, open face, crisp, brown,
and ever more just. For, mark you, untidy hair, cheeks brimful of color, thick
Stanley, I, who do not believe in revolution
from the bottom, the more believe Skye terrier's eyes look out of its shag-
lips, eyes that looked up and out as a
that it is up to us in honor to revolutionize
things from the top !"
Felix as almost frighteningly vital; and
giness—indeed, her whole figure struck
"H'm !" said Stanley; "that's all very she walked as if she despised the ground
well; but the more you give the more she covered. The boy was even more
they want, till there's no end to it." arresting. What a strange, pale-dark
Felix stared round that room, where indeed
face, with its black, uncovered hair, its
one was all body.
straight black brows; what a proud,
"By George," he said, "I've yet to see swan's-eyed, thin-lipped, straight-nosed
a beginning. But, anyway, if you give young devil, marching like a very Highlander;
though still rather run-up, from
in a grudging spirit, or the spirit of a
schoolmaster, what can you expect? If sheer youthfulness! They had come
you offer out of real good-will, so it is abreast of the car by now, and, leaning
taken." And suddenly conscious that he out, he said:
had uttered a constructive phrase, Felix "You don't remember me, I'm afraid !"
cast down his eyes, and added:
The boy shook his head. Wonderful