The Conflict | Page 5

was marrying you because she had to have food, clothing and shelter?''
``I'd marry the woman I loved. Then--I'd MAKE her love me. She simply couldn't help it.''
Jane Hastings shuddered. ``Thank heaven, I don't have to marry!'' Her eyes flashed. ``But I wouldn't, even if I were poor. I'd rather go to work. Why shouldn't a woman work, anyhow?''
``At what?'' inquired Hull. ``Except the men who do manual labor, there are precious few men who can make a living honestly and self-respectingly. It's fortunate the women can hold aloof and remain pure.''
Jane laughed unpleasantly. ``I'm not so sure that the women who live with men just for shelter are pure,'' said she.
``Jen,'' the young man burst out, ``you're ambitious-- aren't you?''
``Rather,'' replied she.
``And you like the sort of thing I'm trying to do-- like it and approve of it?''
``I believe a man ought to succeed--get to the top.''
``So do I--if he can do it honorably.''
Jane hesitated--dared. ``To be quite frank,'' said she, ``I worship success and I despise failure. Success means strength. Failure means weakness--and I abominate weakness.''
He looked quietly disapproving. ``You don't mean that. You don't understand what you're saying.''
``Perfectly,'' she assured him. ``I'm not a bit good. Education has taken all the namby-pamby nonsense out of me.''
But he was not really hearing; besides, what had women to do with the realities of life? They were made to be the property of men--that was the truth, though he would never have confessed it to any woman. They were made to be possessed. ``And I must possess this woman,'' he thought, his blood running hot. He said:
``Why not help me to make a career? I can do it, Jen, with you to help.''
She had thought of this before--of making a career for herself, of doing the ``something'' her intense energy craved, through a man. The ``something'' must be big if it were to satisfy her; and what that was big could a woman do except through a man? But--this man. Her eyes turned thoughtfully upon him--a look that encouraged him to go on:
``Politics interest you, Jen. I've seen that in the way you listen and in the questions you ask.''
She smiled--but not at the surface. In fact, his political talk had bored her. She knew nothing about the subject, and, so, had been as one listening to an unknown language. But, like all women, having only the narrowest range of interests herself and the things that would enable her to show off to advantage, she was used to being bored by the conversational efforts of men and to concealing her boredom. She had listened patiently and had led the conversation by slow, imperceptible stages round to the interesting personal-- to the struggle for dominion over this difficult male.
``Anyhow,'' he went on, ``no intelligent person could fail to be interested in politics, once he or she appreciated what it meant.
And people of our class owe it to society to take part in politics. Victor Dorn is a crank, but he's right about some things--and he's right in saying that we of the upper class are parasites upon the masses. They earn all the wealth, and we take a large part of it away from them. And it's plain stealing unless we give some service in return. For instance, you and I--what have we done, what are we doing that entitles us to draw so much? Somebody must earn by hard labor all that is produced. We are not earning. So''--he was looking handsome now in his manly earnestness--``Jen, it's up to us to do our share--to stop stealing--isn't it?''
She was genuinely interested. ``I hadn't thought of these things,'' said she.
``Victor Dorn says we ought to go to work like laborers,'' pursued David. ``But that's where he's a crank. The truth is, we ought to give the service of leadership--especially in politics. And I'm going to do it, Jane Hastings!''
For the first time she had an interest in him other than that of conquest. ``Just what are you going to do?'' she asked.
``Not upset everything and tear everything to pieces, as Victor Dorn wants to do,'' replied he. ``But reform the abuses and wrongs--make it so that every one shall have a fair chance--make politics straight and honest.''
This sounded hazy to her. ``And what will you get out of it?'' asked she.
He colored and was a little uneasy as he thus faced a direct demand for his innermost secret--the secret of selfishness he tried to hide even from himself. But there was no evading; if he would interest her he must show her the practical advantages of his proposal. ``If I'm to do any good,'' said he, putting the best face, and really not a bad face, upon a difficult and delicate matter--``if I'm to do any good I must win a commanding