Under the Skylights | Page 6

liberal and fluent
praise of The Rod of the Oppressor,--aside from his deep-seated
indignation he had not yet mastered any of those serviceable phrases by
means of which such a volley may be returned; but he found words
when she presently set foot in the roomy field of the betterment of local
conditions. What she had in mind, it appeared, was a training-school--it
might be called the Pence Institute if it went through--and she was

ready to listen to any one who was likely to encourage her with hints or
advice.
"So much energy, so much talent going to waste, so many young
people tumbling up anyhow and presently tumbling over--all for lack of
thorough and systematic training," she said, across her own broad
bosom.
"I know of but one training that is needed," said Abner massively: "the
training of the sense of social justice--such training of the public
conscience as will insist upon seeing that each and every freeman gets
an even chance."
"An even chance?" repeated Eudoxia, rather dashed. "What I think of
offering is an even start. Doesn't it come to much the same thing?"
But Abner would none of it. Possessed of the fatalistic belief in the
efficacy of mere legislation such as dominates the rural townships of
the West, he grasped his companion firmly by the arm, set his sturdy
legs in rapid motion, walked her from assembly hall to assembly hall
through this State, that and the other, and finally fetched up with her
under the dome of the national Capitol. Senators and representatives
co-operated here, there and everywhere, the chosen spokesmen of the
sovereign people; Abner seemed almost to have enrolled himself
among them. Confronted with this august company, whose work it was
to set things right, Eudoxia Pence felt smaller than ever. What were her
imponderable emanations of goodwill and good intention when
compared with the robust masculinity that was marching in firm
phalanxes over solid ground toward the mastery of the great Problem?
She drooped visibly. Little O'Grady, studying her pose and expression
from afar, wrung his hands. "That fellow will drive her away. Ten to
one we shall never see her profile here again!" Yes, Eudoxia was
feeling, with a sudden faintness, that the Better Things might after all
be beyond her reach. She looked about for herself without finding
herself: she had dwindled away to nothingness.

VI
"Do you take her money--such money?" Abner asked of Giles with
severity. Eudoxia had returned to Medora and the samovar.
"Such money?" returned Giles. "Is it different from other money? What
do you mean?"
"Isn't her husband the head of some trust or other?"
"Why, yes, I believe so: the Feather-bed Trust, or the Air-and-Sunlight
Trust--something of that sort; I've never looked into it closely."
"Yet you accept what it offers you."
"And give a good return for it. Yes, she had paid me already for my
sketches--a prompt and business-like way of doing things that I should
be glad to encounter oftener."
Abner shook his head sadly. "I thought we might come to be real
friends."
"And I hope so yet. Anyway, it takes a little money to keep the tea-pot
boiling."
Abner drifted back to the shelter of his canopy and darkly accused
himself for his acceptance of such hospitality. He ought to go, to go at
once, and never to come back. But before he found out how to go,
Clytie Summers came along and hemmed him in.
Clytie was not at all afraid of big men; she had already found them
easier to manage than little ones. Indeed she had pretty nearly come to
the conclusion that a lively young girl with a trim figure and a bright,
confident manner and a fetching mop of sunlit hair and a pair of wide,
forthputting, blue eyes was predestined to have her own way with about
everybody alike. But Clytie had never met an Abner Joyce.
And as soon as Clytie entered upon the particulars of her last slumming
trip through the river wards she began to discover the difference. She

chanced to mention incidentally certain low-grade places of
amusement.
"What!" cried Abner; "you go to theatres--and such theatres?"
"Surely I do!" cried Clytie in turn, no less disconcerted than Abner
himself. "Surely I go to theatres; don't you?"
"Never," replied Abner firmly. "I have other uses for my money." His
rules of conduct marshalled themselves in a stiff row before him;
forlorn Flatfield came into view. Neither his principles nor his practice
of making monthly remittances to the farm permitted such excesses.
"Why, it doesn't cost anything," rejoined Clytie. "There's no admission
charge. All you have to do is to buy a drink now and then."
"Buy a drink?"
"Beer--that will do. You can stay as long as you want to on