Achmed Abdullah

“ They think—poor dears—that it is a great secret of the male, and once in a while, when they need help—as your father did and my brothers—they confide in a woman—a clever, broad-minded woman like myself, who, of course, knew all about it before they had a chance to open their mouths—since I have used the corresponding system myself, against the male! Listen, dear—” She spoke slowly, with a certain academic unction. “The young man—Cornelius de Graaf, for instance—meets a young girl. A young girl, let us say, from Brooklyn, or Flatbush, or Flushing, or the Bronx. ”

“ Well—her father is a mason, or a bricklayer, or an express driver, or ... what do I know? At all events, he belongs to the class of society which your dear father calls the people with muscles and no foreheads. And then—”
“And then?” echoed Priscilla, who was curious in spite of herself.
“One fine romantic, sentimental, soft spring evening, when Cornelius’ little steel-grey roadster pulls up in back of the gas tower—in the Bronx, or Flatbush, or Brooklyn—instead of the girl, out comes a gentleman with a beard and a hairy cap and a corncob pipe and a wretched accent and a glitter in his eyes. ”

“ Cornelius is a gentleman, I trust. He does nothing wrong. He belongs to the new generation—he prefers feeling noble to enjoying himself. But he—what is the slang term—yes!—he fell for the Stolen Apples system, unaware of the fact that the girl is clever—more clever than girls of his own class, like yourself, for instance—and that she is familiar with the same system. ”

“ But—suddenly her thoughts whirled—why, she herself had always treated all human emotions like drab questions in the Rule-of-Three, had always made a point of dissecting the heart and the soul, of trying to find out what made men and women tick. ”

“ He knows all about the wave of conscientious sentimentality which has swept over the rich —he talks sentiment, duty, nobility—and so Cornelius has the choice—”
“What choice?” impatiently from Priscilla.
“The choice between paying the three thousand dollars which he offers—and the ten thousand dollars which the paternal bricklayer demands. Maisie’s people do not want her to marry Cornelius. They would think it a mésalliance. They belong to the Union and look down upon a man like him. They want their daughter to marry the red-haired Irish grocer around the corner. ”

“ The only difference is that you girls are becoming more foolish every year. We, thirty years ago, used to suffer from wind and Ouida and moral antimacassars and ethical ormolu. While you of the new generation—with your ideas about the psychology of love and marriage and eugenics and economic independence and feminism and half a dozen other fads—why! ”

“ I’d rather go away and work in a factory—or nurse—or—something. I have my own principles about life and men and women. I do not believe in treating marriage like a game, which you play with a line and a hook and bait ... ”

“ You must give him a chance to feel wicked, and as soon as he feels wicked you must give him another chance—a chance to show his nobler nature—so that he can make up for his wickedness—by proposing marriage! ”

“ They were rich. But not very rich. Say: thirty thousand dollars a year without work and without worry, a little red brick and white woodwork house on Eleventh Street, a few doors from Fifth Avenue, a place in Westchester County at exactly the correct distance between Suburbia and Yokeldom, four servants, including a French—not an English—butler, an electric landaulette without a nickel clamp to hold paper orchids, and a three thousand dollar automobile that usually lasted into the third season. ”

“ I don’t know what to say, Julia dear. Our income is paid us out of a trust fund. Thirty thousand dollars a year—neither more nor less. There is no elasticity, no margin, no stretching either way. I am afraid we'll have to do without the sleeping porch and the lot of Havana imports and the Chantilly lace and. ”