He could scarcely recollect their names.
"But, Gino dear, if they're low class, why did you talk
to them? Don't you care about your position?"
All Gino cared about at present was idleness and
pocket-money, and his way of expressing it was to exclaim,
"Ouf-pouf! How hot it is in here. No air; I sweat all
over. I expire. I must cool myself, or I shall never get
to sleep." In his funny abrupt way he ran out on to the
loggia, where he lay full length on the parapet, and began
to smoke and spit under the silence of the stars.
Lilia gathered somehow from this conversation that
Continental society was not the go-as-you-please thing she
had expected. Indeed she could not see where Continental
society was. Italy is such a delightful place to live in if
you happen to be a man. There one may enjoy that exquisite
luxury of Socialism--that true Socialism which is based not
on equality of income or character, but on the equality of
manners. In the democracy of the caffe or the street the
great question of our life has been solved, and the
brotherhood of man is a reality. But is accomplished at the
expense of the sisterhood of women. Why should you not make
friends with your neighbour at the theatre or in the train,
when you know and he knows that feminine criticism and
feminine insight and feminine prejudice will never come
between you? Though you become as David and Jonathan, you
need never enter his home, nor he yours. All your lives you
will meet under the open air, the only roof-tree of the
South, under which he will spit and swear, and you will drop
your h's, and nobody will think the worse of either.
Pages:
41
42
43
44
45
46
47
48
49
50
51
52
53
54
55
56
57
58
59
60
61
62
63
64
65