"Why," she said, "whenever I hear a woman miaouling about being
misunderstood, I always want to tell her she doesn't know her luck. Wait
till she marries a man who really does understand--too well. Let her see
how she likes it, whenever she turns loose and gets--going a little, to
have him look interested, as if he were taking notes, and begin asking
questions that are--a little too intelligent. How does she think it'll
feel never to know, _never_--I mean that, that she isn't
being--experimented on!"
It was a rather horrible idea, Frederica didn't try to deny it. But not
being understood wasn't very agreeable either. What did they want then?
Eleanor laughed. "Did you ever think," she asked, "that one of these
regular stage husbands would be rather satisfactory? Terribly
particular, you know, and bossy and domineering. The kind that discovers
a letter or a handkerchief or sees you going into some other man's
'rooms' and gets frightfully jealous, and denounces you without giving
you a chance to explain, and drags you round by the hair and threatens
to kill you? And then discovers--in the last act, you know,--that you
were perfectly innocent all the while, and repents all over the place
and begs you to forgive him and take him back; and you do? Do you
suppose any of the men we know would be capable of acting like that?
Don't you think we'd like it if they were? Not if they really did those
things, perhaps, but if we thought they might?"
Frederica was amused, but didn't think there was much to that.
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