Once, when I first came to the city, I took a place as servant in a
wealthy family. I wanted to stay under cover until my beard grew.
Women used to come there to receptions and to meetings in the
afternoon to talk about reforms they were interested in----Bah! They
work and scheme trying to get at men. They are at it all their lives,
flattering, diverting us, giving us false ideas, pretending to be weak
and uncertain when they are strong and determined. They have no mercy.
They wage war on us trying to make us slaves. They want to take us
captive home to their houses as Caesar took captives home to Rome.
"You look here!" He jumped to his feet again and shook his fingers at
McGregor. "You just try something. You try being open and frank and
square with a woman--any woman--as you would with a man. Let her live
her own life and ask her to let you live yours. You try it. She won't.
She will die first."
He sat down again upon the bench and shook his head back and forth.
"Lord how I wish I could talk!" he said. "I'm making a muddle of this
and I wanted to tell you. Oh, how I wanted to tell you! It's part of
my idea that a man should tell a boy all he knows. We've got to quit
lying to them."
McGregor looked at the ground. He was profoundly and deeply moved and
interested as he had never before been moved by anything but hate.
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