第298章

"But why lean if I'm strong enough to stand alone? Why weaken myself just to gratify your mania for owning and bossing? But let me finish what I was saying.I never got any quarter because I was a woman.No woman does, as a matter of fact;and in the end, the more she uses her sex to help her shirk, the worse her punishment is.But in my case----"I was brought up to play the weak female, to use my sex as my shield.And that was taken from me and--I needn't tell _you_how I was taught to give and take like a man--no, not like a man--for no man ever has to endure what a woman goes through if she is thrown on the world.Still, I'm not whining.Now that it's all over I'm the better for what I've been through.

I've learned to use all a man's weapons and in addition I've got a woman's.""As long as your looks last," sneered he.

"That will be longer than yours," said she pleasantly, "if you keep on with the automobiles and the champagne.And when my looks are gone, my woman's weapons...

"Why, I'll still have the man's weapons left--shan't I?--knowledge, and the ability to use it."His expression of impotent fury mingled with compelled admiration and respect made his face about as unpleasant to look at as she had ever seen it.But she liked to look.His confession of her strength made her feel stronger.The sense of strength was a new sensation with her--new and delicious.

Nor could the feeling that she was being somewhat cruel restrain her from enjoying it.

"I have never asked quarter," she went on."I never shall.

If fate gets me down, as it has many a time, why I'll he able to take my medicine without weeping or whining.I've never asked pity.I've never asked charity.That's why I'm here, Freddie--in this apartment, instead of in a filthy tenement attic--and in these clothes instead of in rags--and with you respecting me, instead of kicking me toward the gutter.Isn't that so?"He was silent.

"Isn't it so?" she insisted.

"Yes," he admitted.And his handsome eyes looked the love so near to hate that fills a strong man for a strong woman when they clash and he cannot conquer."No wonder I'm a fool about you," he muttered.

"I don't purpose that any man or woman shall use me," she went on, "in exchange for merely a few flatteries.I insist that if they use me, they must let me use them.I shan't be mean about it, but I shan't be altogether a fool, either.And what is a woman but a fool when she lets men use her for nothing but being called sweet and loving and womanly? Unless that's the best she can do, poor thing!""You needn't sneer at respectable women."

"I don't," replied she."I've no sneers for anybody.I've discovered a great truth, Freddie the deep-down equality of all human beings--all of them birds in the same wind and battling with it each as best he can.As for myself--with money, with a career that interests me, with position that'll give me any acquaintances and friends that are congenial, Idon't care what is said of me."

As her plan unfolded itself fully to his understanding, which needed only a hint to enable it to grasp all, he forgot his rage for a moment in his interest and admiration.Said he:

"You've used me.Now you're going to use Brent--eh?

Well--what will you give _him_ in exchange?"

"He wants someone to act certain parts in certain plays.""Is that _all_ he wants?"

"He hasn't asked anything else."

"And if he did?"

"Don't be absurd.You know Brent."