The Two Mr. Smiths - Page 2

met Mr. Smith with _empressement_, fluttered about the tea-tray
like a butterfly, wasted her bonmots and the sugar recklessly, and was
as full of pretty animation as her cousin Bethune was of elegant repose.

"I am glad you are come, Mr. Smith," said Mrs. Bethune. "Alice has been
trying to spur me into a fight. I don't want to throw a lance in. Now
you can be my substitute."

"Mr. Smith," said Alice impetuously, "don't you think that women ought
to have the same rights as men?"

"Really, Miss Alice, I--I don't know. When women have got what they call
their 'rights,' do they expect to keep what they call their 'privileges'
also?"

"Certainly they do. When they have driven the men to emigrate, to scrub
floors, and to jump into the East River, they will still expect the
corner seat, the clean side of the road, the front place, and the pick
of everything."

"Ah, indeed! And when all the public and private business of the
country is in their hands, will they still expect to find time for
five-o'clock teas?"

"Yes, sir. They will conduct the affairs of this regenerated country,
and not neglect either their music or their pets, their dress or their
drawing-room. They will be perfectly able to do the one, and not leave
the other undone."

"Glorious creatures! Then they will accomplish what men have been trying
to do ever since the world began. They will get two days' work out of
one day."

"Of course they will."

"But how?"

"Oh, machines and management. It will be done."

"But your answer is illogical, Miss Alice."

"Of course. Men always take refuge in their logic; and yet, with all
their boasted skill, they have never mastered the useful and elementary
proposition, 'It will be, because it will be.'"

Mr. Smith was very much annoyed at the tone Alice was giving to the
conversation. She was treating him as a joke, and he felt how impossible
it was going to be to get Mrs. Bethune to treat him seriously. Indeed,
before he could restore the usual placid, tender tone of their
_tete-à-tete_ tea, two or three ladies joined the party, and the hour
was up, and the opportunity lost.

However, he was not without consolation: Eleanor's hand had rested a
moment very tenderly in his; he had seen her white cheek flush and her
eyelids droop, and he felt almost sure that he was beloved. And as he
had determined that night to test his fortune, he was not inclined to
let himself be disappointed. Consequently he decided on writing to her,
for he was rather proud of his letters; and, indeed, it must be
confessed