Part 12 (1/2)

He cla.s.sifies minerals or blasts out a tunnel. Woman creates physiologically; she supplies the essential, the raw material; her n.o.blest product is a child. I get on splendidly with women, because we both realize the stupidity of the average s.e.x-twaddle. We have no illusions about each other. We know exactly what we are after. We know exactly how to attain it. I tell you what, Phipps, Female Emanc.i.p.ation is going to do away with a lot of cant and idealism. Knock the silly male on the head. There'll be an end of your chast.i.ty-wors.h.i.+p, once women are fairly started on the game. They won't put up with it.”

”Disgusting,” said Denis. ”Go on.”

”I'm done. What, sanidin again?”

Denis still held the stone in his hand. He was thinking, however, of other things. He liked to collect fresh ideas, to be impregnated with the mentality of other people--he knew how much he had to learn. But he would have preferred his mind to be moulded gently, in artistic fas.h.i.+on. Marten's style was more like random blows from a sledge-hammer, half of them wide of the mark. It was not very edifying, or even instructive. Keith was the same. Why was everybody so violent, so extreme in their views?

Marten repeated:

”Sanidin?”

”It might be sanidin in places,” replied Denis. ”I do know a little something about crystals, Marten. I have read Ruskin's ETHICS OF THE DUST.”

”Ruskin. Good G.o.d! He's not a man; he's an emetic. But you never answered my first question. You always. .h.i.t upon sanidin. Why?”

”Oh, I don't know. It's rather a pretty word, don't you think? It would do for a Christian name. Girls' names are so terribly commonplace. They are always Marjorie, or something. If I had a daughter, I should call her Sanidin.”

”You're not likely to find yourself in that position at this rate. If I had a daughter, I know perfectly well what I should call her.”

”What?”

”Angelina.”

”You would?” asked Denis slowly. ”And why?”

”Oh, it's rather a pretty name, don't you think?”

”Not a bad name at all, now I come to think of it. But it sounds foreign. I thought you did not care about foreigners.”

”I don't. But there's one--”

”Go on,” said Denis.

Mr. Marten winked.

The mists had fled from the hilltops; rocks and vineyards, and the sea at their foot, lay flooded in suns.h.i.+ne. With one accord, the two young men rose from the ground and turned their steps homewards. The mineralogical lesson was over.

”Coming to Keith's to-night?” enquired Marten with a fine show of nonchalance.

”I don't know.”

”I would if I were you. They say he does things properly. There'll be an awful crowd--a regular bust-up. He only gives one of these entertainments a year. Dancing and Chinese lanterns and champagne in torrents. Won't you go?”

”Perhaps later in the evening.”

Denis was perturbed. He scented a rival in this brutalitarian, though it seemed hardly possible that Angelina should take much notice of him.

Meanwhile, he felt in need of some gentlemanly and soothing influence, after such an outpouring of vulgarity. He thought of the bibliographer.

He liked Eames; he admired that scholarly detachment. He, too, might end in annotating some masterpiece--who knows? To be a bibliographer--what a calm, studious life!

”I think I'll go to Eames,” he remarked.

”Really? A colourless creature, that Eames. As dry as a stick; a typical Don. I promised him a mineralogical map, by the way. You might tell him I haven't forgotten, will you? I wonder what you can see in the man?”