"Do you flee before the individual
male?" And he turned to Verena.
This young lady gave a laugh that resembled speech in liquid fusion. "Oh
no; I like the individual!"
As an incarnation of a "movement," Ransom thought her more and more
singular, and he wondered how she came to be closeted so soon with his
kinswoman, to whom, only a few hours before, she had been a complete
stranger. These, however, were doubtless the normal proceedings of
women. He begged her to sit down again; he was sure Miss Chancellor
would be sorry to part with her. Verena, looking at her friend, not for
permission, but for sympathy, dropped again into a chair, and Ransom
waited to see Miss Chancellor do the same. She gratified him after a
moment, because she could not refuse without appearing to put a hurt
upon Verena; but it went hard with her, and she was altogether
discomposed. She had never seen any one so free in her own drawing-room
as this loud Southerner, to whom she had so rashly offered a footing; he
extended invitations to her guests under her nose. That Verena should do
as he asked her was a signal sign of the absence of that "home-culture"
(it was so that Miss Chancellor expressed the missing quality) which she
never supposed the girl possessed: fortunately, as it would be supplied
to her in abundance in Charles Street.
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