It may have been Aunt Harriet, it may have been Milt's resolution, but
Mrs. Gilson answered almost meekly, "Well, if you think---- Would you
like to walk, Claire?"
As he tramped off with Claire, Milt demanded, "Glad to escape?"
"Yes, and I'm glad you refused dinner. It really has been wearing, this
trial by food."
"This is the last time I'll dare to meet the Gilsons."
"And I'll have to be going back East. I hope the Gilsons will forgive
me, some day."
"I'm afraid you didn't win them over by Aunt Hatty!"
"No. They're probably off me for life. Oh, these horrible social
complications--worse than any real danger--fire or earthquake----"
"Oh, these complications--they don't exist! We just make 'em, like we
make rules for a card game. What the deuce do we care about the opinions
of people we don't like? And who appointed these people to a fixed
social position? Did the president make Saxton High Cockalorum of
Dress-Suits or something? Why, these are just folks, the same as kings
and coal-heavers. There's no army we've got to fight. There's just you
and me--you and I--and if we stick together, then we have all society,
we are all society!"
"Ye-es, but, Milt dear, I don't want to be an outcast."
"You won't be. In the long run, if you don't take these aristocrats
seriously, they'll be all the more impressed by you."
"No. That sounds cheering, in stories and these optimistic editorials in
the magazines, but it isn't true. And you don't know how pleasant it is
to be In. I've always been more or less on the inside, and thought
outsiders dreadful. But---- Oh, I don't care! I don't care! With
you--I'm happy. That's all I know and all I want to know. I've just
grown up. I've just learned the greatest wisdom--to know when I'm
happy. But, Milt dear---- I say this because I love you. Yes, I do love
you. No, don't kiss me. Yes, it is too---- It's far too public. And I
want to talk seriously. You can't have any idea how strong social
distinctions are. Don't despise them just because you don't know them."
"No. I won't. I'll learn. Probably America will get into the war. I'll
be an engineering officer. I'll learn this social dope from the
college-boy officers. And I'll come to Brooklyn with shoulder-straps and
bells on and---- Will you be waiting?"
"Oh--yes---- But, Milt! If the war comes, you must be very careful not
to get shot!"
"All right, if, you insist. Good Lord, Claire. I don't know what put it
into my head but---- Do you realize that a miracle has happened? We're
no longer Miss Boltwood and a fellow named Daggett. We have been, even
when we've liked each other, up to today. Always there's been a kind of
fence between us. We had to explain and defend ourselves and scrap----
But now we're us, and the rest of the world has disappeared, and----"