"Have you made up your mind fully to go in for public life, Nell?" I
asked mildly. "Some of your friends might not like it very much
and--and--"
"If you mean Polk Hayes, Evelina," Nell answered with the positiveness
that only a very young person can get up the courage to use, "I have
forgot that I was ever influenced by his narrow-minded, primitive
personality at all. If I ever love and marry it will be a man who can
appreciate and further my real woman's destiny."
"Well, then, that's all right," I answered with such relief in my heart
that it must have showed in my voice and face. I had worried about Nell
since I could see plainly, though she hasn't told me yet, and I am sure
he doesn't realize it, that Jane had decided Folk's destiny. Nell is not
twenty-one yet and she will find lots of men in the world that will be
fully capable of making her believe they feel that way about her
destiny, until they succeed in tying her up to using it for the real
utilitarian purposes they are sure such a pretty woman is created for.
It will take men in general another hundred years yet, and lots of
suffering, to realize that a woman's destiny is anything but himself,
and get to housekeeping with her on that basis.
Of course, I see the justice and need of perfect equality in all things
between the sexes, emotional equality especially, but I hope the time
will never come when men get as hungry to see their women folks as said
feminists get to see them, after they have been away about four days out
in the Harpeth Valley.
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