James laid down the law to her concerning the folly of such excursions into the unconventional. Alice listened. She discovered that his viewpoint was exactly like that of Ned Merrill. Any deviation from the conventional was a mistake. Any attempt to escape from existing conditions was a form of treason. Trade, property, business, respectability, good form; these were the shibboleth they worshipped. It was just because she did not want to believe this of James Farnum that she had taken him with her to call on Marchant. It was in a sense a test, and he was answering it by showing himself complacently callous and hidebound.
Surely he had not always been like this, a smug and well-clad Pharisee, afraid to look at the truth. In those early days, when they had been friends, with the possibility of being a good deal more, there had been an impetuous touch of ardor she could no longer find. Her cool glance randown his figure. The man was taking on flesh, the plump well-fed look of one who has escaped moral conduct by giving up the fight. Fat cushioned the square jaw and detracted from its strength. For the first time she observed ahardening of the eye. The visible deterioration of an inner collapse was being writ on him.
Alice sighed. After all she might have spared herself the trouble. He had chosen his path and he must follow it.
At the corner of Powers Avenue and Van Ault Street James left them. It was natural that the talk should revert to Marchant.
"Oscar finds your visits a very great pleasure," Jeff told her.
"The dear madman!" Her eyes were shining softly. "Isn't he brave and optimistic?""Yes."
Both of them were thinking how soon the arm of that unseen God of love and law he worshipped would enfold him.
Alice smiled tenderly, and for the moment the street in front of her danced in a mist. "And his perfect state! Shall we ever realize it?""We must hope so. Perhaps not in the form he sees it, but in the way we work it out through a species of evolution. Think of the progress we have made in the last five years. How many dark corners in the long disused houses of our minds have been flooded with light!""Yes. Why have we made more progress in the past few years?"Jeff's eyes held a gleam of humor. "This is a big country with enormous resources. There used to be room for all the most active plunderers to grab something. But lately the grabbing hasn't been so good. We have discoveredthat the most powerful robbers are doing their snatching from us. So we've suffered a moral awakening.""You don't believe that," she said quickly.
"There's a good deal in the bread and butter interpretation of history. The push of life, its pressure, drives us to think. Out of thought grow new hopes and a broader vision.""And then?"
"Pretty soon the thought will flood the world that we make our ownpoverty, that God and nature have nothing to do with it. After that we'll proceed to eliminate it.""By means of Mr. Marchant's perfect state?""Not by any revolution of an hour probably. Society cannot change its nature in a day. We'll pass gradually from our present state to a better one, the new growing out of the old by generations of progress. But I think we will pass into a form of socialism. It will be necessary to repress the predatory instinct in us that has grown strong under the present system. I don't much care whether you call it democracy or socialism. We must recognize how interdependent we are and work together for the common good."They had come to the car line that would take her home. Up the hill a trolley car was coming.
"May I not see you home?" Jeff dared to ask. "You may."They left the car at Lakeview Park and crossed it to The Brakes. Every step of that walk led Jeff deeper into an excursion of endearment. It was amazingly true that he trod beside her an acknowledged friend, a secret lover. The turn of her head, the shadowy smile bubbling into laughter, the gracious undulations of the body, indeed the whole dear delight of her presence, belonged for that hour to him alone.
