You Never Can Tell

There is no shadow of this on the two persons who are occupying the room just now. One of them, a very pretty woman in miniature, her tiny figure dressed with the daintiest gaiety, is of a later generation, being hardly eighteen yet. This darling little creature clearly does not belong to the room, or even to the country; for her complexion, though very delicate, has been burnt biscuit color by some warmer sun than England’s; and yet there is, for a very subtle observer, a link between them. For she has a glass of water in her hand, and a rapidly clearing cloud of Spartan obstinacy on her tiny firm set mouth and quaintly squared eyebrows. If the least line of conscience could be traced between those eyebrows, an Evangelical might cherish some faint hope of finding her a sheep in wolf’s clothing⁠—for her frock is recklessly pretty⁠—but as the cloud vanishes it leaves her frontal sinus as smoothly free from conviction of sin as a kitten’s.

The Dentist, contemplating her with the self-satisfaction of a successful operator, is a young man of thirty or thereabouts. He does not give the impression of being much of a workman: his professional manner evidently strikes him as being a joke, and is underlain by a thoughtless pleasantry which betrays the young gentleman still unsettled and in search of amusing adventures, behind the newly set up dentist in search of patients. He is not without gravity of demeanor; but the strained nostrils stamp it as the gravity of the humorist.

Valentine

Thank you. He brings the stool from the bench in the corner; places it between them; and sits down with a judicial air. They attend to him with extreme gravity. He addresses himself first to Dolly. Now may I ask, to begin with, have you ever been in an English seaside resort before? She shakes her head slowly and solemnly. He turns to Phil, who shakes his head quickly and expressively. I thought so. Well, Mr. Clandon, our acquaintance has been short; but it has been voluble; and I have gathered enough to convince me that you are neither of you capable of conceiving what life in an English seaside resort is. Believe me, it’s not a question of manners and appearance. In those respects we enjoy a freedom unknown in Madeira. Dolly shakes her head vehemently. Oh, yes, I assure you. Lord de Cresci’s sister bicycles in knickerbockers; and the rector’s wife advocates dress reform and wears hygienic boots. Dolly furtively looks at her own shoe: Valentine catches her in the act, and deftly adds, No, that’s not the sort of boot I mean. Dolly’s shoe vanishes. We don’t bother much about dress and manners in England, because, as a nation we don’t dress well and we’ve no manners. But⁠—and now will you excuse my frankness? They nod. Thank you. Well, in a seaside resort there’s one thing you must have before anybody can afford to be seen going about with you; and that’s a father, alive or dead. He looks at them alternately, with emphasis. They meet his gaze like martyrs. Am I to infer that you have omitted that indispensable part of your social equipment? They confirm him by melancholy nods.

Rising, with all the placidity of her age suddenly broken up; and a curious hard excitement, dignified but dogged, ladylike but implacable⁠—the manner of the Old Guard of the Women’s Rights movement⁠—coming upon her. Phil: take care. Remember what I have always taught you. There are two sorts of family life, Phil; and your experience of human nature only extends, so far, to one of them. Rhetorically. The sort you know is based on mutual respect, on recognition of the right of every member of the household to independence and privacy her emphasis on “privacy” is intense in their personal concerns. And because you have always enjoyed that, it seems such a matter of course to you that you don’t value it. But with biting acrimony there is another sort of family life: a life in which husbands open their wives’ letters, and call on them to account for every farthing of their expenditure and every moment of their time; in which women do the same to their children; in which no room is private and no hour sacred; in which duty, obedience, affection, home, morality and religion are detestable tyrannies, and life is a vulgar round of punishments and lies, coercion and rebellion, jealousy, suspicion, recrimination⁠—Oh! I cannot describe it to you: fortunately for you, you know nothing about it. She sits down, panting. Gloria has listened to her with flashing eyes, sharing all her indignation.

Dolly

Inaccessible to rhetoric. See Twentieth Century Parents, chapter on Liberty, passim.

Mrs. Clandon

Crampton

His eyes shining hardly as he props his drawn, miserable face on his hands. Home! Home!! He drops his arms on the table and bows his head on them, but presently hears someone approaching and hastily sits bolt upright. It is Gloria, who has come up the steps alone, with her sunshade and her book in her hands. He looks defiantly at her, with the brutal obstinacy of his mouth and the wistfulness of his eyes contradicting each other pathetically. She comes to the corner of the garden seat and stands with her back to it, leaning against the end of it, and looking down at him as if wondering at his weakness: too curious about him to be cold, but supremely indifferent to their kinship. Well?

Gloria

I want to speak with you for a moment.

Crampton

Looking steadily at her. Indeed? That’s surprising. You meet your father after eighteen years; and you actually want to speak to him for a moment! That’s touching: isn’t it? He rests his head on his hands, and looks down and away from her, in gloomy reflection.

Gloria

All that is what seems to me so nonsensical, so uncalled for. What do you expect us to feel for you⁠—to do for you? What is it you want? Why are you less civil to us than other people are? You are evidently not very fond of us⁠—why should you be? But surely we can meet without quarrelling.

Crampton

A great deal⁠—by way of illustration. During this whole century, my dear Mrs. Clandon, the progress of artillery has been a duel between the maker of cannons and the maker of armor plates to keep the cannon balls out. You build a ship proof against the best gun known: somebody makes a better gun and sinks your ship. You build a heavier ship, proof against that gun: somebody makes a heavier gun and sinks you again. And so on. Well, the duel of sex is just like that.

Mrs. Clandon

The duel of sex!

Valentine

Yes: you’ve heard of the duel of sex, haven’t you? Oh, I forgot: you’ve been in Madeira: the expression has come up since your time. Need I explain it?

Mrs. Clandon

Contemptuously. No.

Valentine

Of course not. Now what happens in the duel of sex? The old fashioned mother received an old fashioned education to protect her against the wiles of man. Well, you know the result: the old fashioned man got round her. The old fashioned woman resolved to protect her daughter more effectually⁠—to find some armor too strong for the old fashioned man. So she gave her daughter a scientific education⁠—your plan. That was a corker for the old fashioned man: he said it wasn’t fair⁠—unwomanly and all the rest of it. But that didn’t do him any good. So he had to give up his old fashioned plan of attack⁠—you know⁠—going down on his knees and swearing to love, honor and obey, and so on.

Mrs. Clandon

Excuse me: that was what the woman swore.

Valentine