They've been tongue-tied and hand-tied so long, they haven't taken in
yet they've got to do their own untying."

"It's a pretty lonely job--and a pretty hard one." I turned from the
window. Kitty's automobile had stopped in front of the house. I was
to go in it to call on Mrs. and Miss Swink. Kitty had insisted that
I use it.

I dressed quickly, putting on my best garments, but as I got into the
car something of the old protest at having to do what I did not want
to do, to go where I did not want to go, came over me, and I was
conscious of childish irritability. I did not care to know the
Swinks. Eternity wouldn't be long enough, and certainly time wasn't
to waste on people like that, and yet because Selwyn had asked me to
call I was doing it. All men are alike. When they don't know how to
do a thing that's got to be done, they tell a woman to do it. It was
not my business to tell this Swink person and her daughter that they
should be careful concerning matrimonial alliances. I would agree
with them that such intimation on my part was presumptuous and I had
no intention of making it. What I was going to do I did not know,
but it was necessary to see them, talk with them before any
suggestions could be made to Selwyn as to a tactful handling of an
embarrassing situation; and in obedience to this primary requisite I
was calling.

In their private parlor at the Melbourne, pompously furnished, and
bare of all things that make a room reflective of personality, Mrs.
Swink and her daughter were awaiting me on my arrival, and the moment
I met the former all the perversity of which I am possessed rose up
within me, and for the latter I was conscious of sympathy, based on