"You are a true daughter of your sex," he said, smiling. "The keynote of
your life must be sacrifice."

"Perhaps we are not so unwise, after all," she answered, "for I think
that there are more happy women in the world than men."

"There are more, I think, who deserve to be, dear," he answered, holding
her hand for a moment. "Good-bye!"

Mannering walked in somewhat abstracted fashion to the corner of the
street, and signalled for a hansom. With his foot upon the step he
hesitated.




CHAPTER VII

THE DUCHESS'S "AT HOME"


"The perfect man," the Duchess murmured, as she stirred her tea, "does
not exist. I know a dozen perfect women, dear, dull creatures, and plenty
of men who know how to cover up the flaw. But there is something in the
composition of the male sex which keeps them always a little below the
highest pinnacle."

"It is purely a matter of concealment," her friend declared. "Women are
cleverer humbugs than men."