degenerate citizens by starving them, to say nothing of the effect of
disease and bad air, of the constant fear of poverty that haunts the
great majority of homes. There is no reason why that fear should not be
removed, why the latest discoveries in medicine and science should not be
at the disposal of all."

The genuineness of her passion was unmistakable. His whole being
responded to it.

"Have you always felt like this?" he asked. Like what?"

"Indignant--that so many people were suffering."

His question threw her into reflection.

"Why, no," she answered, at length, "I never thought----I see what you
mean. Four or five years ago, when I was going to socialist lectures,
my sense of all this--inequality, injustice was intellectual. I didn't
get indignant over it, as I do now when I think of it."

"And why do you get indignant now?"

"You mean," she asked, "that I have no right to be indignant, since I do
nothing to attempt to better conditions?--"

"Not at all," Hodder disavowed. "Perhaps my question is too personal,
but I didn't intend it to be. I was merely wondering whether any event
or series of events had transformed a mere knowledge of these conditions
into feeling."