it would be different, of course; but, as it is, Ideala is simply
sacrificing herself for nothing--and worse, she is setting a bad
example by showing men they need not mend their manners since wives
will endure anything. It is immoral for a woman to live with such a
husband. I don't understand Ideala's meekness; it amounts to weakness
sometimes, I think. I believe if he struck her she would say, 'Thank
you,' and fetch him his slippers. I feel sure she thinks some unknown
defect in herself is at the bottom of all his misdeeds."

"I don't think she knows half as much about his misdeeds as we do," I
observed.

"Then I think it would be a charity to enlighten her," Claudia
answered, decidedly. "One can't touch pitch without being defiled, and
when it is too late we shall find she has suffered 'some taint in
nature,' in spite of herself. Will you kindly take us to the Palace
this evening? The Bishop wants us to go in after dinner, and Ideala has
promised to come too."

Ideala was fastidious about her dress, and being in one of her moods
that evening she teased Claudia unmercifully, on the way to the Palace,
about a blue woollen shawl she was wearing. "A delicate and refined
nature expresses itself by nothing more certainly than elegant wraps,"
she said, parodying another famous dictum; "and I should not like to be
able to understand the state of mind a lady was in when she bought
herself a blue woollen shawl; but I could believe she was suffering at
the time from a temporary aberration of intellect--only, if she wore it
afterwards the thing would be quite inexplicable." Claudia drew the
wrap round her with dignity, and made no reply; then Ideala laughed and
turned to me. "Certainly your friend," she said, alluding to a young