Page:The One Woman (1903).pdf/196

 "Can't stand the rustle of a woman's dress?"

"Oh, I might survive. You know they say the only really happy people at a wedding are the old bachelors."

"Then why not?"

"I draw the line at the progressive harem idea."

"And a bachelor?" Gordon sneered.

Overman nodded. "Many things may be forgiven sinners, but a bishop must be the husband of one wife."

"I'm not a bishop. I'm a man. I ask no quarter of my enemies."

"You have but one enemy. You can see him in the mirror any time."

"It's funny to hear you preach!"

The banker bent forward.

"Frank, you're joking. You don't mean to tell me that your Socialist poppy plant has borne its opium fruit so soon? That you are going to desert that charming little woman, shy, timid and tremulous, with her great soulful eyes, the bride of your youth, the mother of your babes, and take up with another woman, just as any ordinary cur has done now and then for the past four thousand years?"

Gordon winced.

"No. I am going to form a union with this beautiful woman which shall be a prophecy and a propaganda of the freedom of the race, when comrade life shall forget the ancient fears, each shall be free to find and love his own, love be loosed from