something might be said for him.”
“That's just it,” said Margaret.
“Charity,” I suggested.
“I don't like that sort of toleration.”
I was oddly annoyed. “Like eating with publicans and sinners,” I said. “No!...”
But scandals, and the contempt for rigid standards their condonation displayed, weren't more than the sharp edge of the trouble.
“It's their whole position, their selfish predominance, their class conspiracy against the mass of people,” said Margaret. “When I sit at dinner in that splendid room, with its glitter and white reflections and candlelight, and its flowers and its wonderful service and its candelabra of solid gold, I seem to feel the slums and the mines and the over-crowded cottages stuffed away under the table.”
I reminded Margaret that she was not altogether innocent of unearned increment.
“But aren't we doing our best to give it back?” she said.
I was moved to