"What do you think of American women, Mr. von Inwald?" he asked, and
everybody stopped playing cards and listened for the answer. As Mr.
von Inwald represented the prince, wouldn't he be likely to voice the
prince's opinion of American women?
It's my belief Mr. von Inwald was going to say something nice. He
smiled as if he meant to, but just then he saw Mr. Pierce in his corner
sneering behind his pipe. They looked at each other steadily, and nobody
could mistake the hate in Mr. Pierce's face or his sneer. After a minute
the prince looked away and shrugged his shoulders, but he didn't make
his pretty speech.
"American women!" he said, turning his glass of spring water around
on the table before him, "they are very lovely, of course." He looked
around and there were Mrs. Moody and Mrs. Biggs and Miss Cobb, and he
even glanced at me in the spring. Then he looked again at Mr. Pierce and
kept his eyes there. "But they are spoiled, fearfully spoiled. They rule
their parents and they expect to rule their husbands. In Europe we do
things better; we are not--what is the English?--hag-ridden?"
There was a sort of murmur among the men, but the women all nodded as if
they thought Europe was entirely right. They'd have agreed with him if
he'd advocated sixteen wives sitting cross-legged on a mat, like the
Turks. Mr. Pierce was still staring at the prince.
"What I don't quite understand, Mr. von Inwald," the bishop put in in
his nice way, "is your custom of expecting a girl to bring her husband
a certain definite sum of money and to place it under the husband's
control.
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