"She is too intelligent, too high-minded," he often reassured himself, "to
cling to this stupidity of class-feeling. She has heard nothing but
class-distinction all her life. Now that she is away from those people,
with their petty routine of petty ideas, she will begin to see things as
they are."
So he suppressed the argument and, instead, said in a tone of mock-pity:
"Poor fallen queen--to marry beneath her. How she must have fought against
the idea of such a plebeian partner."
"Plebeian--you?" Marian looked at him proudly. "Why, one has only to see
you to know."
"Yes, plebeian. I shall conceal it no longer. My ancestors were plain,
ordinary, common, untitled Americans."
"Why, so were mine," she laughed.
"Don't! You distress me. I should never have married you had I known that."
"I _am_ absurd, am I not?" Marian said gaily. "But let me have my
craze for well-mannered people and I'll leave you your craze for the--the
masses."
They began to canter. Howard was smiling in spite of his irritation; for it
always irritated him to have her refuse to see his point in this
matter--his distinction between a person as a friend and a person as a
sociological unit.
He worked for an hour or two every morning and sometimes in the evening,
Marian not far from his desk, so seated that when she turned the page of
her book she could lift her eyes and look at him.
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