supplied the bodies of the dancers.
Dexter had often told her that it was a common blackmailing trick.
Even if the photograph were genuine, Pauline could understand and
make allowances. She had never seen anything of the kind herself
at Dawnside—heaven forbid!—but whenever she had gone there for a
lecture, or a new course of exercises, she had suspected that the
bare whitewashed room, with its throned Buddha, which received her
and other like–minded ladies of her age, all active, earnest and
eager for self–improvement, had not let them very far into the
mystery. Beyond, perhaps, were other rites, other settings: why
not? Wasn't everybody talking about "the return to Nature," and
ridiculing the American prudery in which the minds and bodies of
her generation had been swaddled? The Mahatma was one of the
leaders of the new movement: the Return to Purity, he called it.
He was always celebrating the nobility of the human body, and
praising the ease of the loose Oriental dress compared with the
constricting western garb: but Pauline had supposed the draperies
he advocated to be longer and less transparent; above all, she had
not expected familiar faces above those insufficient scarves…
But here she was at her own door. There was just time to be ready
for the Mothers; none in which to telephone to Dexter, or buy up
the whole edition of the "Looker–on" (fantastic vision!), or try
and get hold of its editor, who had once dined with her, and was
rather a friend of Lita's. All these possibilities and
impossibilities raced through her brain to the maddening tune of
"too late" while she slipped off her street–dress and sat twitching
with impatience under the maid's readjustment of her ruffled head.
The gown prepared for the meeting, rich, matronly and just the
least bit old–fashioned—very different from the one designed for
the Birth Control committee—lay spread out beside the copy of her
speech, and Maisie Bruss, who had been hovering within call, dashed
back breathless from a peep over the stairs.
"They're arriving—"
"Oh, Maisie, rush down! Say I'm telephoning—"
Her incurable sincerity made her unhook the receiver and call out
Manford's office number. Almost instantly she heard him. "Dexter,
this Mahatma investigation must be stopped! Don't ask me why—
there isn't time. Only promise—"
She heard his impatient laugh.
"No?"
"Impossible," came back.
She supposed she had hung up the receiver, fastened on her jewelled
"Motherhood" badge, slipped on rings and bracelets as usual. But
she remembered nothing clearly until she found herself on the
platform at the end of the packed ball–room, looking across rows
and rows of earnest confiding faces, with lips and eyes prepared
for the admiring reception of her "message." She was considered a
very good speaker: she knew how to reach the type of woman
represented by this imposing assemblage—delegates from small towns
all over the country, united by a common faith in the infinite
extent of human benevolence and the incalculable resources of
American hygiene. Something of the moral simplicity of her own
bringing–up brought her close to these women, who had flocked to
the great perfidious city serenely unaware of its being anything
more, or other, than the gigantic setting of a Mothers' Meeting.
Pauline, at such times, saw the world through their eyes, and was
animated by a genuine ardour for the cause of motherhood and
domesticity.
As she turned toward her audience a factitious serenity descended
on her. She felt in control of herself and of the situation. She
spoke.
"Personality—first and last, and at all costs. I've begun my talk
to you with that one word because it seems to me to sum up our
whole case. Personality—room to develop in: not only elbow–room
but body–room and soul–room, and plenty of both. That's what every
human being has a right to. No more effaced wives, no more
drudging mothers, no more human slaves crushed by the eternal round
of
Dexter had often told her that it was a common blackmailing trick.
Even if the photograph were genuine, Pauline could understand and
make allowances. She had never seen anything of the kind herself
at Dawnside—heaven forbid!—but whenever she had gone there for a
lecture, or a new course of exercises, she had suspected that the
bare whitewashed room, with its throned Buddha, which received her
and other like–minded ladies of her age, all active, earnest and
eager for self–improvement, had not let them very far into the
mystery. Beyond, perhaps, were other rites, other settings: why
not? Wasn't everybody talking about "the return to Nature," and
ridiculing the American prudery in which the minds and bodies of
her generation had been swaddled? The Mahatma was one of the
leaders of the new movement: the Return to Purity, he called it.
He was always celebrating the nobility of the human body, and
praising the ease of the loose Oriental dress compared with the
constricting western garb: but Pauline had supposed the draperies
he advocated to be longer and less transparent; above all, she had
not expected familiar faces above those insufficient scarves…
But here she was at her own door. There was just time to be ready
for the Mothers; none in which to telephone to Dexter, or buy up
the whole edition of the "Looker–on" (fantastic vision!), or try
and get hold of its editor, who had once dined with her, and was
rather a friend of Lita's. All these possibilities and
impossibilities raced through her brain to the maddening tune of
"too late" while she slipped off her street–dress and sat twitching
with impatience under the maid's readjustment of her ruffled head.
The gown prepared for the meeting, rich, matronly and just the
least bit old–fashioned—very different from the one designed for
the Birth Control committee—lay spread out beside the copy of her
speech, and Maisie Bruss, who had been hovering within call, dashed
back breathless from a peep over the stairs.
"They're arriving—"
"Oh, Maisie, rush down! Say I'm telephoning—"
Her incurable sincerity made her unhook the receiver and call out
Manford's office number. Almost instantly she heard him. "Dexter,
this Mahatma investigation must be stopped! Don't ask me why—
there isn't time. Only promise—"
She heard his impatient laugh.
"No?"
"Impossible," came back.
She supposed she had hung up the receiver, fastened on her jewelled
"Motherhood" badge, slipped on rings and bracelets as usual. But
she remembered nothing clearly until she found herself on the
platform at the end of the packed ball–room, looking across rows
and rows of earnest confiding faces, with lips and eyes prepared
for the admiring reception of her "message." She was considered a
very good speaker: she knew how to reach the type of woman
represented by this imposing assemblage—delegates from small towns
all over the country, united by a common faith in the infinite
extent of human benevolence and the incalculable resources of
American hygiene. Something of the moral simplicity of her own
bringing–up brought her close to these women, who had flocked to
the great perfidious city serenely unaware of its being anything
more, or other, than the gigantic setting of a Mothers' Meeting.
Pauline, at such times, saw the world through their eyes, and was
animated by a genuine ardour for the cause of motherhood and
domesticity.
As she turned toward her audience a factitious serenity descended
on her. She felt in control of herself and of the situation. She
spoke.
"Personality—first and last, and at all costs. I've begun my talk
to you with that one word because it seems to me to sum up our
whole case. Personality—room to develop in: not only elbow–room
but body–room and soul–room, and plenty of both. That's what every
human being has a right to. No more effaced wives, no more
drudging mothers, no more human slaves crushed by the eternal round
of
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