Absurd! But, yes, how she remembered it now!
“Very dangerous being a woman,” Keggo
had said. “Men go into dangers but they
come out of them and go home to tea. That’s
what it is with men, Rosalie. They can always
get out. They can always come back. They
never belong to a thing, heart and soul, body and
mind. Rosalie, women do. That’s why
it is so very, very dangerous being a woman. Women
can’t come back. They take to a thing, anything,
and go deep enough, and they’re its; they never,
never will get away from it; they never, never will
be able to come back out of it. Rosalie, I tell
you this, when a woman gives herself, forgets moderation
and gives herself to anything, she is its captive
for ever. She may think she can come back but
she can’t come back. For a woman there
is no comeback. They don’t issue return
tickets to women. For women there is only departure;
there is no return.”
Poor Keggo!
Poor Keggo had of course founded her theory upon her
own bitter plight. How she had given her case
away when she had said, “Look at me!”
It applied to her, of course, or to any woman—or
man for that matter—who drank or drugged.
It applied not in the least to such a case as this
of her own. Keggo had tried to apply it.
She had said, “You have a theory of life.
You are bent upon a career in life. Suppose you
ever wanted to come back?”
She had laughed and declared she never would want
to come back. Well, look how absurd all poor
Keggo’s idea was now being proved! It had
suddenly occurred to her that it might at some future
time be required of her to come back; and all she
had to do was just—to come back. No
difficulty about it whatsoever! No struggle!
Indeed, and fondly she touched that by her side which
had called up these thoughts, she would come back
joyously. Of course she would! Field and
Company, ambition, that for if and when her darlings
called her! Yes, wrong every way, that poor Keggo.
Dangerous being a woman, she had said, and it was
not dangerous. It could be, and she had proved
it, a state that could be lived full in every aspect,—full
in freedom, full in endeavour, full in love, full in
motherhood. Dangerous! A week ago, inimical
to this advent, injurious; now, in this advent’s
presence, and with this resolution gladly dedicated
to it, only and wholly glorious.
This one! Come after connection, come in contrition,
come to call her back when she should need to be called,
the little tiny one, the belovedest one, the Benjamin
one—her Benji!
