Free Dark Tunnel by Ross MacDonald

could not be sure of being right when he takes the law into his own hands. Especially a woman, a young girl.”
    “You seem to share Hitler’s prejudice against women,” I said, “as well as his prejudice against Jews.”
    “I have no concern with Hitler,” Peter said.
    Dr. Schneider spoke for the first time in minutes, “It is not entirely courteous to argue so strenuously with a guest. You must accept our apologies, Dr. Branch.” His voice was a light monotone which contrasted with his usual rich blatancy. It sounded as if he was afraid to speak but couldn’t help himself.
    I said, “The conversation is both interesting and instructive. I believe that Mr. Schneider was about to expound an old Turkish doctrine regarding the inferiority of women.”
    “Ach, women,” Peter said. “You Americans are hag-ridden by your women. They ride on your shoulders and strangle you with their legs. Their legs are pretty, of course. But why should they be treated as equals? Would you give equal civil rights to a race-horse?”
    “If it had equal intelligence and other human qualities.”
    “Are women equal in intelligence to men?”
    “Not if they’re not educated. The Middle Ages proved that.”
    “Why attempt to educate them? Women can perform their natural functions without education. Most of them are hardly more complicated than a child’s puzzle. Press three buttons in the proper sequence and the gates open. The gates of Aulis and the gates of hell. Abandon hope all ye who enter here.”
    Suddenly I could contain my anger no longer and it boiled over. “I abandon the argument. Your political and social ideas have the fascination of the horrible as far as I’m concerned. And the horrible loses its fascination very quickly.”
    What Peter said had convinced me that if he wasn’t a Nazi intellectual he had missed his calling. I stood up with a vague notion of walking out of the house, but the thought of Ruth held me. She was coming there to-night and evidently didn’t know what kind of family she was walking into.
    Peter stood up and said, “Come now, Dr. Branch, you must learn to be a better loser. We must have no hard feelings over a small argument of purely academic interest.”
    I bit back my anger and said, “I suppose I did fly off the handle. I must be getting the professorial habit of resenting contradiction.”
    Dr. Schneider produced an artificial laugh which bounced twice against the roof of his mouth and fell flat.
    “Not contradiction, sir. Merely disagreement,” Peter said. “We are probably using different words to mean the same thing.”
    I let even that pass.
    Dr. Schneider got out of his chair and said, “It’s some time before we’re due at the station, Dr. Branch. Would you care to look over my house?”
    I said I would and Peter excused himself. A moment later I heard his light feet go up the stairs two or three at a time. His father showed me the library with its shelf of first editions, the copper-screened back porch overlooking the lights of Arbana, the small, warm conservatory opening off the porch, and even the utility room where the furnace sat drinking oil and glowing contentedly. Dr. Schneider became quite amiable again after Peter left us, and he waxed lyrical over his radiant heating system which kept the floors warm enough to sleep on all winter. He seemed to love his house better than he loved his son.
    I listened enough to answer when I had to, but material possessions bore me, especially when they belong to other people. I pricked up my ears, though, when he offered to show me the salle d’armes. A special room for fencing seemed incongruous in the house of a man of Dr. Schneider’s age and weight.
    “I’m rather interested in fencing,” I said. “Do you fence?”
    “When I was a student, I indulged in some sabre-play.” He touched his left cheek, which was seamed with scars. “But I have not fenced for thirty years. Peter is a considerable fencer, I