was quite a nice woman--she's so good looking."

"_Henry!_ At your time of life, are you deciding a woman's 'niceness' by
her looks?"

"But tell her she mustn't bore him," he said, ignoring the rebuke. "Tell
her that when it comes to wives, every husband on earth is Mr. F.'s
aunt--he 'hates a fool'!"

"Why not tell her yourself?" she said: then she sighed; "why _did_ she
do it?"

"She did it," he instructed her, "because the flattery of a boy's
lovemaking went to her head. I have an idea that she was hungry for
happiness--so it was champagne on an empty stomach. Think of the
starvation dullness of living with that Newbolt female, who drops
her g's all over the floor! Edith likes her," he added.

"Oh, Edith!" said Edith's mother, with a shrug; "well; if you can
explain Eleanor, perhaps you can explain Maurice?"

"_That's_ easy; anything in petticoats will answer as a peg for a man
(we are the idealizing sex) to hang his heart on. Then, there's her
music--and her pathos. For she is pathetic, Kit?"

But Mary Houghton shook her head: "It is Maurice who is pathetic--my
poor Maurice!..."

When they went down to the east porch, with its great white columns,
and its broad steps leading into Mrs. Houghton's gay and fragrant