try the experiment because the picture is new now, and its influence
will be all the more real. In a few weeks it may have lost some of its
freshness and reality and will have become one of the fixtures in the
room."

Stuart decided that under these new conditions it would be more pleasant
to dine at Delmonico's, and he was on the point of asking the Picture
what she thought of it, when he remembered that while it had been
possible for him to make a practice of dining at that place as a
bachelor, he could not now afford so expensive a luxury, and he decided
that he had better economize in that particular and go instead to one of
the table d'hôte restaurants in the neighborhood. He regretted not
having thought of this sooner, for he did not care to dine at a table
d'hôte in evening dress, as in some places it rendered him conspicuous.
So, sooner than have this happen he decided to dine at home, as he had
originally intended when he first thought of attempting this experiment,
and then conducted the picture into dinner and placed her in an
armchair facing him, with the candles full upon the face.

"Now this is something like," he exclaimed, joyously. "I can't imagine
anything better than this. Here we are all to ourselves with no one to
bother us, with no chaperone, or chaperone's husband either, which is
generally worse. Why is it, my dear," he asked gayly, in a tone that he
considered affectionate and husbandly, "that the attractive chaperones
are always handicapped by such stupid husbands, and vice versa?"

"If that is true," replied the Picture, or replied Stuart, rather, for
the picture, "I cannot be a very attractive chaperone." Stuart bowed
politely at this, and then considered the point it had raised as to
whether he had, in assuming both characters, the right to pay himself