"Here's your fourth room," said he, throwing open a door at the back of
the hall.

"This box? It can't be made a really comfortable room, even if I do my
best with it. Your bachelor will not stay long."

"Best not make him too comfortable. Nobody wants him to stay long." And
Red Pepper closed the door again, with an air of having settled the
matter to his entire satisfaction. "Besides," he added, "if he's really a
desirable chap, and we want him around more than a day or two, he can
bunk in my old room downstairs. When he's not there I'll use it for an
annex to my offices. Somebody's always needing to be put to bed for an
hour or two. Amy Mathewson will revel in that extra space. Her long suit
is making people comfortable, and smoothing the upper sheet under their
chins."

"Redfield Pepper, please consider this carefully," said his wife, as they
returned to the gray-and-rose room. "Remember how long you have had that
downstairs room,--you are attached to it, perhaps, more than you think.
You have been a bachelor yourself a good while--"

"And am supposed to be old and set in my ways," interpolated her
listener. He stood before her with folded arms, a judicial expression on
his brow. Beneath his coppery hair his black eyebrows drew together a
little above a pair of hazel eyes which sparkled with a whimsical light
which somewhat impaired the gravity of the expression.

"You are wonted to your ways--naturally," Ellen pursued. "It will not be
so convenient for you, having your rooms up here. I am quite contented