he should doubt for an instant Billy's entire
devotion to him, and yet--there were times when
he wished he _could_ come home and not always
find Alice Greggory, Calderwell, Arkwright, or
all three of them strumming the piano in the
drawing-room! At such times, always, though,
if he did feel impatient, he immediately demanded
of himself: ``Are you, then, the kind of husband
that begrudges your wife young companions of
her own age and tastes to help her while away the
hours that you cannot possibly spend with her
yourself?''

This question, and the answer that his better
self always gave to it, were usually sufficient to
send him into some florists for a bunch of violets
for Billy, or into a candy shop on a like atoning
errand.

As to Billy--Billy, too, was busy these days
chief of her concerns being, perhaps, attention
to that honeymoon of hers, to see that it did
not wane. At least, the most of her thoughts,
and many of her actions, centered about that
object.

Billy had the book, now--the ``Talk to Young
Wives.'' For a time she had worked with only
the newspaper criticism to guide her; but, coming
at last to the conclusion that if a little was good,