in the hands of the right woman...
You see, Mrs. Hilmer was a good soul, but, of course, she didn't quite
... that is, she was a bit old fashioned and ... well, she didn't know
how, poor dear!

Thus it was that over her household tasks on this particular February
morning Helen Starratt dawdled as her mind played with the fiction of
what Hilmer might become under the proper influence. Now, if _she_ had
married him!...

It was all very well for Mrs. Hilmer to see that her lord and master
was fed properly, but why did she waste hours over a custard when she
had money enough to hire it done? That course didn't get either of
them anywhere--Hilmer remained at a level of torpid content, and
naturally he looked down on his wife as a sort of sublimated servant
girl who wasn't always preparing to leave and demanding higher
wages... No, most men fell too easily in the trap of their personal
comforts. Even Fred had become self-satisfied. Beyond his dinner and
paper and an occasional sober flight at the movies or bridge with old
friends he didn't seem to have any stirring ambitions. That was where
a wife came in. Hadn't she been casting around for bait that would
make Fred rise to something new? Hadn't she invited the Hilmers to
dinner in the hope that the two men would hit it off? The very first
time she had met Hilmer she had thought, "There's a man that Fred
ought to know."

She was perfectly willing to concede certain virtues to her husband,
and she flattered herself that with the materials at her command she
had managed to keep Fred pretty well up to the scratch. The only thing
that had been lacking was plenty of money. If she had had one quarter
of Hilmer's income she would have evolved a husband that any woman
could have been proud of, instead of one that most women would have
found merely satisfactory... This was the way she had argued before
her absurd dinner party. She had to admit, after it was all over, that
her husband had managed to make her thoroughly ashamed of him. It was
better to have an outrageous husband than a ridiculous one. And she
fancied that Hilmer could be outrageous if he chose... But she was
sure of one thing ... if Hilmer came home and announced that he had
given up his position and had decided to plunge in boldly for himself,
his wife would scarcely give the matter a second thought. Hilmer would
carry the thing through ... _some way_. A man who could brain an
assailant and fight for a mouthful of