critical
survey of the room.

"Well!" he said. "Between us we have made a pretty good job of this, I
with the paper and the wiring, and you with your pretty furnishings and
your pretty self."

He glanced at her appreciatively. Christine saw his approval, and was
happier than she had been for weeks. She put on the thousand little airs
and graces that were a part of her--held her chin high, looked up at
him with the little appealing glances that she had found were wasted on
Palmer. She lighted the spirit-lamp to make tea, drew out the best chair
for him, and patted a cushion with her well-cared-for hands.

"A big chair for a big man!" she said. "And see, here's a footstool."

"I am ridiculously fond of being babied," said K., and quite basked in
his new atmosphere of well-being. This was better than his empty room
upstairs, than tramping along country roads, than his own thoughts.

"And now, how is everything?" asked Christine from across the fire. "Do
tell me all the scandal of the Street."

"There has been no scandal since you went away," said K. And, because
each was glad not to be left to his own thoughts, they laughed at this
bit of unconscious humor.

"Seriously," said Le Moyne, "we have been very quiet. I have had my
salary raised and am now rejoicing in twenty-two dollars a week. I
am still not accustomed to it. Just when I had all my ideas fixed for
fifteen, I get twenty-two and have to reassemble them. I am disgustingly
rich."

"It is very disagreeable when one's income becomes a burden," said
Christine gravely.

She was finding in Le Moyne something that she needed just then--a
solidity, a sort of dependability, that had nothing to do with
heaviness. She felt that here was a man she could trust, almost confide
in. She liked his long hands, his shabby but well-cut clothes, his fine
profile with its strong chin. She left off her little affectations,--a
tribute to his own lack of them,--and sat back in her chair, watching
the fire.

When K. chose, he could talk well. The Howes had been to Bermuda on
their wedding trip. He knew Bermuda; that gave them a common ground.
Christine relaxed under his steady voice. As for K., he frankly enjoyed
the little visit--drew himself at last with regret out of his chair.

"You've been very nice to ask me in, Mrs. Howe," he said. "I hope you
will allow me to come again. But, of course, you are going to be very
gay."

It seemed to Christine she would never be gay ag