mpbell: "We've been married a whole year now--"

Campbell: "Longer, isn't it?"

Mrs. Campbell: "--And I haven't known you do an unkind thing, a brutal
thing."

Campbell: "Well, I understand the banging around hardly ever begins much
under two years."

Mrs. Campbell: "How _sweet_ you are! And you're _so_ funny always!"

Campbell: "Come, come, Amy; get down to business. What is it you do
want?"

Mrs. Campbell: "You won't go and tease that poor boy about his letter,
will you? Just hand it to him, and say you suppose here is something
that has come into your possession by mistake, and that you wish to
restore it to him, and then--just run off."

Campbell: "With my parasol in one hand, and my skirts caught up in the
other?"

Mrs. Campbell: "Oh, how good! Of course I was imagining how _I_ should
do it."

Campbell: "Well, a man can't do it that way. He would look silly." He
rises from the table, and comes and puts his arm round her shoulders.
"But you needn't be afraid of my being rough with him. Of course it's a
mistake; but he's a fellow who will enter into the joke too; he'll enjoy
it; he'll--" He merges his sentence in a kiss on her upturned lips, and
she clings to his hand with her right, pressing it fondly to her cheek.
"I shall do it in a man's way; but I guess you'll approve of it quite as
much."

Mrs. Campbell: "I know I shall. That's what I like about you, Willis:
your being so helplessly a man always."

Campbell: "Well, that's what attracted me to you, Amy; your manliness."

Mrs. Campbell: "And I liked your _finesse_. You are awfully inventive,
Willis. Why, Willis, I've just thought of something. Oh, it would be
_so_ good if you only would!"

Campbell: "Would what?"

Mrs. Campbell: "Invent something now to get us out of the scrape."

Campbell: "What a brilliant idea! _I'm_ not in any scrape. And as for
Mr. Welling, I don't see how you could help him out unless you sent this
letter to Miss Rice, and asked her to send yours back--"

Mrs. Campbell, springing to her feet: "Willis, you are inspired! Oh, how
perfectly delightful! And it's so delicate of you to think of that! I
will just enclose his note--give it here, Willis--and he need never know
that it ever went to the wrong address. Oh, I always felt that you were
_truly_ refined, anyway." He passively yields the letter, and she whirls
away to a writing-desk in the corner of the room. "Now, I'll just keep a
copy of the letter--for a joke; I think