yrrh and incense and meat and drink to me. I
wish I had words to tell you what I'm thinking now. But I haven't. So
I'll just cover it up. We both know it's there. And I'll tell you that
you make love like a 'movie' hero. Yes, you do! Better than a 'movie'
hero, because, in the films, the heroine always has to turn to face the
camera, which makes it necessary for him to make love down the back of
her neck."

But T. A. Buck was unsmiling.

"Don't trifle, Emma. And don't think you can fool me that way. I
haven't finished. I want to settle this Fifth Avenue creature for all
time. What I have to say is this: I think you are more
attractive--finer, bigger, more rounded in character and manner,
mellower, sweeter, sounder, with all your angles and corners rubbed
smooth, saner, better poised than any woman I have ever known. And
what I am to-day you have made me, directly and indirectly, by
association and by actual orders, by suggestion, and by direct contact.
What you did for Jock, purposefully and by force, you did for me, too.
Not so directly, perhaps, but with the same result. Emma McChesney,
you've made--actually made, molded, shaped, and turned out two men.
You're the greatest sculptor that ever lived. You could make a
scarecrow in a field get up and achieve. Everywhere one sees women
over-wrought, over-stimulated, eager, tense. When there appears one
who has herself in leash, balanced, tolerant, poised, sane, composed,
she restores your faith in things. You lean on her, spiritually. I
know I need you more than you need me, Emma. And I know you won't love
me the less for that. There--that's about all for this evening."

"I think," breathed Emma McChesney in a choked little voice, "that
that's about--enough."

Two days before the date set for their very quiet wedding, they told
the heads of office and workroom. Office and workroom, somewhat moist
as to eye and flushed as to cheek and highly congratulatory, proved
their knowingness by promptly presenting to their employers a very
costly and unbelievably hideous set of mantel ornaments and clock,
calculated to strike horror to the heart of any woman who has lovingly
planned the furnishing of her drawing-room. Pop Henderson, after some
preliminary wrestling with collar, necktie, spectacles, and voice,
launched forth on a presentation speech that threatened to close down
the works for the day. Emma McChesney heard it, tears in her eyes. T.
A. Buck g