sh the
dinner dishes, thus leaving Marie's evenings free--"for the shaded
lamp," Billy said.

Marie had not arrived at this--to her, delightful--arrangement of a
"visiting acquaintance" without some opposition from her friends. Even
Billy had stood somewhat aghast.

"But, my dear, won't it be hard for you, to do so much?" she argued one
day. "You know you aren't very strong."

"I know; but it won't be hard, as I've planned it," replied Marie,
"specially when I've been longing for years to do this very thing. Why,
Billy, if I had to stand by and watch a maid do all these things I
want to do myself, I should feel just like--like a hungry man who sees
another man eating up his dinner! Oh, of course," she added plaintively,
after Billy's laughter had subsided, "I sha'n't do it always. I don't
expect to. Of course, when we have a house--I'm not sure, then, though,
that I sha'n't dress up the maid and order her to receive the calls and
go to the pink teas, while I make her puddings," she finished saucily,
as Billy began to laugh again.

The bride and groom, as was proper, were, soon after their arrival,
invited to dine at both William's and Billy's. Then, until Marie's "At
Homes" should begin, the devoted couple settled down to quiet days
by themselves, with only occasional visits from the family to
interrupt--"interrupt" was Bertram's word, not Marie's. Though it is
safe to say it was not far different from the one Cyril used--in his
thoughts.

Bertram himself, these days, was more than busy. Besides working on
Miss Winthrop's portrait, and on two or three other commissions, he was
putting the finishing touches to four pictures which he was to show in
the exhibition soon to be held by a prominent Art Club of which he was
the acknowledged "star" member. Naturally, therefore, his time was
well occupied. Naturally, too, Billy, knowing this, lashed herself more
sternly than ever into a daily reminder of Kate's assertion that he
belonged first to his Art.

In pursuance of this idea, Billy was careful to see that no engagement
with herself should in any way interfere with the artist's work, and
that no word of hers should attempt to keep him at her side when ART
called. (Billy always spelled that word now in her mind with tall, black
letters--the way it had sounded when it fell from Kate's lips.) That
these tactics on her part were beginning to fill her lover with vague
alarm and a very definite unrest, she did not once su