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Jewel Weed

Page 147

"Sit down over there," she commanded. "No, you shan't come near me,

Dick, until I've said my say. I'm really much displeased, and you need

not act as though you thought it was a trifling matter."

Dick sat humbly in the spot appointed.

"Dick, I don't want you to say any more horrid little things about

women. You've done it several times lately. The other day you said

something to Mr. Early about his 'glorious freedom'; and you made a

sneering remark to Mr. Preston about women's small dishonesties."

"Only jokes, I assure you."

"Everybody knows that women are a great deal better than men."

"They must be," said Dick. "Literature is full of statements to that

effect."

"And marriage is far more desirable than 'glorious freedom'."

"It is," answered Dick. "So long as there are things to disagree about,

marriage will not lose its savor."

"You say that in a perfectly mean way, as though you did not really

believe anything nice. But whether you believe it or not, I am going to

ask you not to talk so any more," Mrs. Percival went on with dignity,

"because it sounds exactly like a criticism of me, and I think you owe

it to me to treat me with respect. What must people think of me when you

fling in--what do you call them--innuendoes like that around?"

Mr. Percival looked at his wife in silence; then he picked her up,

chair and all, and whirled her around in front of a long pier glass.

"Do you see that?" he demanded.

Lena saw and dimpled.

"Now I propose," Dick went on, "to carry you down stairs, just as you

are! I shall then arouse the whole household by my shouts and gather

them around you; and when every man jack of them is there, I shall say

'Ladies and gentlemen, is it possible for a man whose wife looks like

this to utter any serious accusation against femininity?'"

"Dick, don't be silly," said Lena, pouting with pleasure, and she

glanced again at herself in the glass. "I am nice, am I not?"

"Nice!" ejaculated Dick, "Huyler and Maillard and Whitman and Lowney,

all rolled into one big candy man, never dreamed of anything so sweet.

Did you really think I was disrespectful? Why, little Lena!"

Easter morning dawned, a God-given splendor of blue and spring softness,

and the six stood, after breakfast, on the veranda and looked at the

day.

"Time and the world are before you. Choose how you will spend the

forenoon," said Mrs. Lenox.

"I should like to drive," Lena promptly replied. "Mr. Lenox was telling

me last night about his new pair of horses. I know he is pining to show

them off."

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