The tenor rose to his feet with the howl of an anguished hyena. "Oh, good gracious!" cried his wife; "he's going to have one of his creezes--his creezes de nare!" He did have a _crise de nerfs_. "Ten dollair!" he yelled, "for ten dollair of glass!" He tore his pomaded hair; he tore off his bib and his neck-tie, and for three minutes without cessation he shrieked wildly and unintelligibly. It was possible to make out, however, that "arteest" and "ten dollair" were the themes of the improvisation. Finally he sank exhausted into the chair, and his white-faced wife rushed to his side. "Louise!" she cried, "get the foot-tub out of the closet while I spray his throat, or he can't sing a note. Fill it up with warm water--102 degrees--there's the thermometer--and bathe his feet." Trembling from head to foot, Louise obeyed her orders, and brought the foot-tub, full of steaming water. Then she knelt down and began to serve the maestro for the first time. She took off his shoes. Then she looked at his socks. Could she do it? "Eediot!" gasped the sufferer, "make haste! I die!" "Hold your mouth open, dear," said Madame, "I haven't half sprayed you." "Ah! _you!_" cried the tenor. "Cat! Devil! It ees you zat have killed me!" And moved by an access of blind rage, he extended his arm, and thrust his wife violently from him. Louise rose to her feet, with a hard set, good old New England look on her face. She lifted the tub of water to the level of her breast, and then she inverted it on the tenor's head. For one instant she gazed at the deluge, and at the bath-tub balanced on the maestro's skull like a helmet several sizes too large--then she fled like the wind. Once in the servant's quarters, she snatched her hat and jacket. From below came mad yells of rage. "I kill hare! give me my knife--give me my rivvolvare! Au secours! Assassin!" Miss Slattery appeared in the doorway, still polishing her nails. "What have you done to His Tonsils?" she inquired. "He's pretty hot, this trip." "How can I get away from here?" cried Louise. Miss Slattery pointed to a small door. Louise rushed down a long stairway--another--and yet others--through a great room where there was a smell of cooking and a noise of fires--past white-capped cooks and scullions--through a long stone corridor, and out into the street. She cried aloud as she saw Esther's face at the window of the coupe. She drove home--cured. FOOTNOTE: [1] From "Stories of H. C. Bunner," copyright, 1890, 1896, by Alice L. Bunner; published by Charles Scribner's Sons. By permission of the publishers. H. C. BUNNER