"Oh, not a great deal," Starratt returned, ruffling a trifle. "Office rent for two or three months before the premiums begin to come in ... a little capital to furnish up a room. I might even get some one to give me a desk in his office until I got started. It's done, you know." Brauer neatly extracted a succulent morsel from its scaly sheath. "Don't you think it's better to put up a front?" he inquired. "If you've got a decent office and your own phone and a good stenographer it makes an impression when you're going after business... Why don't you go in with somebody?... There ought to be plenty of fellows ready to put up their money against your time." "Who, for instance?" escaped Starratt, involuntarily. Brauer shoved his plate of husked shrimps to one side. "Take me. I've saved up quite a bit, and..." The waiter broke in upon them with the oysters. Starratt knitted his brows. "Well, why not?" was his mental calculation. Brauer ordered two more pints of beer. Starratt had leaned at first toward keeping his business venture a secret from Helen. But in the end a boyish eagerness to sun himself in the warmth of her surprise unlocked his reserve. "I've quit Ford-Wetherbee," he said, quietly, that night, as she was seating herself after bringing on the dessert. He had never seen such a startled look flash across her face. "What! Did you have trouble?" He decided swiftly not to give her the details. He didn't want her to think that any outside influence had pushed him into action. "Oh no!..." he drawled, lightly. "I've been thinking of leaving for some time. Working for another person doesn't get you anywhere." He could see that she was puzzled, perhaps a little annoyed. Last night in a malicious moment she had been quite ready to sneer at her husband's inactivity, but now, with the situation a matter of practice rather than theory, Starratt felt that she was having her misgivings. A suggestion of a frown hovered above her black eyebrows. "You can't mean that you're going into business!" she returned, as she passed him a dish of steaming pudding. There was a suggestion of last night's scorn in her incredulity. "No?... And why not?" She cast a sidelong glance at him. "That takes money," she objected. He knew now, from her tone, what was behind the veil of her intimations and he found a curious new pleasure in watching her squirm. "Oh, well," he half mused, "I guess we'll struggle through somehow. We've always managed to." She leaned one elbow heavily on the table. "_More_ economies, I suppose!" He had trapped her too easily! It was his turn to be cutting. "Don't worry!... I sha'n't ask you to do without any more than you've done without so far. If you can stand it as it is awhile longer, why ..." He broke off with a shrug.