"They're dead," said Mr. Bertram, when he saw them. "Or--well, darned if I know. Maybe they just got some kind of disease that turned 'em yellow. If they were as dead as they look, I don't know why the needles wouldn't be falling off. Maybe they got dropped in a vat of yellow paint by mistake. Well, the people got your money and they've delivered you some trees, so I guess there's nothing you can do about it." Which proved that he didn't know Grant. All over town, where Christmas trees were being sold, there were red ones, blue ones and white ones, as well as the more prosaic natural green. "Nobody seems to want green trees any more, anyway," Grant mused, that evening after the children were in bed. Sitting at the kitchen table, he placed on a slice of bread the egg he had just fried, added a lavish knifeful of peanut butter, and munched thoughtfully. "Where's that sign I painted?" he asked finally, drumming his fingers on the table. I brought it to him quietly, not wanting to interrupt the obvious churning of his brain by telling him it was right where he had left it, on the desk. He stared at it a while. Finally he rose, went back to the desk with the sign and sat down. He turned the sign to its blank side and began sketching letters with a pencil. Curious, I got up and looked over his shoulder. "Snow Saffrons for sale," he wrote. And then, in smaller letters: "Try a new color this year for your tree--Sunlight Yellow!" Our little crop of Christmas trees was completely sold the next day. Students of behaviour--and of marital relationships in particular--should have, as one requisite to a diploma, a period of managing a motel. The simple business of engaging a cabin for the night reveals a composite picture of all the quarrels a couple has ever had, highlights their differences and their individual idiosyncrasies, and stamps the dominant one as boss. A couple named Mr. and Mrs. Godwin stayed with us for a week, waiting for their promised job in Palm Springs to open up. She was small and round and good-natured; he was big and round and good-natured. She was definitely the boss. It was she who, when they first came, registered and paid me; it was she who overrode his feeble protest about "changing motels." "Y'see, we always stayed at the Peacock, before, whenever we were traveling through here," she explained. "Me, though, I want to try a new one." "Variety is the spice of life," I remarked brilliantly. "Y'know, we both like this place of yours better than the Peacock," Mrs. Godwin told me, one night when their week with us was about half gone. I noticed again her curious, confusing habit of stressing her most unimportant words. "Y'know, you people have the nicest court in Banning. I always thought the Garner's place, the Peacock, was supposed to be the nicest one, but me, I don't think it can compare with this one."