"You haven't got any principles," he declared, baldly. "No woman has." At this brutal statement on the part of her husband, Mrs. Delancy stiffened, and an exclamation of shocked amazement burst from her. Cicily smiled cynically, as she addressed her aunt: "Well, Aunt Emma," she said amusedly, "you see now what your attitude has led to. You began with no backbone. So, now, you have no principles. Oh, you nice, sweet-faced, gray-headed, deceiving old-lady reprobate, you!" But Mrs. Delancy refused to see any element of humor in the situation. Indeed, she was on the verge of tears over the wantonly injurious statement made by the husband whom she had cherished for a lifetime. "James, how could you!" she cried out, in a voice broken by emotion. "To say such things to your wife--oh!" Too late, the irascible husband realized that he had committed a serious fault, had in fact been guilty of a gross injustice, which was hardly less than an insult, to the woman whom he thoroughly respected. "Emma--" he began, appealingly. But Mrs. Delancy had changed in an instant from tearful reproach to righteous indignation. "No, don't speak to me!" she commanded; and she deliberately turned her back on the culprit. Under the goad of this treatment, Delancy addressed his niece in a tone that was almost ferocious. "So," he snarled, "not content with breaking up your own home, you'd try to ruin mine, would you! You should apologize to your Aunt Emma, at once." "Dear Auntie," Cicily exclaimed without a moment's hesitation, in a voice of contrition, "I beg you to let me apologize to you very humbly for what Uncle James said." "What the--!" stormed the badgered old gentleman. "Now, look here, Cicily. You think you're very smart. But do you know what your attitude has led to?--Scandal!" Mrs. Delancy forgot for the moment her own subject for complaint. "Yes," she agreed, turning to her niece, "it's a scandal to live in a house with a strange man--you know, that's what you yourself called Charles." "It's a worse scandal," Delancy amended, "not to live with him." "Oh, I see," Cicily remarked, meditatively. "I must have a chaperon. But, on the other hand, now, Charles is, or rather he was, my husband. That seems, somehow, to make a difference. At least, we are well acquainted, although strangers at present, in a sense. And, besides, I have the kindliest feeling for Charles, and that's more than lots of women have for their husbands. As to that, you know, since he's not my husband now, there is really no reason why I should not have the very kindliest of feelings for him." "Well, you claim to renounce your husband," Delancy argued angrily, "and yet you continue to live with him in the same house. It's a monstrous state of affairs. Will you tell me, please, madam, when this scandalous situation is to end?"