“Oh! you young men!” said Mrs. Maradick, “we know you’re all the same. And I must say I enjoyed _‘The Girl and the Cheese_’ the other day, positively the only thing I’ve seen for ages.” From the other side Mrs. Lawrence could be heard making attack on Mr. Lester. “It was really too awfully sweet of you to put it that way, Mr. Lester. It was just what I’d been feeling, but couldn’t put into words; and when I came across it in your book I said to myself, ‘There, that’s just what I’ve been feeling all along.’ I simply love your book, Mr. Lester. I feel as if it had been written specially for me, you know.” Mr. Lester flushed with annoyance. He hated, beyond everything, that people should talk to him about his books, and now this silly woman! It was such a hot day, and he had quarrelled with his wife. “But what I’ve really always so often wanted to ask you,” pursued Mrs. Lawrence, “is whether you took Mrs. Abbey in ‘To Paradise’ from anyone? I think you must have done; and I know some one so exactly like her that I couldn’t help wondering—Mrs. Roland Temmett—she lives in Hankin Street, No. 3 I think it is. Do you know her? If you don’t you must meet her, because she’s the very image, exactly like. You know in that chapter when she goes down to poor Mr. Elliot——” But this was too much for Mr. Lester. “I have never met her,” he said brusquely, and his lips closed as though he never meant to open them again. Mrs. Lester watched them and was amused. She knew how her husband hated it; she could even sympathise with him, but it would punish him for having been so horrid to her. She herself was rapidly recovering her temper. It was such a lovely day that it was impossible to be cross for long, and then her husband had often been cross and disagreeable before, it wasn’t as though it were anything new. What a dreadful woman that Mrs. Maradick was! Why had Lady Gale invited her? Poor Mr. Maradick! She rather liked him, his size and strength and stolidity, but how dreadful to be tied to such a woman for life! Even worse, she reflected, than to be tied for life to a man such as her own special treasure! Oh! our marriage system. She turned round to Maradick. “It’s better, thank you,” she said. “What is?” he asked her. “My temper,” she answered. “It was just the Devil when we started. I was positively fuming. You must have noticed——” “You have been perfectly charming,” he said. “Well, it’s very nice of you to say so, but I assure you it was through my clenched teeth. My hubby and I had a tiff before we started, and it was hot, and my maid did everything wrong. Oh! little things! but all enough to upset me. But it’s simply impossible to stay cross with a view and a day like this. I don’t suppose you know,” she said, looking up at him, “what it is to be bad-tempered.”