With a sense of guilt the husband hurried home. In the hallway, as he took off hat and coat, he noticed the card, and picked it up. “So he did come,” he growled, with a frown. “I hope Meg had gone to bed before he got here. Not, of course, that it really matters,” he went on. “She told me she never could endure him, so he’s welcome to call as often as he likes to be snubbed.” To prove how little he cared, the husband crushed the card viciously, and tossed it on the floor. The light in Margaret’s room was burning low, Harry noticed when he had ascended the stairs, and, peeping in, he saw that she was sleeping peacefully. Entering quietly, he looked at her for a moment, thinking with a little pang that he had given her pain. “You don’t deserve such an angel,” he said aloud. “See how she has done just what you asked her to do, with never a word of— There isn’t another woman who would have taken it so sweetly. You’re an ass! And for what? Four hours of—of nothing, when I might have been with her.” He leaned down to very softly kiss a stray curl, and went towards his own room, while saying: “How pretty and dainty she is! She’s worth all the clubs in the world!” What was more, for a minute he believed it. The moment Harry was gone Margaret opened her eyes very wide, rose softly, and looked at the clock. Then she went back to bed, smiling demurely. ⁂ The next morning, when Harry entered the breakfast room a little late, he was received with a kiss, and no word of reproach. Margaret chatted over the meal in her usual entertaining, happy mood, telling him the news she had already extracted from the morning’s paper. “She’s too clever ever to nag a man,” thought Harry, and assured that he was not to be taken to task, he became equally amiable, and told her whom he had seen at the club, and of his score. “I’m glad you had such a pleasant evening!” said Margaret, sweetly. “I hope you didn’t stay so late as to tire yourself.” “I didn’t notice the time,” fibbed Harry, “but probably I was in by twelve.” “Oh, no, dear,” said Margaret, pleasantly, “for I didn’t get home till after one myself, and you weren’t back then.” ⁂ Twenty times Harry has tried to persuade his wife into acknowledging that she spoke in jest, but Margaret only looks at him with wideopen, questioning eyes, as innocent as a child’s. Her husband firmly believes that she went to bed ten minutes after he left the house, and always ends his unsuccessful attempts to get her to confess the fact by taking Margaret in his arms and telling her of his belief. This faith his wife rewards with a tender kiss, but only a kiss, and still maintains her demure silence. Harry spends no more evenings at the club, and every woman who knows him holds him up to other men as an ideal married Benedick. THE CORTELYOU FEUD ❦