“_My Agnes! Did I hear you say You will not stop to hear us play The trio I composed to-day? What! Let Maria come and dust! I’d sooner starve--yet, Love, I trust You’ll pardon me, for say I must_ That’s _not the way to treat a genius!_ “_Here’s something good by Malloray, I’ll read it if you’ll only stay. (Damnation! Take that child away!) Say I will dine at six to-night, Something both nourishing and light. No, dear--my pocket’s empty quite._ That’s _not the way to treat a genius!_ “_Ask me not, Agnes dear, to think Of anything but pen and ink (Unless its something new to drink). There is no need, my love, for you To live at all, I’ll live for two. In tears! My darling, that won’t do!_ That’s _not the way to treat a genius!_” Mrs. Figgins was delighted. “There, Harry,” she exclaimed, “she’s absolutely right, she has seen you through and through; I’ve always told you you were the most selfish beast on earth. It doesn’t matter what happens to me or the children so long as you get your wretched stuff out of your head on to paper. And that about the reading aloud is so good--and the dusting--and yet you complain the house is dirty! Oh dear.” Mr. Figgins rose, picked his wife out of her comfortable chair, and transferred her to his own, which he said was more her size, then he sat down and read the ode again. “My dear Jane,” he said, “I have looked this over very carefully, and you are absolutely wrong; it is you she means. Look at that about the children being all over the house, and a beastly housemaid pottering about his study, and no money in the house. He even has to order his own dinner or she gives him indigestible stuff he can’t work on. He does his best to amuse and entertain her, and then she bursts into tears and says she wants to live; it seems to me to be an admirable picture of the sort of thing I go through, only you haven’t the wit to see it.” I took a stroll round the garden for a quarter of an hour and when I came back they were still disputing. “Do I or do I not have to sit on the mat for hours at a time listening to you talking? And if so, how can I be ordering dinner at the same time?” “You could order it the night before and tell them that, whatever happens, I must have it at a certain time.” “The certain time being anything between ten in the morning and three in the afternoon.” “Malloray’s wife gets her husband the most excellent food all ready in five minutes, at any moment he may happen to come in.” “Mr. Malloray gets paid for his dreary stuff and you don’t, so he can afford to have sixteen parlourmaids all sitting about with nothing else to do. And that about your living for two is so good. What life do I have sitting round when you are there, and then working like a galley-slave when you are not to make up for the lost time and clear up the mess?”