From that moment, he avoided the subject; from that moment, he became impregnable whenever the little old white-haired lady tried to assail him with the weapons of her worldly knowledge. "I can get John to say nothing," she said one night to her husband. "He won’t speak about it at all." He put his arms round her in the darkness. "You’re worrying yourself, little woman," he said, sleepily. "I woke up once last night and you were wide awake. Did you sleep at all?" "Very little," she admitted. "Well--you mustn’t worry. Leave it to Nature. John will tell her everything about it one of these days. Young men are always getting on the high horse and trying to tilt against Nature, and women are forever offering to assist Nature, thinking she must come off the worst. It’s waste of time either way, my dearest. Nature’s a windmill. It’ll grind the flour out of everyone of us when the wind blows. It’s no good tilting at it on a windy day; and it’s no good trying to turn the sails round when it’s calm. The wind’ll blow,"--he yawned and turned over on his side--"soon enough." And he was asleep. She believed so much in what her husband said, did the little old white-haired lady. It is not often, that after twenty odd years of married life, a man keeps still alive that ideal of unquestionable reliability which his wife first found in everything he said. Usually there comes a time--sad enough in its way, since ideals are almost everything--when those which once were words of wisdom, fall tainted with the odour of self-interest. It becomes a difficult thing to believe in then, that aphorism of your philosopher, which brings him the warmest seat in the chimney corner, or the softest place in the bed. And that is the wisdom of a lot of people--a philosophy of self, translated into a language for others. By some kink of chance perhaps--though rather it would be kinder to think, by some quality of mutual affection--the old gentleman had avoided this tragedy. It is a tragedy; for no man likes a mean motive to be attributed to his philosophy--especially when it is true. And so, the old lady still believed in the infallibility of her husband’s wisdom which in its way was quite good. That night at least then, she worried no more. She turned over her white head in his direction and she fell asleep. And whenever he turned through the night, she turned as well. After twenty years or so, these things become mechanical. Life is easier after twenty years, if you can bear with it till then. But before John had left, her worries began again and, not daring to speak to him any more, she was driven to bear her trouble in silence. She hoped up to the last that he would mention it once more, and a thousand different times in a thousand different ways, decoyed their conversations into topics which would suggest it to his mind. Yet always with the caution of some wary animal pursued, John avoided it--sheered off and chose another path.