Stella reflected a moment. "There was the last appointment, for instance. I found that the awarding of it lay with that funny old Judge Willoughby, with the wart on his nose, and I asked him for it--not the wart, you understand,--and got it. We simply had him to dinner, and I was specially butterfly; I fluttered airily about, was as silly as I knew how to be, looked helpless and wore my best gown. He thought me a pretty little fool, and gave Peter the appointment. That is only an instance, but it shows how I help." Stella regarded me, uncertainly. "Why, but an authorman ought to understand!" Of a sudden I understood a number of things--things that had puzzled. This was the meaning of Stella's queer dinner the night before, and the ensuing theatre-party, for instance; this was the explanation of those impossible men, vaguely heralded as "very influential in politics," and of the unaccountable women, painfully condensed in every lurid shade of satin, and so liberally adorned with gems as to make them almost valuable. Stella, incapable by nature of two consecutive ideas, was determined to manipulate the unseen wires, and to be, as she probably phrased it, the power behind the throne.... "Eh, it would be laughable," I thought, "were not her earnestness so pathetic! For here is Columbine mimicking Semiramis." Yet it was true that Peter Blagden had made tremendous strides in his profession, of late. For a moment, I wondered--? Then I looked at this butterfly young person opposite, and I frowned. "I don't like it," I said, decisively. "It is a bit cold-blooded. It isn't worthy of you, Stella." "It is my career," she flouted me, with shrugging shoulders. "It is the one career the world--our Lichfield world--has left me. And I am doing it for Peter." The absurd look that I objected to--on principle, you understand-- returned at this point in the conversation. I arose, resolutely, for I was really unable to put up with her nonsense. "You are in love with your husband," I grumbled, "and I cannot countenance such eccentricities. These things are simply not done--" She touched my hand. "Old crosspatch, and to think how near I came to marrying you." "I do think of it--sometimes. So you had better stop pawing at me. It isn't safe." I wish I could describe her smile. I wish I knew just what it was that Stella wanted me to say or do as we stood for a moment silent, in this pleasant, half-lit room where brass things blinked in the firelight. "Old crosspatch!" she repeated.... "Stella," said I, with dignity, "I wish it distinctly understood that I am not a funny old judge with a wart on his nose." Whereupon I went away. 14. _He Participates in a Brave Jest_