"Abram," reproachfully, "have I ever failed you? What is it?" "The next time you have something going on here I want you to invite Kate Prentice." Mrs. Pantin recoiled. "What!" "Don't squawk like that!" said Mr. Pantin, irritably. "You do it often, and it's an annoying mannerism." "Do you quite realize what you are asking?" his wife demanded. "Perfectly," replied Mr. Pantin, calmly. "I've passed the stage when I talk to make conversation." "But think how she's been criticised!" Mr. Pantin got up impatiently. "Oh, you virtuous dames--" Mrs. Pantin's thin lips went shut like a rat-trap. "Abram, are you twitting me?" Mr. Pantin ignored the accusation, and observed astutely: "I presume you've done your share of talking, and that's why--" "She is impossible, and what you ask is impossible," Mrs. Pantin declared firmly. "It's not often that I ask a favor of you, Prissy." His tone was conciliatory. Mrs. Pantin met him half way and her voice was softer as she answered: "I appreciate that, Abram, but there are a few of us who must keep up the bars against such persons. Society--" "Rats!" ejaculated Mr. Pantin coarsely. The hand which she had laid tenderly upon his shoulder was withdrawn as if it harbored a hornet. "I don't understand this at all--not at all," she said, icily. "However," very distinctly, "it is not necessary that I should, for I shall not do it." She folded her arms as she confronted him. Mr. Pantin was silent so long that she thought the battle was over, and purred at him: "You can realize how I feel about it, can't you, darling?" "No, by George, I can't! And I'm not going to either." He slapped the table with Henry Van Dyke in ooze leather for emphasis. "I want Kate Prentice invited here the next time she's in town. If you don't do as I ask, Priscilla, you shan't go a step--not a step--to Keokuk this winter." "Is that an ultimatum?" Mrs. Pantin demanded. Mr. Pantin gave a quick furtive look over either shoulder, then declared with emphatic gusto: "I mean every damn word of it!" Mrs. Pantin stood speechless, thinking rapidly. There was nothing for it evidently but to play her trump card, which never yet had failed her. She wasted no breath in further argument, but threw herself full-length on the davenport and had hysterics. Only a few times in their married life had Mr. Pantin risen on his hind legs, speaking figuratively, and defied her. In the beginning, before he was well housebroken, he was careless in the matter of cleaning his soles on the scraper, and had been obstinate on the question of changing his shirt on Wednesdays, holding that once a week was enough for a person not engaged in manual labor. Mrs. Pantin had won out on each issue, but it had not been an easy victory. Mr. Pantin had been docile so long now that she had expected no further trouble with him, therefore this outbreak was so unlooked for that her fit was almost genuine.