And she sighed, tolerantly. Patricia had come within the last two weeks to believe that she was neglected, if not positively ill-treated, by her husband; and she had no earthly objection to Mr. Charteris thinking likewise. Her face expressed patient resignation now, as they walked under the close-matted foliage of the beech-trees, which made a pleasant, sun-flecked gloom about them. Patricia removed her hat--the morning really was rather close--and paused where a sunbeam fell upon her copper-colored hair, and glorified her wistful countenance. She sighed once more, and added a finishing touch to the portrait of a _femme incomprise_. "Pray, don't think, _mon ami_," she said very earnestly, "that I am blaming Rudolph! I suppose no wife can ever hope to have any part in her husband's inner life." "Not in her own husband's, of course," said Charteris, cryptically. "No, for while a woman gives her heart all at once, men crumble theirs away, as one feeds bread to birds--a crumb to this woman, a crumb to that--and such a little crumb, sometimes! And his wife gets what is left over." "Pray, where did you read that?" said Charteris. "I didn't read it anywhere. It was simply a thought that came to me," Patricia lied, gently. "But don't let's try to be clever. Cleverness is always a tax, but before luncheon it is an extortion. Personally, it makes me feel as if I had attended a welsh-rabbit supper the night before. Your wife must be very patient." "My wife," cried Charteris, in turn resolved to screen an unappreciative mate, "is the most dear and most kind-hearted among the Philistines. And yet, at times, I grant you--" "Oh, but, of course!" Patricia said impatiently. "I don't for a moment question that your wife is an angel." "And why?" His eyebrows lifted, and he smiled. "Why, wasn't it an angel," Patricia queried, all impishness now, "who kept the first man and woman out of paradise?" "If--if I thought you meant that----!" he cried; and then he shrugged his shoulders. "My wife's virtues merit a better husband than Fate has accorded her. Anne is the best woman I have ever known." Patricia was not unnaturally irritated. After all, one does not take the trouble to meet a man accidentally in a plantation of young beech-trees in order to hear him discourse of his wife's good qualities; and besides, Mr. Charteris was speaking in a disagreeably solemn manner, rather as if he fancied himself in a cathedral. Therefore Patricia cast down her eyes again, and said: "Men of genius are so rarely understood by their wives." "We will waive the question of genius." Mr. Charteris laughed heartily, but he had flushed with pleasure.