The morning broke clear, and for Mrs. Jett full of small reassurances. It was good to hear the clatter of milk deliveries, and the first bar of sunshine came in through the hand-embroidered window curtains like a smile, and she could smile back. Later she ventured down shamefacedly for the two cups of coffee, which she drank bravely, facing the inevitable potpourri of comment from this one and that one. "That was a fine scare you gave us last night, Mrs. Jett." "I woke up stiff with fright. Didn't I, Will? Gracious! That first yell was a curdler!" "Just before Jeanette was born I used to have bad dreams, too, but nothing like that. My!" "My mother had a friend whose sister-in-law walked in her sleep right out of a third-story window and was dashed to--" "Shh-h-h!" "It's natural, Mrs. Jett. Don't you worry." She really tried not to, and after some subsequent and private reassurance from Mrs. Peopping and Mrs. Keller, went for her hansom ride with a pleasant anticipation of the Park in red leaf, Mrs. Plush, in a brocade cape with ball fringe, sitting erect beside her. One day, in the presence of Mrs. Peopping, Mrs. Jett jumped to her feet with a violent shaking of her right hand, as if to dash off something that had crawled across its back. "Ugh!" she cried. "It flopped right on my hand. A minnow! Ugh!" "A what?" cried Mrs. Peopping, jumping to her feet and her flesh seeming to crawl up. "A minnow. I mean a bug--a June bug. It was a bug, Mrs. Peopping." There ensued a mock search for the thing, the two women, on all-fours, peering beneath the chairs. In that position they met levelly, eye to eye. Then without more ado rose, brushing their knees and reseating themselves. "Maybe if you would read books you would feel better," said Mrs. Peopping, scooping up a needleful of steel beads. "I know a woman who made it her business to read all the poetry books she could lay hands on, and went to all the bandstand concerts in the Park the whole time, and now her daughter sings in the choir out in Saginaw, Michigan." "I know some believe in that," said Mrs. Jett, trying to force a smile through her pallor. "I must try it." But the infinitesimal stitching kept her so busy. * * * * * It was inevitable, though, that in time Henry should begin to shoulder more than a normal share of unease. One evening she leaned across the little lamplit table between them as he sat reading in the Persian-design dressing gown and said, as rapidly as her lips could form the dreadful repetition, "The fish, the fish, the fish, the fish." And then, almost impudently for her, disclaimed having said it. He urged her to visit her doctor and she would not, and so, secretly, he did, and came away better satisfied, and with directions for keeping her diverted, which punctiliously he tried to observe.