t Abbie's
loud praise of the general effect and her unfailing instinct for
picking out the worst things on the walls or the floors. This distress
caused a counter-distress of self-rebuke.

Jake was on his dignity at first, but finally he unbent enough to take
off his coat, hang it over a chair, and stretch himself out on a divan
whose ulterior maroon did not disturb his repose in the least.

"This is what I call something like," he said; and then, "And now,
Mamise, set in and tell us all about yourself."

This was the last thing Mamise wanted to do, and she evaded with a
plea:

"I can wait. I want to hear all about you, Abbie darling. How are you,
and how long have you been married, and where do you live?"

"Goin' on eight years come next October, and we got three childern. I
been right poorly lately. Don't seem to take as much interest in
worshin' as I useter."

"Washing!" Marie Louise exclaimed. "You don't wash, do you? That is, I
mean to say--professionally?"

"Yes, I worsh. Do right smart of work, too."

Marie Louise was overwhelmed. She had a hundred thousand dollars, and
her sister was a--washerwoman! It was intolerable. She glanced at
Jake.

"But Mr.--your husband--"

"Oh, Jake, he works--off and on. But he ain't got what you might call
a hankerin' for it. He can take work or let it alone. I can't say as
much for him when it comes to licker. Fact is, some the women say,
'Why, Mrs. Nuddle, how do you ever--'"

"Your name isn't--it isn't Nuddle, is it?" Marie Louise broke in.

"Sure it is. What did you think it was?"

So the sleeping brother-in-law was the mysterious inquirer. That
solved one of her day's puzzles and solved it very tamely. So many of
life's mysteries, like so many of fiction's, peter out at the end.
They don't sustain.

Marie Louise still belonged to the obsolescent generation that
believed it a husband's duty to support his wife by his own labor. The
thought of her sister supporting a worthless husband by her own toil
was odious. The first task was to get Jake to work. It was only
natural that she should think of her own new mania.

She spoke so eagerly that she woke Jake when she said: "I have it! Why
doesn't your husband go in for ship-building?"

Marie Louise told him about Davidge and what Davidge had said of the
need of men. She was sure that she could get him a splendid job, and
that Mr. Davidge would do anything for her.

Jake was about to rebuke such impudence as it