er, of course; and if we
did have to do it, we wouldn't have a big house like this for you to do
it in. But I didn't marry for a cook, and I knew I wasn't getting one
when I married you."

Billy bridled into instant wrath.

"Well, I like that, Bertram Henshaw! Can't I cook? Haven't I proved that
I can cook?"

Bertram laughed, and kissed the indignant lips till they quivered into
an unwilling smile.

"Bless your spunky little heart, of course you have! But that doesn't
mean that I want you to do it. You see, it so happens that you can do
other things, too; and I'd rather you did those. Billy, you haven't
played to me for a week, nor sung to me for a month. You're too tired
every night to talk, or read together, or go anywhere with me. I married
for companionship--not cooking and sweeping!"

Billy shook her head stubbornly. Her mouth settled into determined
lines.

"That's all very well to say. You aren't hungry now, Bertram. But it's
different when you are, and they said 'twould be."

"Humph! 'They' are Aunt Hannah and Kate, I suppose."

"Yes--and the 'Talk to Young Wives.'"

"The w-what?"

Billy choked a little. She had forgotten that Bertram did not know about
the "Talk to Young Wives." She wished that she had not mentioned the
book, but now that she had, she would make the best of it. She drew
herself up with dignity.

"It's a book; a very nice book. It says lots of things--that have come
true."

"Where is that book? Let me see it, please."

With visible reluctance Billy got down from her perch on Bertram's knee,
went to her desk and brought back the book.

Bertram regarded it frowningly, so frowningly that Billy hastened to its
defense.

"And it's true--what it says in there, and what Aunt Hannah and Kate
said. It _is_ different when they're hungry! You said yourself if I'd
tend to my husband and my home a little more, and--"

Bertram looked up with unfeigned amazement.

"I said what?" he demanded.

In a voice shaken with emotion, Billy repeated the fateful words.

"I never--when did I say that?"

"The night Uncle William and I came home from--Pete's."

For a moment Bertram stared dumbly; then a shamed red swept to his
forehead.

"Billy, _did_ I say that? I ought to be shot if I did. But, Billy, you
said you'd forgiven me!"

"I did, dear--truly I did; but, don't you see?--it was true. I _hadn't_
tended to things. So I've been doing it since."

A sudden comprehension illuminated Bertr