n't slept a wink all night: I 've been studying out that character."

"I thought you looked like it. You ought to take some rest to-day."

"I can't. I 've got to put in my time on the same subject."

Mrs. Jones pursed her lips and bustled among the teacups. The idea of
their laughing over their escapades right before her face and thinking
that she did not understand! She made the mental observation that all
men were natural born liars, and most guilty when they appeared to be
most innocent. "Character," indeed! Did they think to blind her to the
true situation of things? Oh, astute woman!

"Strange fellow," said Perkins to his spoon, when, after a slight
breakfast, Brent had left the table.

"There 's others that are just as strange, only they think they 're
sharper," quoth Mrs. Jones, with a knowing look.

"I don't understand you," returned her boarder, turning his attention
from his spoon to the lady's face.

"There 's none so blind as those who don't want to see."

"Again I say, I don't understand you, Mrs. Jones."

"Oh, Mr. Perkins, it 's no use trying to fool me. I know men. In my
younger days I was married to a man."

"Strange contingency! But still it casts no light on your previous
remarks."

"You 've got very innocent eyes, I must say, Mr. Perkins."

"The eyes, madam, are the windows of the soul," Perkins quoted, with
mock gravity.

"Well, if the eyes are the soul's windows, there are some people who
always keep their windows curtained."

"But I must deny any such questionable performance on my part. I have
not the shrewdness to veil my soul from the scrutiny of so keen an
observer as yourself."

"Oh, flattery is n't going to do your cause one mite of good, Mr.
Perkins. I 'm not going to scold, but next time you get him in such a
state I wish you 'd bring him home yourself, and not let him come
tearing in here like a madman, scaring a body half to death."

"Will you kindly explain yourself? What condition? And who is 'him'?"

"Oh, of course you don't know."

"I do not."

"Do you mean to tell me that you were n't out with Mr. Brent last night
before he came home?"

"I assuredly was not with him after the first quarter of an hour."

"Well, it 's hard to believe that he got that way by himself."

"That way! Why, he left me at the door of Meyer's beer-garden to talk to
a temperance crank who he thought was a character."

"Well, no temperance character sent him rushing and stumbling in h