r," said Mr. Dale solemnly, "you're a fool."

"If you mean my age, Henry," cried the other, his whole face a dusky
crimson, that sent the tears stinging into his little brown eyes, "I
cannot say I think your--surprise--is--ah--justified. It is not as though
there was anything unsuitable--she--they--are quite my age. And for
Willie's sake, I doubt if it is not a--a duty. And I am only sixty-one
and a half, Henry. You did not remember, perhaps, that I was so much
younger than you?"

Mr. Dale pulled off his red handkerchief, and wiped his forehead; after
which he said quite violently, "The devil!"

"Oh," remonstrated Mr. Denner, balancing his mug on his knee, and lifting
his hands deprecatingly, "not such words, Henry,--not such words; we are
speaking of ladies, Henry."

Mr. Dale was silent.

"You have no idea," the other continued, "in your comfortable house, with
a good wife, who makes you perfectly happy, how lonely a man is who lives
as I do; and I can tell you, the older he grows, the more he feels it. So
really, age is a reason for considering it."

"I was not thinking of age," said Mr. Dale feebly.

"Well, then," replied the other triumphantly, "age is the only objection
that could be urged. A man is happier and better for female influence;
and the dinners I have are really not--not what they should be, Henry.
That would all be changed, if I had a--ah--wife."

"Denner," said his friend, "there are circumstances where a dinner of
herbs is more to be desired than a stalled ox, you will remember."

"That is just how I feel," said the other eagerly, and too much
interested in his own anxieties to see Mr. Dale's point. "Mary is not
altogether amiable."

Again Mr. Dale was silent.

"I knew you would see the--the--desirability of it," the lawyer
continued, the flush of embarrassment fading away, "and so I decided to
ask your advice. I thought that, not only from your own--ah--heart, but
from the novels and tales you read, you would be able to advise me in any
matter of esteem."

Mr. Dale groaned, and shook his head from side to side.

"But, good Lord, Denner, books are one thing, life's another. You can't
live in a book, man."

"Just so," said Mr. Denner, "just so; but I only want the benefit of your
experience in reading these tales of--ah--romance. You see, here is my
trouble, Henry,--I cannot make up my mind."

"To do it?" cried Mr. Dale, with animation.

But Mr. Denner interrupted him with a polite