hich I inhabit there must be a limit to the thinness of the coffee."

Eve (as he called her, after the mother and prototype of all women--her
earthly name was Marian) sipped the coffee. She wrinkled her forehead
and then glanced at him in trouble.

"Yes, it's thin," she said. "But I've had to ration the cook. Oh,
Arthur, I _am_ going to make you unhappy after all. It's impossible for
me to manage any longer on the housekeeping allowance."

"Why didn't you tell me before, child?"

"I have told you 'before,'" said she. "If you hadn't happened to mention
the coffee, I mightn't have said anything for another fortnight. You
started to give me more money in June, and you said that was the utmost
limit you could go to, and I believed it was. But it isn't enough. I
hate to bother you, and I feel ashamed--"

"That's ridiculous. Why should you feel ashamed?"

"Well, I'm like that."

"You're revelling in your own virtuousness, my girl. Now in last week's
_Economist_ it said that the Index Number of commodity prices had
slightly fallen these last few weeks."

"I don't know anything about indexes and the _Economist_," Eve retorted.
"But I know what coffee is a pound, and I know what the tradesmen's
books are--"

At this point she cried without warning.

"No," murmured Mr. Prohack, soothingly, caressingly. "You mustn't
baptise me. I couldn't bear it." And he kissed her eyes.

III

"I _know_ we can't afford any more for housekeeping," she whispered,
sniffing damply. "And I'm ashamed I can't manage, and I knew I should
make you unhappy. What with idle and greedy working-men, and all these
profiteers...! It's a shame!"

"Yes," said Mr. Prohack. "It's what our Charlie fought for, and got
wounded twice for, and won the M.C. for. That's what it is. But you see
we're the famous salaried middle-class that you read so much about in
the papers, and we're going through the famous process of being crushed
between the famous upper and nether millstones. Those millstones have
been approaching each other--and us--for some time. Now they've begun to
nip. That funny feeling in your inside that's causing you still to
baptise me, in spite of my protest--that's the first real nip."

She caught her breath.

"Arthur," she said. "If you go on like that I shall scream."

"Do," Mr. Prohack encouraged her. "But of course not too loud. At the
same time don't forget that I'm a humourist. Humourists make jokes when
they're happy, and