purpose. No one
ever sees you nowadays."

Dr. Chetwynd smiled.

"Perhaps you do not know I am a married man," he said. "Which
accounts for a good deal of my time, and as a matter of fact I have
but little leisure, for my practice keeps me always at the
grindstone."

"Doing pretty well?"

"Yes, I think I may say I am. Uphill work, of course, but still--"

"And where are you living?"

Chetwynd hesitated.

"Close by here," he replied the next moment. "Come home with me now,
if you have nothing better to do, and allow me to present my wife to
you."

And they walked on side by side.

"You have dined? I am afraid--"

"My dear fellow, I have this moment left the club."

Dr. Chetwynd put his latch-key into the lock and ushered his friend
upstairs to his wife's pretty drawing-room.

But Bella was not there; and finding that she was not in her bedroom,
or in fact in the house at all, he rang the bell and questioned the
maid as to when her mistress had gone out and if she knew when she
would be likely to return.

"No, sir, that I'm sure I don't. My mistress never said anything to
me."

"Well, she is not likely to be away long," remarked the doctor
philosophically. "Have a cigar, Meynell."

"Thanks, no. Your wife spoils you, Jack, if she allows you to smoke
in her pretty little room."

"Oh, she will not mind; but we will go down to my den shortly. You
see, Meynell, I'm a bit of a Bohemian, although I like to preserve
the customs of the civilised world all the same, to a certain extent.
But my little wife--well--she--she--I daresay you may have heard she
was on the stage before I married her."

"No, indeed I hadn't." Gus Meynell looked a good deal surprised.

"Well, I mention it because perhaps she is not quite like the
ordinary run of women."

Meynell could no longer be blind to the want of ease in his host's
manner, and in his turn became proportionately uncomfortable.

"Hang it all! A man marries to please himself," he said awkwardly.

"She is just the dearest girl in the world," continued Jack Chetwynd,
with warmth. "I'm not only fond of her, but proud of her too, but you
know--"

"I perfectly understand what you mean. To my idea unconventionality
is the most charming thing a woman can have. I hate the bride
manufactured out of the schoolgirl. The oppressive resemblance
between most of our friends' wives is one of the safe-guards of
society."

"What is that?" Chetwynd broke in upon his friend's