ou're at that
house."

But Wayne, staring up at the wintry sky, answered, more roughly than his
wife had ever heard him speak: "_No_--God knows I envy them even at a time
like this!"

XXIII.--TWO NOT OF A KIND

"Yes, they are very pleasant rooms," Juliet admitted, with the air of one
endeavouring to be polite. She sat upon a many-hued divan, and glanced
from the blue-and-yellow wall-paper to the green velvet chairs, the
dull-red carpet and the stiff "lace" curtains. "You get the afternoon sun,
and the view opposite isn't bad. The vestibule seemed to be well kept, and
I rang only three times before I made you hear."

"The janitor promised to fix that bell," said Judith hastily. "Oh, I know
the colour combinations are dreadful, but one can't help that in rented
rooms. Of course our things look badly with the ones that belong here. But
as soon as we can we are going to move into a still better place."

"Going to keep house?"

"No-o, not just yet." Judith hesitated. "You seem to think there's nothing
in the world to do but to keep house."

"I'm sure of it."

"I can't see why. A girl doesn't need to assume all the cares of life the
minute she marries. Why can't she keep young and fresh for a while?"

Juliet glanced toward a mirror opposite. "How old and haggard I must be
looking," she observed, with--it must be confessed--a touch of
complacency. The woman who could have seen that image reflected as her own
without complacency must have been indifferent, indeed.

"Of course, you manage it somehow--I suppose because Anthony takes such
care of you. But you wait till five years more have gone over your head,
and see if you're not tired of it."

"If I'm as tired of it as you are--" began Juliet, and stopped. "But
seriously, Judith, is it nothing to you to please Wayne?"

"Why, of course." Judith flushed. "But Wayne is satisfied."

"Are you sure of it?"

"Certainly. Oh, sometimes, when we go to see you, and you make things so
pleasant with your big fire and your good things to eat, he gets a spasm
of wishing we were by ourselves, but----"

Juliet shook her head. "Wayne doesn't say a word," she said, "and he's as
devoted to you as a man can be. But, Judith, if I know the symptoms, that
husband of yours is starving for a home, and--do I dare say it?"

Judith was staring out of the window at the ugly walls opposite. It was
her bedroom window, and the opposite walls were not six feet away.

"I suppose you