ws I'm fond of Juliet, but I get decidedly tired of
having her held up as a model. And I haven't been anxious to entertain her
until we were in order."

"We're certainly as much in order now as we shall be for some time. Let's
have them out. You'll find they'll see everything there is to praise. It's
their way."

So Anthony and Juliet were asked, and came. Wayne's prophecy was proven a
true one--even Judith grew complacent as her friends admired the result of
her house-furnishing. And in truth there was much to admire. Judith was a
young woman of taste and more or less discretion, and if she could have
had full sway in her purchasing the result might have been admirable. As
it was, the unspoken criticism in the minds of both the guests, as they
followed their hosts about the house, was that Judith had struck a
key-note in her construction of a home a little too ambitious to be wholly
satisfactory.

"I believe in buying the best of everything as far as you go," she said,
indicating a particularly costly lounging chair in a corner of the
living-room. "Of course that was very expensive, but it will always be
right, and we can get others to go with it. The bookcases were another
high-priced purchase, but they give an air to the room worth paying for."

"I've only one objection to this room," said Wayne with some hesitation.
"As Judith says, the things in it seem to be all right, and it certainly
looks in good taste, if I'm any judge, but--I don't know just how to
explain it----" he hesitated again, and smiled deprecatingly at his wife.

"Speak out," said Judith. She was in a very good humour, for her guests
had shown so fine a tact in their commendation that she was in quite a
glow of satisfaction, and for the first time felt the pleasure of the
hostess in an attractive home. "It can't be a serious objection, for
you've liked every single thing we've put into it."

"Indeed I have," agreed Carey, eagerly glancing about the brilliantly lit
room. "I like it all awfully well--especially in the daylight. The corner
by the window is a famous place for reading. But, you see, I'm so little
here in the daytime, except on Sundays. Of course I know we lack the
fireplace that makes your living-room jolly, but it seems as if we lack
something besides that we might have, and for the life of me I can't tell
what it is."

Anthony knew by a certain curve in the corner of his wife's mouth that she
longed to tell him what it was. For h