airs and feed you."

"But I mean--afterward?"

"Bring--or send--you up here to go to bed."

"Are you going away?"

"Where?"

"Away from me."

He looked at her with amused eyes. She was exquisitely lovely; never had
he seen her lovelier. It delighted him to note her charms--the charms
that had enslaved him--not a single charm missing--and to feel that he
was no longer their slave, was his own master again.

A strange look swept across her uncannily mobile face--a look of wonder,
of awe, of fear, of dread. "You don't even like me any more," she said
in her colorless way.

"What have I done to make you think I dislike you?" said he pleasantly.

She gazed down in silence.

"You need have no fear," said he. "You are my wife. You will be well
taken care of, and you will not be annoyed. What more can I say?"

"Thank you," she murmured.

He winced. She had made him feel like an unpleasant cross between an
alms-giver and a bully. "Now," said he, with forced but resolute
cheerfulness, "we will eat, drink and be merry."

On the way down in the elevator he watched her out of the corner of his
eye. When they reached the hall leading to the supper room he touched
her arm and halted her. "My dear," said he in the pleasant voice which
yet somehow never failed to secure attention and obedience, "there will
be some of my acquaintances in there at supper. I don't want them to see
you with that whipped dog look. There's no occasion for it."

Her lip trembled. "I'll do my best," said she.

"Let's see you smile," laughed he. "You have often shown me that you
know the woman's trick of wearing what feelings you choose on the
outside. So don't pretend that you've got to look as if you were about
to be hung for a crime you didn't commit. There!--that's better."

And indeed to a casual glance she looked the happy bride trying--not
very successfully--to seem used to her husband and her new status.

"Hold it!" he urged gayly. "I've no fancy for leading round a lovely
martyr in chains. Especially as you're about as healthy and well placed
a person as I know. And you'll feel as well as you look when you've had
something to eat."

Whether it was obedience or the result of a decision to drop an
unprofitable pose he could not tell, but as soon as they were seated and
she had a bill of fare before her and was reading it, her expression of
happiness lost its last suggestion of being forced. "Crab meat!" she
said. "I love it!"

"Tw