im, he married perhaps the dullest
woman he could have found. Mrs. Poppleton not only never made a joke,
but couldn't understand what joking meant. Only the flattest literalism
was intelligible to her; she could follow nothing but the very macadam
of conversation--had no palate for anything but the suet-pudding of
talk.'

Rhoda's eyes twinkled, and Miss Barfoot laughed. Everard was allowing
himself a freedom in expression which hitherto he had sedulously
avoided.

'Yes,' he continued, 'she was by birth a lady--which made the
infliction harder to bear. Poor old Poppleton! Again and again I have
heard him--what do you think?--laboriously _explaining_ jests to her.
That was a trial, as you may imagine. There we sat, we three, in the
unbeautiful little parlour--for they were anything but rich. Poppleton
would say something that convulsed me with laughter--in spite of my
efforts, for I always dreaded the result so much that I strove my
hardest to do no more than smile appreciation. My laugh compelled Mrs.
Poppleton to stare at me--oh, her eyes I Thereupon, her husband began
his dread performance. The patience, the heroic patience, of that dear,
good fellow! I have known him explain, and re-explain, for a quarter of
an hour, and invariably without success. It might be a mere pun; Mrs.
Poppleton no more understood the nature of a pun than of the binomial
theorem. But worse was when the jest involved some allusion. When I
heard Poppleton begin to elucidate, to expound, the perspiration
already on his forehead, I looked at him with imploring anguish. Why
_would_ he attempt the impossible? But the kind fellow couldn't
disregard his wife's request. Shall I ever forget her. "Oh--yes--I
see"?--when obviously she saw nothing but the wall at which she sat
staring.'

'I have known her like,' said Miss Barfoot merrily.

'I am convinced his madness didn't come from business anxiety. It was
the necessity, ever recurring, ever before him, of expounding jokes to
his wife. Believe me, it was nothing but that.'

'It seems very probable,' asserted Rhoda dryly.

'Then there's another friend of yours whose marriage has been
unfortunate,' said the hostess. 'They tell me that Mr. Orchard has
forsaken his wife, and without intelligible reason.'

'There, too, I can offer an explanation,' replied Barfoot quietly,
'though you may doubt whether it justifies him. I met Orchard a few
months ago in Alexandria, met him by chance in the street, and