"

"But they aren't reasonable," declared the bachelor doggedly.

The widow closed her book with a sigh and laid it on the table beside
her.

"Who said they were?" she asked witheringly. "Neither is a woman. Being
reasonable is so stupid. It's worse than being suitable or sensible,
or--or proper."

The bachelor lifted his eyebrows in mild astonishment.

"I thought those were virtues," he protested.

"They are, Mr. Travers," returned the widow crushingly, "and that's why
they're so uninteresting. You might as well ask why is music, or
painting, or pate de foie gras, or champagne, or ice cream, or anything
else charming and delicious--"

"And utterly useless."

"Of course," agreed the widow, leaning back and thoughtfully twisting
the bit of lace she called a handkerchief. "It's the utterly useless
things that make the world attractive and pleasant to live in--like
flowers and bonbons and politics and love--"

"And tobacco," added the bachelor reflectively.

"Woman is the dessert to the feast," went on the widow, "the trimmings
on the garment of life, the spice in the pudding. Of course, a man can
eat his dinner without dessert or champagne and live his life without
kisses or a woman--but somehow he never does."

"And that's just where he gets into trouble," retorted the bachelor
promptly. "If you could only tell," he went on pathetically, "what any
one of them was going to do or why she was going to do it, or----"

"Then it isn't 'Why _is_ a woman?' but 'Why _does_ a woman?' that you
wanted to know," interrupted the widow helpfully.

"That's it!" cried the bachelor, "why does she get off a car backward?
Why does she wear a skirt four yards long and then get furious if you
step on it? Why does she make a solemn and important engagement without
the slightest intention of keeping it? Why does she put on open-work
stockings and gaudy shoes and hold her frock as high as she dares--and
then annihilate you if you stare at her? Why does she use everything as
it was not intended to be used--a hairpin to pick a lock, a buttonhook
to open a can, a hairbrush to hammer a nail, a hatpin to rob a letter
box, a razor to sharpen a pencil and a cup and saucer to decorate the
mantelpiece? Why does she gush over the woman she hates worst and snub
the man she is dying to marry? Why does she lick all the glue off a
postage stamp and then try to make it stick? Why does she cry at a
wedding and act frivolous at a funeral? Why doe