to put
into practice in their homes all they have gleaned from the sojourn in
the world; the ill-given service of unfitted menials will disappear,
as will waste and nerve-racking detail.

"And love must be the leavener of it all--with all her progress and
her ability, trained talents and clever logic, the American woman must
not and will not renounce her romance--for it is part of God's very
promise of immortality."

"How often may I come here?" he begged.

Mary shook her head. "You've got me started, as Luke says, and I'm
hard to check. But have you never thought that out of all the world
the American woman is the only woman who cooks and serves her dinner
if it is necessary, adjourns to her parlour afterward and discusses
poetry and politics and the latest style hat with her guests? For she
has learned how to possess true democracy, not rebellion, courage and
not hysterical threats to play the rebel, the slacker.

"And now I'll make you a cup of coffee. And never let me catch you
here again!"

When Luke arrived home he found Steve O'Valley basking in the big
chair he was wont to occupy, though it was past ten o'clock and he had
anticipated questions from Mary as to his tardiness. Instead he found
a very rosy-cheeked, almost sunrise-eyed sister who stammered her
greeting as the flustered Mr. O'Valley found his hat and the neglected
business portfolio and took his leave.

CHAPTER XII

To keep down the rising tide of overweight Beatrice abandoned the
occult method of having a good time and turned her interest to new
creeds containing continual bogus joy and a denial of the vicarious
theory of life. But when she discovered that optimism was no deterrent
to the oncoming tide of flesh she began a vigorous course in face
bleaching, reducing, massage, and electrical treatments, with Trudy
playing attentive friend and confidante and secretly chuckling over
the Gorgeous Girl's fast-appearing double chin and her disappearing
waistline.

The extensive work of making the house into an Italian villa kept
Beatrice from brooding too much over her _embonpoint_. She enjoyed the
endless conferences with the decorators, drapers, artists, and
who-nots, with Gay's suave, flattering little self always at her
elbow, his tactful remarks about So-and-so being altogether too thin,
and the wonderful nutritive value of chocolate.

"Bea will look like a fishwife when she is forty," he told Trudy soon
after the villa was under