t of it," he admonished further. "You'll only
make your eyes red and give yourself a headache."

"You're a brute, Abram Pantin, and I wish I'd never seen you!"

Mr. Pantin suppressed the reply that the wish was mutual. Instead, he
picked up the leather button which flew on the floor when Mrs. Pantin
doubled her fist and smote the davenport.

"I doubt very much if she'd come, even if you ask her," said Pantin. It
was a stroke of genius.

"Not come!" The eye which Mrs. Pantin exposed regarded Mr. Pantin
scornfully. "Not come? Why, she'd be tickled to pieces."

But of that Mr. Pantin continued to have his own opinion.

Mrs. Pantin sat up and winked rapidly in her indignation.

"She's made if I take her up, and the woman isn't so stupid as not to
know it, is she?"

"She may not see it from that angle," dryly. "At any rate, you'll be
pleasing me greatly by asking her."

Mrs. Pantin looked at her husband fixedly:

"Why this deep interest, Abram?"

Flattered by the implied accusation, Mr. Pantin, however, resisted the
temptation to make Mrs. Pantin jealous, and answered truthfully:

"I admire her greatly. She deserves recognition and will get it. If you
are a wise woman you'll swallow your prejudices and be the first to
admit it."

Mrs. Pantin raised both eyebrows--her own and the one she put on
mornings--incredulously.

"She's the kind that would win out anywhere," he added, with conviction.

Mrs. Pantin stared at him absently, while the tears on her lashes dried
to smudges. She murmured finally:

"I could have pineapple with mayonnaise dressing."

To conceal a smile, Mr. Pantin stooped for his paper.

"Or would you have lettuce with roquefort cheese dressing, Abram?"

"You know much more about such things than I do--your luncheons are
always perfect, Prissy. Who do you think of inviting to meet her?"

Mrs. Pantin considered. Then her eyes sparkled with malice, "I'll begin
with Mrs. Toomey."

* * * * *

In the office of the _Grit_, Hiram Butefish was reading the proof of his
editorial that pointed out the many advantages Prouty enjoyed over its
rival in the next county.

There was no more perfect spot on the footstool for the rearing of
children, Mr. Butefish declared editorially. Fresh air, pure water, and
a moral atmosphere--wherein it differed, he hinted, from its neighbor.
There Vice rampant and innocent Youth met on every corner, while the
curse of the