anxiety burst out. "What difference can
it make about her? About Donaldson's wife? About any hang-over from that
rotten time? They're gone, all of them. He's here. He's safe and happy.
He's strong and fine. That's gone."

In the lower hall Dick was taking off his overcoat.

"Smell's like chicken, Minnie," he said, into the dining room.

"Chicken and biscuits, Mr. Dick."

"Hi, up there!" he called lustily. "Come and feed a starving man. I'm
going to muffle the door-bell!"

He stood smiling up at them, very tidy in his Sunday suit, very boyish,
for all his thirty-two years. His face, smilingly tender as he watched
them, was strong rather than handsome, quietly dependable and faintly
humorous.

"In the language of our great ally," he said, "Madame et Monsieur, le
diner est servi."

In his eyes there was not only tenderness but a somewhat emphasized
affection, as though he meant to demonstrate, not only to them but to
himself, that this new thing that had come to him did not touch their
old relationship. For the new thing had come. He was still slightly
dazed with the knowledge of it, and considerably anxious. Because he had
just taken a glance at himself in the mirror of the walnut hat-rack, and
had seen nothing there particularly to inspire--well, to inspire what he
wanted to inspire.

At the foot of the stairs he drew Lucy's arm through his, and held her
hand. She seemed very small and frail beside him.

"Some day," he said, "a strong wind will come along and carry off Mrs.
Lucy Crosby, and the Doctors Livingstone will be obliged hurriedly to
rent aeroplanes, and to search for her at various elevations!"

David sat down and picked up the old fashioned carving knife.

"Get the clubs?" he inquired.

Dick looked almost stricken.

"I forgot them, David," he said guiltily. "Jim Wheeler went out to look
them up, and I--I'll go back after dinner."

It was sometime later in the meal that Dick looked up from his plate and
said:

"I'd like to cut office hours on Wednesday night, David. I've asked
Elizabeth Wheeler to go into town to the theater."

"What about the baby at the Homer place?"

"Not due until Sunday. I'll leave my seat number at the box office,
anyhow."

"What are you going to see, Dick?" Mrs. Crosby asked. "Will you have
some dumplings?"

"I will, but David shouldn't. Too much starch. Why, it's 'The Valley,' I
think. An actress named Carlysle, Beverly Carlysle, is starring in it."

He ate