offers about the poorest returns, from a business standpoint, of any feminine occupation—the longest hours, the hardest work, the greatest drain on your patience, the most exacting master and the smallest pay, to say nothing of no holidays and not even an evening off."

[64]

"Nor a chance to 'give notice' if you don't like your job," added the bachelor sympathetically.

"If the average business man," went on the widow, ignoring the interruption, "demanded half of his stenographer that he demands of his wife he couldn't keep her three hours."

"And yet," remarked the bachelor, pulling on his pipe meditatively, "the average stenographer is only too[65] glad to exchange her position for that of wife whenever she gets——"

[65]

The jangle of gold bangles, as the widow brought her arms down from behind her head and sat up straight, interrupted his speech.

"Whenever she gets——"

The widow picked up her ruffles and started to rise.

"Whenever she gets—ready," finished the bachelor quickly.

The widow sat down again and leaned back against the tree.

"How perfectly you illustrate my point," she remarked sweetly.

"Oh," said the bachelor, taking his pipe out of his mouth, "did you have a point?"

"That marriage is something higher and finer than a business proposition, Mr. Travers, and that[66] there are lots of reasons for marrying besides financial ones."

[66]

"Oh, yes," agreed the bachelor, "there is folly and feminine coercion and because you can't get out of it, and——"

"As for marriage as a money affair," pursued the widow without waiting, "it's just the money side of it that causes all the squabbles and unhappiness. If they've got it, they are always quarreling over it and if they haven't got it they are always quarreling for it. The Castellanes and Marlboroughs who fight over their bills and their debts aren't any happier than the Murphys and the Hooligans who fight over the price of a pint of beer. It's just as difficult to know what to do 

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