And then--I did not know you were married."
"No, oh, no," I said hastily. "But, of course, the more a woman
is married--I mean, you can not say too many nice things to
married women. They--need them, you know."
I had floundered miserably, with his eyes on me, and I half
expected him to be shocked, or to say that married women should
be satisfied with the nice things their husbands say to them. But
he merely remarked apropos of nothing, or following a line of
thought he had not voiced, that it was trite but true that a good
many men owed their success in life to their wives.
"And a good many owe their wives to their success in life," I
retorted cynically. At which he stared at me again.
It was then that the real complexity of the situation began to
develop. Some one had rung the bell and been admitted to the
library and a maid came to the door of the den. When she saw us
she stopped uncertainly. Even then it struck me that she looked
odd, and she was not in uniform. However, I was not informed at
that time about bachelor establishments, and the first thing she
said, when she had asked to speak to me in the hall, knocked her
and her clothes clear out of my head. Evidently she knew me.
"Miss McNair," she said in a low tone. "There is a lady in the
drawing room, a veiled person, and she is asking for Mr.
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