"Gertrude Trevor is not yet a wife. The best wife in the world is beside me now; and since you are already proved to be in the wrong you must perforce pay the penalty."
She was in the act of doing so when Gertrude entered the room.
"Oh, dear," she began, hesitating in pretended consternation, "is there never to be an end of it?"
"An end of what?" demanded my wife with some little asperity, for she does not like her little endearments to be witnessed by other people.
"Of this billing and cooing," the other replied. "You two insane creatures have been married more than four years, and yet a third person can never enter the room without finding you love-making. I declare it upsets all one's theories of marriage. One of my most cherished ideas was that this sort of thing ceased with the honeymoon, and that the couple invariably lead a cat-and-dog life for the remainder of their existence."
"So they do," my wife answered unblushingly. "And what can you expect when one is a great silly creature who will not learn to jump away and be looking innocently out of the window when he hears the handle turned? Never marry, Gertrude. Mark my words: you will repent it if you do!"
"Well, for ingratitude and cool impudence, that surpasses everything!" I said in astonishment. "Why, you audacious creature, not more than five minutes ago you were inviting me to co-operate in the noble task of finding a husband for Miss Trevor!"
"Richard, how can you stand there and say such things?" she ejaculated. "Gertrude, my dear, I insist that you come away at once. I don't know what he will say next."
Miss Trevor laughed.
"I like to hear you two squabbling," she said. "Please go on, it amuses me!"