“Don’t call me old companion!”
“Eh, what? Oh, right-o!”
Lucille steered her husband out of the danger zone, and they entered the lift.
“Poor father!” she said, as they went to their suite, “it’s a shame. They must have done it to annoy him. This man McCall has a place next to some property father bought in Westchester, and he’s bringing a law-suit against father about a bit of land which he claims belongs to him. He might have had the tact to go to another hotel. But, after all, I don’t suppose it was the poor little fellow’s fault. He does whatever his wife tells him to.”
“We all do that,” said Archie the married man.
Lucille eyed him fondly.
“Isn’t it a shame, precious, that all husbands haven’t nice wives like me?”
“When I think of you, by Jove,” said Archie, fervently, “I want to babble, absolutely babble!”
“Oh, I was telling you about the McCalls. Mr. McCall is one of those little, meek men, and his wife’s one of those big, bullying women. It was she who started all the trouble with father. Father and Mr. McCall were very fond of each other till she made him begin the suit. I feel sure she made him come to this hotel just to annoy father. Still, they’ve probably taken the most expensive suite in the place, which is something.”
Archie was at the telephone. His mood was now one of quiet peace. Of all the happenings which went to make up existence in New York, he liked best the cosy tête-à-tête dinners with Lucille in their suite, which, owing to their engagements—for Lucille was a popular girl, with many friends—occurred all too seldom.