Mrs. Martinet looked at me curiously.
"If not a remedy, there is, I am sure, a palliative," I returned, feeling doubtful of the effect of what I had it in my mind to express.
"What is the remedy or palliative of which you speak. Name it, for goodness' sake! Like a drowning man, I will clutch it, if it be but a straw."
"The remedy is patience." My voice slightly faltered as I spoke.
Instantly the colour deepened on the face of Mrs. Martinet. But our close intimacy, and her knowledge of the fact that I was really a friend, prevented her from being offended.
"Patience!" she said, after she had a little recovered herself. "Patience is no remedy. To endure is not to cure."
"In that, perhaps, you are mistaken," I returned. "The effect of patience is to cure domestic evils. A calm exterior and a gentle, yet firm voice, will in nine cases in ten, effect more than the most passionate outbreak of indignant feelings. I have seen it tried over and over again, and I am sure of the effect."
"I should like to have seen the effect of a gentle voice upon my Harry, just now."
"Forgive me for saying," I answered to this, "that in my opinion, if you had met his passionate outbreak at the wrong he had suffered in losing his top-cord, in a different manner from what you did, that the effect would have been of a like different character."
My friend's face coloured more deeply, and her lips trembled. But she had good sense, and this kept her from being offended at what I said. I went on—