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“But we haven’t any,” objected Mrs. Darius Hardy, Jr., meekly.

“Then get up one,” said the one time president of clubs. “Get all you can to join a class, send for a teacher, and I will make up the deficit, in the subscription list.”

A parliamentary teacher of renown came. She was also a teacher of expression–that was her poetical word. Hester caught her breath the first time her mother-in-law rose in the class to “speak to the motion.” She embraced her with beaming eyes and the prettiest rose of delight on her cheeks. “Oh, how did you learn it?” she sighed, happily, “you are the best of us all!”

“I took some private lessons in Chicago,” said Mrs. Hardy–her quiet manner did not betray an unexpected thrill.

“You’re beautiful !” cried Hester.

After that, Hester always seconded her mother-in-law’s motions; and fought in the mimic debates as valiantly on her side as a natural reticence would let her. It was odd (to Mrs. Hardy) what a different relation grew up between them; a sense of comradeship and the pleasures of partisanship, wherein it is not only the leader who exults in the winning fray, the follower has a simpler and a nobler joy. The first natural consequence of Hester’s admiration was that she begged her mother-in-law to join her club. Before the end of the year, Mrs. Hardy was elected president of the club; before the end of the next year, she was burrowing in books and magazines, as absorbed as Hester, in the conduct of Great Britain to her colonies. She found herself suddenly interested in the newspapers; Darrie talked politics with her; and they were no longer unintelligible.

“Whew, isn’t mother getting cultivated!” Darius whispered to his boy; and they both grinned.

“She’s growing handsomer, too,” said Darius the younger.

“I hope she won’t go to any of those fakirs in the newspapers who paint you all over, so’s you crack when you laugh,” commented Darius, anxiously, “and, say, Darrie, there’s a way they have, nowadays, of burning off your skin and giving you a new skin–they call it being ‘ done over‘; it must be frightful torture–I’m not going to have your mother’s face sizzled up, that fashion.”

“She doesn’t need it; mother’s skin is lovely,” said the loyal son.

“Her not needing it is no reason why she won’t want it–being a woman–Darrie. Your mother is the most sensible woman in the world, Darrie; but she’s a woman. And I’m not sure whether a woman ought to monkey with her age, the way mother is doing. What do you suppose I saw with my own eyes, yesterday? There was mother, swinging her arms over her head and bowing like a heathen Chinee, until her slender fingers touched the floor; and then she went to kicking over the chairs–high kicks!”

“Oh, that’s only Delsarte–they only do that to limber up and make themselves graceful. Hetty can kick the chandelier.”

Myrtle caught echoes of this conversation; and was base enough to listen behind her sewing-room curtains, giving no sign. It was true that a change had come over her, and that her mirror reflected smarter toilets, a different carriage, and a fresher charm. For one reason, she looked younger because she was much more cheerful. “I am a child with a new toy,” she would say to herself. But there is no question that she found a pungent enjoyment in her new activity. One of the perpetual wonders of life is how small a figure the stake cuts in the game. It is infinitely more exciting to make money, for example, than to have it. To keep our souls in repair they need exercise; and the vicissitudes, the emotions, the excitement of a career, happily do not depend on the size of the stage. The great stake, the large stage, count; but they count less than their claims. What comes to more than the pomp of success (as the vulgar name an intangible thing) is the elation of using all one’s powers; nor is there any tawdry applause comparable to the rich and fine content of accomplishment. But often Myrtle caught Darius’s pondering eyes and wondered to herself what he was thinking. Really, Darius was experiencing the rather piquant emotions of a man who discovers an entirely new creature in his own wife. By a natural transition his thoughts went back to the days when he was courting Myrtle Danforth, and “couldn’t make her out;” by an equally natural process of selection, he fumbled through dim passages in his soul, striving to see the relation between this assured and graceful woman of affairs and the joyous young beauty that he had won, the high-hearted comrade of his poverty and struggles, the tender comforter of his sorrows. A hundred little trivial, affecting incidents rose out of the hazy years to gripe his heart. He felt a novel shyness, however; and the only token of his feelings (outside the check-book) was a habit he had fallen into of watching his wife when she was not looking.