This should go very well with a banjo accompaniment.

* * * * *

THE TRAGEDY OF AN AUTHOR’S WIFE.

“I won’t stand it any longer,” said Janet intensely, meeting me in the hall.  “Take off your umbrella and listen to me.”

“It’s off,” I replied faintly, perceiving that something was all my fault.  “Can’t you hear it singing ‘Niagara’ in the porch?”

I dropped the shopping on the floor and sat down to watch Janet walking up and down the room.

“I want,” she continued in the tone of one who has had nobody to be indignant with all day, “a divorce.”

“Who for?” I inquired.  “Really, darling, we can’t afford any more presents this—­”

“Me,” she interrupted, frowning.

“Couldn’t you have it for your birthday?” I suggested.  “I may have some more money by then.  Besides, I gave you—­”

“No, I could not,” replied Janet in a voice like the end of the world; “I want it now.  I will not wear myself out trying to live up to an impossible ideal, and lose all my friends because they can’t help comparing me with it.  And it isn’t even as if it were my own ideal.  I never know what I’ve got to be like from one week to another.  And what do I get for my struggles?  Not even recognition, much less gratitude.”

“Janet,” I said kindly, “I don’t know what you’re talking about.  Who are these people who keep idealising you?  I will not have you annoyed in this way.  Send them to me and I’ll put a little solid realism into their heads.  I’ll tell them what you really are, and that’ll settle their unfortunate illusions.  Dear old girl, don’t worry so....  I’ll soon put it right.”

Janet looked at me piercingly.

“It’s this,” she said; “I keep having people to call on me.”

“I know,” I answered, shuddering; “but I can’t help it, can I?  You shouldn’t be so attractive.”

“Dear Willyum,” she replied, “that’s just the point; you can help it.”

“Stop calling me names and I’ll see what can be done.”

“But it’s part of my ‘whimsical wit’ to call you Willyum,” she said grimly.  “I understand that I am like that.  People realise this when they read your articles, and immediately call to see if I’m true.  I’ve read through nearly all your stories to-day, in between the visitors, and—­and—­”

I gripped her hand in silence.

“I’m losing all my friends,” she mourned, touched by my sympathy, “even those who used to like me long ago.  Girls who knew me at school say to themselves, ’Fancy poor old Janet being like that all the time, and we never knew!’ and they rush down to see me again.  They sit hopefully round me as long as they can bear it; then, after the breakdown, they go away indignant and never think kindly of me again.”

She gloomed.

“And all the cousins and nice young men who used to think I was quite jolly have suddenly noticed how much jollier I might be if only I could say the things they say you say I say....”