Mrs. Wilkins was taken aback.  This question of the beds was unexpected.  In inviting Mellersh she had intended to put him in one of the four spare-rooms that she imagined were there.  When there were plenty of rooms and enough servants there was no reason why they should, as they did in their small, two-servanted house at home, share the same one.  Love, even universal love, the kind of love with which she felt herself flooded, should not be tried.  Much patience and self-effacement were needed for successful married sleep.  Placidity; a steady faith; these too were needed.  She was sure she would be much fonder of Mellersh, and he not mind her nearly so much, if they were not shut up together at night, if in the morning they could meet with the cheery affection of friends between whom lies no shadow of differences about the window or the washing arrangements, or of absurd little choked-down resentments at something that had seemed to one of them unfair.  Her happiness, she felt, and her ability to be friends with everybody, was the result of her sudden new freedom and its peace.  Would there be that sense of freedom, that peace, after a night shut up with Mellersh?  Would she be able in the morning to be full towards him, as she was at that moment full, of nothing at all but loving-kindness?  After all, she hadn’t been very long in heaven.  Suppose she hadn’t been in it long enough for her to have become fixed in blandness?  And only that morning what an extraordinary joy it had been to find herself alone when she woke, and able to pull the bed-clothes any way she liked!

Francesca had to nudge her.  She was so much absorbed that she did not notice the pudding.

“If,” thought Mrs. Wilkins, distractedly helping herself, “I share my room with Mellersh I risk losing all I now feel about him.  If on the other hand I put him in the one spare-room, I prevent Mrs. Fisher and Lady Caroline from giving somebody a treat.  True they don’t seem to want to at present, but at any moment in this place one or the other of them may be seized with a desire to make somebody happy, and then they wouldn’t be able to because of Mellersh.”

“What a problem,” she said aloud, her eyebrows puckered.

“What is?” asked Scrap.

“Where to put Mellersh.”

Scrap stared.  “Why, isn’t one room enough for him?” she asked?

“Oh yes, quite.  But then there won’t be any room left at all—­ any room for somebody you may want to invite.”

“I shan’t want to,” said Scrap.

“Or you,” said Mrs. Wilkins to Mrs. Fisher.  “Rose, of course, doesn’t count.  I’m sure she would like sharing her room with her husband.  It’s written all over her.”

“Really—­” said Mrs. Fisher.

“Really what?” asked Mrs. Wilkins, turning hopefully to her, for she thought the word this time was the preliminary to a helpful suggestion.

It was not.  It stood by itself.  It was, as before, mere frost.