Jessie, you must not ask these people again: I will not have them come to to the house.

But I like them, Tom; Ellen is a great chum of mine; we were school-girls together.

I can’t help that. I don’t like them, and that’s enough.

Then it seems this house is yours, and not ours.

Be reasonable, you are always extreme. It is ours for all right and proper purposes.

I will try to be reasonable, Tom, but I am so stupid, and I cannot understand. You endowed me with all your worldly goods, I thought; and this house,—was it excepted?

Really, Jessie, what a goose you are! That was a mere form,—a detail in the marriage service.

Well, let us quit that just now, Tom. You admit it is ours for right and proper purposes; but you decide that for me to meet my old time-tried friends herein is not right and proper. By what authority do you become the law-maker?

In the first place, you vowed to obey, and in the second here is my warrant: God made man to rule over his wife.

Oh! now I begin to see daylight, Tom. Your first point, the promise to obey, was a mere detail in the marriage service. I had forgotten it; and for the second, it is a forgery, God is obsolete. As I do not recognize him, I rebel.

What! Jessie! How insane you are! Remember, I support this house by my earnings and will always regulate its affairs. I insist that you do not ask the Shermans again.

I might earn as good a living as I desire if I spent my time and strength in printing or teaching, instead of in bringing forth and rearing our children and in doing the housework, etc. This is not to be taken as the equivalent of your labor?

No, of course not. You dear little fool, what do you do but potter about and make the house pleasant for a chap when he’s tired. I’m awful glad to have you singing round and making it cosy, but—

You said just now I insist. Supposing I also insist and ask Ellen again.

Jessie, you make me tired. I shall turn her out neck and crop if she comes.

Now I see completely. It is all clear, Tom. You are stronger than I am. Your right to command is only might to enforce your will. We are not equals in muscle, and I have put myself in your power. I have been for some time past suspecting ours was no marriage. I go to take lessons of Sullivan: when I return, I may be strong enough to eject Mr. Hartnell, your cousin, whose presence in this house is a continual offence to me.

Jessie, you’re enough to drive me to the devil. What are you putting on your hat for?

That is my concern.

Sit down, I tell you.

If you touch me, Tom, I shall go at some future time and not come back to you. I am wanting fresh air. I must be alone. I must think.

Think! that is too absurd! Now, come, dear ickle sing, let’s make up this silly quarrel. Your chap loves his wee wife.

It’s no quarrel. I have not been angry, and besides it is too cold and sad a fact to fall out over. The truth begins to show me that what I thought was gold is only brass. I am a slave. I, who am your acknowledged equal in learning and accomplishments, failing the muscle, have to knuckle under, deceive you, or go. Which of the three ways, the two first so well-worn, the third so lonesome, thorny, and untried, I take, remains to be proved, but—

Exit Tom banging the door and whistling Yankee Doodle.

Miriam Daniell