“Perhaps,” suggested the kindly bosom friend, ever the one to plead the cause of the transgressor, “perhaps he was swearing, and she did not hear him. You see, if he had his head well underneath the bed—”

The door opened.

“Sorry I am late,” said Mr. Korner, bursting cheerfully into the room. It was a point with Mr. Korner always to be cheerful in the morning. “Greet the day with a smile and it will leave you with a blessing,” was the motto Mrs. Korner, this day a married woman of six months and three weeks standing had heard her husband murmur before getting out of bed on precisely two hundred and two occasions. The Motto entered largely into the scheme of Mr. Korner's life. Written in fine copperplate upon cards all of the same size, a choice selection counselled him each morning from the rim of his shaving-glass.

“Did you find it?” asked Mrs. Korner.

“It is most extraordinary,” replied Mr. Korner, as he seated himself at the breakfast-table. “I saw it go under the bed with my own eyes. Perhaps—”

“Don't ask me to look for it,” interrupted Mrs. Korner. “Crawling about on their hands and knees, knocking their heads against iron bedsteads, would be enough to make some people swear.” The emphasis was on the “some.”

“It is not bad training for the character,” hinted Mr. Korner, “occasionally to force oneself to perform patiently tasks calculated—”

“If you get tied up in one of those long sentences of yours, you will never get out in time to eat your breakfast,” was the fear of Mrs. Korner.

“I should be sorry for anything to happen to it,” remarked Mr. Korner, “its intrinsic value may perhaps—”

“I will look for it after breakfast,” volunteered the amiable Miss Greene. “I am good at finding things.”

“I can well believe it,” the gallant Mr. Korner assured her, as with the handle of his spoon he peeled his egg. “From such bright eyes as yours, few—”