buoyant good looks, and he felt that he was defrauded by the change in her—a change so marked that even his careless and ledger-bound eyes could not fail to see it. And secretly his poor mundane spirit groaned aloud that his missus—the best-dressed woman in Hong Kong three years ago, and every bit as smart as her clothes—had degenerated into a frumpish nobody, looked older than he did, by the Lord Harry, and without an ounce of snap in her or a word to say to any one. Greatly to his credit, he had kept all this to himself loyally. He had never spoken of it, not even hinted at it, to any one, beyond plaintive and repeated entreaties to Hilda to help him find some way to buck Mother up. He had never been unkind to his wife. He still bought flowers for her—the bouquet she carried at their son's wedding had cost five guineas—and burdened her with gifts of jewelry almost inappropriate to his means. And Mr. Gregory was growing very rich indeed. The wounds that "Mr. Wu" had dealt his fortune had soon healed, and left no scar. He was still a faithful husband. Such pride and consolation as a woman may take from the continence that is chiefly the outcome of a husband's indifference to her sex and of his absorption in business and in self were Mrs. Gregory's. And in all their married life they had had but one quarrel—a unique quarrel, as husbands and wives go. It had occurred two years ago, and had been over a dressmaker's bill.
Such quarrels are common? They are scarcely uncommon—certainly not unique. But this was one with a difference. Mr. Gregory had always seen and paid his wife's dressmakers' bills. It had been one of his greatest pleasures. Madame Eloise had taken less pleasure in concocting those princely accounts, and in receipting them, than Robert Gregory had taken in writing
