"I can quite imagine it," returned my husband, with an irony wasted on Jepson, but delightful to me.

"Well," said our visitor, rising, "I hope you will think better of it and send me a cheque for the full amount. It will save unpleasantness."

"I antic.i.p.ate unpleasantness from my past experience with you," said the Angel, "and that is every cent you will get from me for November rent."

"Then we shall sue you, Mr. Jardine. Doubtless you would be embarra.s.sed to be sued for twenty-seven dollars."

"It wouldn't embarra.s.s me to be sued for twenty-seven cents," said Aubrey, cheerfully, for he always expands in good nature when the other man shows signs of temper.

"Do you expect us to sue?" asked the astonished agent.

"Here is my defence," said Aubrey, pleasantly, drawing a bundle of law papers from his pocket. "My partner and I have been at work on this case for a fortnight."

Jepson sat down again suddenly and unwound his neck-scarf. The Angel does look gentle.

"I didn't think--" he began and stopped, but Aubrey helped him out.

"You didn't think several things, Mr. Jepson. You didn't think I meant it when I said I must have heat. You didn't think I meant it when I wrote you that I would go to a hotel if you didn't give it to me. You didn't think I would resent your paying no attention to our requests about cleaning the halls. You didn't think I intended to live in this apartment to suit my own comfort and convenience and not yours. You didn't think I could force you to live up to the terms of our lease, which says 'heat when necessary.' But I intend to give you an opportunity right now to change your mind about several things."

Jepson dropped his hat on the floor and fumbled for it.

"I'll take the matter up with the president of our company," he said.

"Do," said Aubrey, cordially.

The next morning while Aubrey was down-town the president of the real estate company called.

"Now, Mrs. Jardine," he said, "I just thought I would drop in while your husband was away to discuss this little difficulty in a friendly way and see if you and I couldn't come to some arrangement by which both parties will be satisfied."

"Yes?" I said.

"You see, Mrs. Jardine, you as a lady will realize that your husband took a very high-handed way,--in fact, I may say it was the most high-handed proceeding I have ever heard of in all my business career."

"Yes? I suppose it must have astonished you as much as it amazed us to discover that we were to be heated by date instead of by temperature."

"Er--er well! Of course, you didn't know, but you must understand that that rule obtains among all agents in New York."

"So we heard," I said, indifferently.

"You know that?"

"Oh, certainly."

"Did you know what method Mr. Jardine was about to pursue to force us to heat your apartment before any one else asked for heat?"

"I suggested it to him," I said, gently.

"You sug--Well, of course. Hum! I see."

"And as for none of the other tenants wanting heat, every family in the house asked for it. The lady on the third floor has a five-weeks-old baby, and, as you know, there are no gas-logs in any of the bedrooms."

"Well," said the president, rising, "I must look into this. I will take the matter up with the owners."

"Good morning," I said. "I will tell Mr. Jardine that you called."

"Yes, do," he said, hurriedly putting on his hat, and then taking it off again. "Good morning. Mr. Jardine will hear from me."

"I hope so," I said to myself as Mary closed the door. "We never have before."

The owners called next, singly and in couples. We were delighted to meet them, for we were convinced that we never would have had the pleasure of their acquaintance under any other circ.u.mstances.

After more interviews and letters than any $27 ever occasioned before, we finally received a letter stating that our claim had been allowed, and they enclosed a receipt in full for November's rent.

n.o.body believed us when we told them, and we nearly wore the letter out exhibiting it. It is worn at the folding places now from much handling, like an autograph letter of Lincoln's or Washington's.

During the following year a new firm of agents took possession of us, who knew us not, so that the next October, when we wanted heat, the same patronizing manner greeted the Angel when he telephoned for permission to have the janitor light the furnaces.

"Oh, no. Oh, no, Mr.--er--Really, we couldn't consider such a request,"

came a voice.

"Look here," said Aubrey. "I am the man who went to the Waldorf last year when the agent refused us heat and took twenty-seven dollars out of the rent. You may have heard of me."

"What name, sir? Oh, Jardine! Yes, Mr. Jardine, you shall have heat within an hour."

The next morning the janitor--also a new one by the way--told the Angel that he got a telephone message from the agent to start a fire in the furnace if he had to tear off wooden doors and burn them!

"All of which goes to show," said Aubrey to me, "that somebody ought to write a book on 'The Value of the Kicker.'"

CHAPTER V

HOW WE TAMED THE COOK

Second only to the skill required in managing a husband is the diplomacy necessary in the art of living with one's cook. Therefore let the unmarried pa.s.s this over, feeling that the time for them to read it is not yet, but let those who have a cross-grained, crotchety, obstinate, or bad-tempered cook take this to a quiet corner and hear my tale. While it may not be exactly your experience it cannot fail to touch a responsive chord, for whether you have already had a spoiled cook or not, rest a.s.sured that you will have one some day, and do not scorn to make her the subject of deep and earnest study and the object of diplomatic negotiations.

In our case Mary was old and obstinate, but her virtues were too many to dismiss her without valiant efforts made to reform her in one or two particulars. It is, alas! but too true, that perfection does not exist, especially in cooks. But as even her failings leaned to virtue's side we bore and bore with her, making light of our inconveniences, and pretending not to notice that we could never make her do anything that she had not wanted to do beforehand. It was a good deal of a strain on us sometimes, for we are self-respecting folk, with excellent opinions of ourselves.

But among her good points was an absolute reverence for food. She never wasted a mouthful, even saving the crusts she cut from the toast to grind for breading and doing all the thrifty things one would do oneself, but which no cook ever born is expected to do nowadays. She had lived some years in Paris, for one thing, and for another,--"Missis, I always believe that them that wastes--wants. I've seen it too many times to want to run the risk."

Mary is a character, but this theory of hers she carried to an extreme, as you shall hear.

Owing to our respect for Mary's white hairs, the dinner-hour was as changeable as a weatherc.o.c.k. We dined anywhere from seven to nine, and soothed each other's irritation by calling ostentatious attention to the delicacy and perfection of each dish as it came on the table. Why shouldn't each be perfect, forsooth, when no amount of coaxing or persuading, no amount of instructions beforehand or hints or orders could make that cook of ours lift a finger toward dinner until we both were in the house with hungry countenances and expectant demeanours? We even tried telephoning her from down-town that we were on the way and would be at home in an hour. When we came in at the end of that hour and said:

"Mary, is dinner ready?" the answer was always:

"No, dear child, but it will be in a minute."