"Wait till I hold my breath," she said.

"_Great guns!_" he e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed, and by the exertion of much force fastened the girdle. Then he stood off a step or two and looked at his wife curiously. Flushed and laughing she returned his gaze.

"Can you breathe?" he asked solicitously.

"Of course I can."

"What with?"

"It is a little tight, of course," she admitted. "This is one of my trousseau dresses. I've grown a little stouter, I suppose. Never mind, I can stand it for to-night. Thank you very much. You must hurry now, Tony."

"I haven't had my pay for playing maid," he said, and came close. He surveyed his wife's fair neck and shoulders, turned her around and deliberately kissed the soft hollow where the firm white flesh of her neck met the waving brown hair drawn lightly upwards.

"That's the spot that tantalized me for about six years," he observed.

Hunting hurriedly through various drawers and boxes in the blue-and-white room, in search of gloves and fan, Juliet heard her husband come in his turn to her open door.

"Will you have the goodness to look at me?" he requested, in a melancholy voice. Juliet turned, gave him one glance, and broke into a merry peal.

"Oh, Tony!--What's the matter? Have you been growing stouter, too?"

"It must be," he said solemnly.

His clawhammer coat was so tight across the shoulders that the strain was evident. He was holding his arms in the exaggerated position of the small boy who wears a last year's suit. Juliet revolved around her husband's well built figure with interest.

"It does look tight," she said. "But have you grown heavier all at once?

It can't be long since you wore that coat before."

"Don't believe I have for months. It's been altogether frock-coats and informals. I haven't been to an evening affair with ladies for a good while."

"It doesn't look as it feels, I'm sure. It's getting very late--we ought to be off," and Juliet gathered up her belongings and gave him a long loose coat to hold for her which covered her finery completely.

"Now's the hour when I regret that I haven't a carriage for you," said Anthony, as they descended the stairs. He got into his outer coat reluctantly. "I shall split something around my back before the evening is over," he prophesied resignedly.

"Never mind. Remember how tight my girdle is. It grows tighter every minute."

They got out upon the porch and Anthony locked the door. "If I should show that door-key to any man I know except Carey he would howl," he remarked, holding up the queer old bra.s.s affair before he slipped it into his pocket. He looked down at Juliet in the gathering June twilight. "Don't you wish we didn't have to go?"

"Yes, I do," she agreed frankly.

"Let's not!"

"My dear boy! At this hour?"

"We could telephone."

"Shouldn't you feel rather ashamed to, so late?"

"Not a bit. But of course we'll go if you say so."

She laughed, and he joined her boyishly. She hesitated.

"If I see you looking faint in that girdle shall I throw a gla.s.s of cold water over you?"

"Please do. If I hear a sound as of rending cloth shall I divert the attention of the company?"

"By all means."

They were laughing like two children. Anthony sat down in one of the porch chairs. He drew a long sigh. "I never hated to leave my dear home so since I came into it," he said gloomily.

Juliet pulled off her coat. "If you'll do the telephoning I'll stay," she said.

He jumped to his feet. "Let me loosen that girdle for you. I haven't been breathing below the fifth rib myself since you put it on, just in sympathy," he declared.

XVI.--A HOUSE-PARTY--OUTDOORS

"The trouble is," said Anthony Robeson, shifting his position on the step below Juliet so that he could rest his head against her knee, "the trouble is we're getting too popular."

Juliet laughed and ran her fingers through his thick locks, gently tweaking them. The two were alone together in the warm darkness of a July evening, upon their own little porch.

"It's the first evening we've had to ourselves since the big snowdrift under the front windows melted. That was about the date Roger Barnes met Louis Lockwood here the first time. Ye G.o.ds--but they've kept each other's footprints warm since then, haven't they? And now Cathcart is giving indications of having contracted the fatal malady. Can't Rachel Redding be incarcerated somewhere until the next moon is past? I notice they all have worse symptoms each third quarter. That girl looks innocent, but--by heaven, Julie, I think she has it down fine."

"No, you don't," said Juliet persuasively. "I should catch her at it if she were deliberately trying to keep two such men as Roger and Louis pitted against each other. They're doing it all themselves. I've known her to run away when she saw one of them coming--so that she couldn't be found. But, Tony dear, I've a plan."

"Good. I hope it's a duel between the two princ.i.p.als. If it is I'm going to tamper with the weapons and see that each injures himself past help.

I'm getting a little weary of playing the hospitable host to a trio of would-bes."

"Listen. We'll entertain them all at once for a week, with some extra girls, and Judith and Wayne, and then we'll announce that we're not at home for a month."

"All at once--a house-party?" Anthony sat up and laughed uproariously.

"I've tremendous faith in you, love, but where in the name of all the French sardines that ever were dovetailed would you put such a crowd?"

"I've a practical plan. Louis Lockwood belongs to a fishing club that spends every August up in Canada. They have a big tent, twenty by twenty-five, for he told me so the other day. He would get it for us; we would put it out in the orchard, close to the river. You and Wayne, and Roger and Louis, and Stevens Cathcart could sleep down there, and I could easily take care of Judith and Suzanne Gerard and Marie Dresser, here in the house. Rachel should stay here, too. And Auntie Dingley would send down Mary McKaim to cook for us, I'm sure."

"That's not so bad. But why Rachel--when you have so little room?"

"Because I want her to have all the fun; because if I don't keep her here she will be running away half the time; and because----"

"Now comes the real reason," observed Anthony sagely.

"I don't want the other girls thinking she has the unfair advantage of taking a man away from the party every evening to walk down home with her."

"Wise little chaperon. I can see Roger and Louis now, glaring at each other as the hour approaches for her departure."

"What do you think of my plan? It's only a plan, you know, Tony--subject to your approval."