invented a system of discipline that laid the onus of all misfortunes and untoward happenings on his shoulders.
“Women do not take nearly enough notice of the third promise made to them in the marriage service!” she had explained to me. “Men are such weather-cocks that it is ridiculous to rely on their keeping the first; they can’t help keeping the second if we so choose; but the third, on which really hinges both the all-important first and fourth, most wives overlook. But I decided, when I first read that very one-sided contract, that I would rule my future by the third. Insist on being cherished, my dear girl,—man is a poor creature, you will find, very much influenced by his habits. And so, if you train him to strictly carry out the promise that coincides with ours to obey, he will unconsciously form a custom that will be at least a good working model of love and will obviate every mental reserve he may have made, and every arising difficulty, with regard to the bestowal of his worldly goods!”
It followed, necessarily, that if Her Ladyship was not comfortable the husband, and the husband alone, no matter how innocent he might be of the cause, was the scapegoat; and if unpleasant for him it was at all events a simple plan that saved its author a great deal of trouble less ingenious persons put themselves to in searching out the guilty.
On this occasion he owed his escape from the vials of her wrath to a handbill pasted on the wall of the hotel, just opposite to us as we alighted. It gave me an inspiration.
“Oh, how glorious!” I exclaimed with much fervour, and so struck with amazement was Mrs Greendays at such an expression in such a place that she forgot her grievances to find out what had drawn it forth. “Look at this!” I continued. “That Maori singer Colonel Deane told us about, Princess Te Rangi Pai, is giving a concert here to-night. Isn’t it luck? We could not have timed our arrival more opportunely. If we had had to make another early start I don’t think that even the finest of singers would have seemed so attractive as sleep, and you would certainly have had to go to bed at once! But we can be as late as we like to-morrow, so that staying up to-night will not hurt us.”
Captain Greendays gave me an expressive little nod as he hurried into the hotel with our rugs and umbrellas. He knew that the danger was over once her thoughts were directed into another channel, for her disposition was not in the least sulky, and she was far more likely to discover the amusing side of things than to growl about them on second consideration.
And that was what happened after the concert, when the singer’s beautiful voice had charmed our invalid once again into her natural frame of mind, wherein she looked upon the world as a play, taking disappointments and discomforts as part of the programme. But nevertheless her husband and I had to proceed warily on that dull Sunday. The two long days perched up on the coach, cold and wet most of the time, with an utter absence of comfort when
