MR. SMEETH IS REASSURED 75

teraptuous, but she had no contempt, beyond that ex-
perienced by all deeply feminine natures for the male,
for the man himself. He had been her sweetheart, he
was her husband; he had given her innumerable
pleasures, had looked after her, had been patient with
her, had always been fond of her; and she loved him and
was proud of what seemed to her his cleverness. She
knew enough about life to realise that Smeeth was a
really good husband and that this was something to be
thankful for. (North London does not form any part of
that small hot-house world in which a good husband or
wife is regarded as a bore, perhaps as an obstacle in the
path of the partner's self-development.) Chastity for its
own sake made no appeal to her, and she recognised
with inward pleasure (though not with any outward
sign) the glances that flirtatious and challenging males, in
buses and shops and tea-rooms, threw in her direction.
If Mr. Smeeth had started any little games—as she
frankly confessed—she would not have moaned and re-
pined, but would have promptly "shown him" what she
could do in that line. As it was, he did not require show-
ing. He grumbled soitetimes at her extravagance, her
thoughtlessness, her rather slapdash housekeeping, but
in spite of all that, in spite, too, of the fact that for two-
and-twenty years they had been cooped up together in
tiny houses, she still seemed to him an adorable person,
at once incredible and delightful in the large, wilful,
intriguing, mysterious mass of her femininity, the
Woman among the almost indistinguishable crowd of
mere women.

"And if this pudding tastes like nothing on earth/*
cried Mrs. Smeeth, rushing it on to the table, "don't
blame me, blame Mrs. Newark at number twenty-three.