Bert laughed at her face.

"Funny how your viewpoint on luck changes. This morning you had
the coat and the Lord knows how much silver and glass and lace
besides--"

"Oh, I know. But that's the kind of a woman I am, Bert. I don't
like things to come to me so fast that I can't taste them. I don't
like having four servants, I get more satisfaction out of one. And
if I am hospitable, I'd rather give meals and rooms to persons who
really need them, than to others who have left better meals and
better rooms to come and share mine!

"Why, Bert dear," Nancy's cheek was against his now, "the thought
of waking up in the morning and realizing that nobody expects
anything of me makes me feel young again! It makes me feel as if I
was breathing fresh air deep down into my lungs. We haven't room
for servants, we have no guest room, I simply can't do anything
but amuse Priscilla and make desserts. We'll have the children at
the dinner table every night, and nights that Agnes is off, I'll
have a dotted black and white percale apron for you--"

This was old history, there had been a dotted percale apron years
ago, and Nancy was joking, but Bert did not laugh. He made a gruff
sound, and tightened his arm.

"Bert," said his wife, seriously, "Bert, when I kissed you this
afternoon, dirty and hot and sooty as you were, I knew that I'd
been missing something for a long time!"