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Rh I permitted her. I acquiesced in everything she said and did. I was bound to, partly out of gratitude for her distinguished services at a time of domestic stress, and partly for the sake of peace. But I had my mental reservations, and inwardly prayed that the time might be shortened to us.

Then one day, going into the kitchen, I became aware of an unwonted and self-conscious silence there. Sheila looked like a drooping flower. Her face was kept studiously away from me. I knew the hour had come and I quailed before it. I wonder if other women are such cowards in their kitchens as I am in mine; if they feel, as I do, the delicacies of the situation, the injustices it engenders, the necessary reserves? Personal service involves personal relations between strangers. No wonder such relations become strained, particularly when one remembers the youth, the inexperience and too often the lack of guidance of at least one of the participants. Tact and patience and discerning sympathy are all in requisition when skating over such thin ice as kitchen nerves cover, and too few of us keep these elemental virtues on top.

"Sheila, my girl, what is it?" I said finally.