Volume IX Part 24 (1/2)

”Teach little babies their a b c's? I'm afraid that isn't your specialty, heart of mine. Now if you could teach other women the art of making a man believe that he has cornered the entire visible supply of ecstatic thrills in marrying the woman of his choice--by Jove, now!

there's an idea!”

Now Jimaboy had no idea in particular; he never had an idea that he did not immediately coin it into words and try to sell it. But Isobel's eyes were suspiciously bright, and the situation had to be saved.

”I was just thinking: the thing to do successfully is the--er--the thing you do best, isn't it?”

She laughed, in spite of the unpaid bills.

”Why can't you put clever things like that into your stories, Jimmy, dear?”

”As if I didn't!” he retorted. ”But don't step on my idea and squash it while it's in the soft-sh.e.l.l-crab stage. As I said, I was thinking: there is just one thing we can give the world odds on and beat it out of sight. And that thing is our long suit--our specialty.”

”But you said you had an idea,” said Isobel, whose private specialty was singleness of purpose.

”Oh--yes,” said Jimaboy. Then he smote hard upon the anvil and forged one on the spur of the moment. ”Suppose we call it The Post-Graduate School of W. B., Professor James Augustus Jimaboy, princ.i.p.al; Mrs.

Isobel Jimaboy, a.s.sistant princ.i.p.al. How would that sound?”

”It would sound like the steam siren on the planing mill. But what is the 'W. B.'?”

”'Wedded Bliss,' of course. Here is the way it figures out. We've been married three years, and--”

”Three years, five months and fourteen days,” she corrected.

”Excellent! That accuracy of yours would be worth a fortune on the faculty. But let me finish--during these three years, five months and fourteen days we have fought, bled and died on the literary battle-field; dined on bath-mitts and _cafe hydraulique_, walked past the opera-house entrance when our favorite play was on, and all that.

But tell me, throb of my heart, have we ever gone shy on bliss?”

She met him half-way. It was the spirit in which they had faced the bill collector since the beginning of the period of leanness.

”Never, Jimmy, dear; not even hardly ever.”

”There you are, then. Remains only for us to tell others how to do it; to found the Post-Graduate School of W. B. It's the one thing needful in a world of educational advantage; a world in which everything but the gentle art of being happy, though married, is taught by the postman. We have solved all the other problems, but there has been no renaissance in the art of matrimony. Think of the ten thousand divorces granted in a single state last year! My dear Isobel, we mustn't lose a day--an hour--a minute!”

She pretended to take him seriously.

”I don't know why we shouldn't do it, I'm sure,” she mused. ”They teach everything by mail nowadays. But who is going to die and leave us the endowment to start with?”

”That's the artistic beauty of the mail scheme,” said Jimaboy, enthusiastically. ”It doesn't require capitalizing; no buildings, no campus, no football team, no expensive university plant; nothing but an inspiration, a serviceable typewriter, and a little old postman to blow his whistle at the door.”

”And the specialty,” added Isobel, ”though some of them don't seem to trouble themselves much about that. Oh, yes; and the advertising; that is where the endowment comes in, isn't it?”

But Jimaboy would not admit the obstacle.

”That is one of the things that grow by what they are fed upon: your ad.

brings in the money, and then the money buys more ad. Now, there's Blicker, of the _Woman's Uplift_; he still owes us for that last story--we take it out in advertising s.p.a.ce. Also Dormus, of the _Home World_, and Amory, of the _Storylovers_--same boat--more advertising s.p.a.ce. Then the _Times_ hasn't paid for that string of s.p.a.ce-fillers on 'The Lovers of All Nations.' The _Times_ has a job office, and we could take that out in prospectuses and application blanks.”

By this time the situation was entirely saved and Isobel's eyes were dancing.

”Wouldn't it be glorious?” she murmured. ”Think of the precious, precious letters we'd get; real letters like some of those pretended ones in Mr. Blicker's correspondence column. And we wouldn't tell them what the 'W. B.' meant until after they'd finished the course, and then we'd send them the degree of 'Master of Wedded Bliss,' and write it out in the diploma.”