"Lays of ancient Rome." - McCaulay.

It was then that I saw the cook book, and while Mr. Harbison had his back turned I got it down. It was quite clear that the domestic type of woman was his ideal, so I took the book into the pantry and read the recipe over three times. When I came back I knew it by heart though I did not understand it. "I will tell you how," I said, with a great deal of dignity, "and since you want to help you can make it yourself."

He was delighted.

"Fine!" he said. "Suppose you give me the idea first. Then we'll go over it slowly, bit by bit. We'll make a big fluffy omelet and if the others aren't around we'll eat it ourselves."

"Well," I said, trying to remember, "you take two eggs - ." "Two!" he repeated. "Two eggs for ten people!" "Don't interrupt me," I said irritably. "If - if two isn't enough we can make several omelets, one after the other."

He looked at at me with admiration. "Well, what next?"

"Separate them," I said easily. No, I didn't know what it meant, but I hoped he would. Iknew he was staring at me puzzled.

"Separate them!" he said. "Why they aren't fastened together!" Then he laughed. "Oh, yes, of course!" When I looked at him he had put one on each end of the table "Afraid they'll quarrel, I suppose," he said. "Wel, now they're separated."

"Then beat."

"First separate, then beat!" he repeated. "-The author of that cook book must have had a mean disposition. What next? Hang them?" He looked up at me with his boyish smile.

"Separate and beat," I repeated. If I lost a word of that recipe I was gone. "Well," he reflected, "you can't beat an egg, no matter how cruel you may be, unless you break it first." He picked up an egg and looked at it. "Separate:" he reflected. "Ah. the white from the - whatever you cooking experts call it - the yellow part." "Of course. I knew you would find out." Then back to the recipe - "beat until well mixed; then fold in the whites."

"Fold:" he questioned. "It looks pretty thin to fold, doesn't it? Please come and show me how."

"Just fold them in," I said desperately. "It - it isn't difficult." And because I was so transparent a fraud, I said something about butter and went into the pantry. I leaned my elbows despondently on the shelf of the kitchen pantry and waited for Mr. Harbison to come in and demand that I fold a raw egg.

He came. "I have solved it," he said. "The mixture awaits the magic touch of the cook."

I honestly thought I could do the rest. It was only to be put in a pan and browned in the oven three minutes. And I did it properly, but for two things; I should have greased the pan, (but this was the book's fault; it didn't say) and I should have lighted the oven. The latter, however, was Mr. Harbison's fault as much as mine, and I had wit enough to lay it to absent mindedness on the part of us both.

Taken from "When a Man Marries." By Mary Roberts Rineheart.