What first drew Robert's attention to his wife's secret was the sudden inexplicable condoning of his own small negligences and ignorances, which had once been brought to book. So accustomed does the happily married husband of the day become to certain domestic requisitions that the withdrawal of them is apt to arouse his suspicions at once. These jealous doubts, later on, ran the whole gamut from the postman to the rector of Mrs.

Penn's church, but at first all Robert feared was that she had become indifferent to him. That, after five happy years, she should be sweetly serene when he suddenly remembered that he had bought tickets for the theater, just as they had settled down after dinner for a quiet evening, Mrs. Penn looking prettily domestic in a lilac tea gown! Nothing but the established repugnance of a self-made man to wasting four dollars, even to save his pride, made him uncover his delinquency-and he held his breath till the storm should pass.