something, though he did not yet understand
what it was. The first perception of a change not for the better flashed
upon him one evening in the second week, when he came home an hour
later than his wont. Mrs. Jordan, who always stood waiting for him at
the window, had no smile as he entered.

'Why are you late?' she asked, in her clear, restrained voice.

'Oh--something or other kept me.'

This would not do. Mrs. Jordan quietly insisted on a full explanation of
the delay, and it seemed to her unsatisfactory.

'I hope you won't be irregular in your habits, Archibald,' said his
wife, with gentle admonition. 'What I always liked in you was your
methodical way of living. I shall be very uncomfortable if I never
know when to expect you.'

'Yes, my dear, but--business, you see--'

'But you have explained that you _could_ have been back at the usual
time.'

'Yes--that's true--but--'

'Well, well, you won't let it happen again. Oh really, Archibald!' she
suddenly exclaimed. 'The idea of you coming into the room with muddy
boots! Why, look! There's a patch of mud on the carpet--'

'It was my hurry to speak to you,' murmured Mr. Jordan, in confusion.

'Please go at once and take your boots off. And you left your slippers
in the bedroom this morning. You must always bring them down, and put
them in the dining-room cupboard; then they're ready for you when you
come into the house.'

Mr. Jordan had but a moderate appetite for his dinner, and he did not
talk so pleasantly as usual. This was but the beginning of troubles such
as he had not for a moment foreseen. His wife, having since their
engagement taken the upper hand, began to show her determination to keep
it, and day by day her rule grew more galling to the ex-bachelor. He
himself, in the old days, had plagued his landladies by insisting upon
method and routine, by his faddish attention to domestic minutiae; he
now learnt what it was to be subjected to the same kind of despotism,
exercised with much more exasperating persistence. Whereas Mrs.
Elderfield had scrupulously obeyed every direction given by her lodger,
Mrs. Jordan was evidently resolved that her husband should live, move,
and have his being in the strictest accordance with her own ideal. Not
in any spirit of nagging, or ill-tempered unreasonableness; it was
merely that she had her favourite way of doing every conceivable thing,
and felt so sure it was the best of all possible ways that she could not
en