“Not much, considering what it’s worth,” said her husband, still exuberant. “It’s genuine something or other, I forget what. I got it at a bargain at a place down-town where they are selling off. It took my eye the moment I saw it. What’s the matter, Mildred? Don’t you like it?” “Why, it’s very nice,” said Mrs. Thatcher, trying to keep rein on her feelings. “Only _of course_, those reds and yellows don’t go with anything that we have; it would look perfectly dreadful with the old rose wallpaper.” “Why, I don’t see that it would.” Mr. Thatcher was still lovingly regarding the article in question, stretched out in the hall. “They put all kinds of colours together nowadays. Here, let me set it out where it belongs, and see if you don’t think it looks all right.” He switched a chair or two out of the way, moved back the tea-table, and stretched the rug down on the open space on the floor. He stood off admiringly. “Now, don’t you think that’s fine? Why don’t you speak?” “Oh, Nevin, it’s _too_ dreadful! Can’t you see? It’s a disgrace, a perfect disgrace. I wouldn’t have any one I cared for come into the house with that thing on the floor; I don’t know _what_ they’d think of me.” Her voice had gone beyond control, and rose more and more hysterical. “Oh, how _could_ you be mean enough to go and buy a rug without me—something I’d set my _heart_ on. A rug, of all _things_, that you have to live with always! And I had been looking forward so to choosing it with you! Why didn’t you tell me about it? It’s so terrible, it’s so _common_——” “‘Common!’ Now you don’t know what you’re talking about.” Mr. Thatcher’s confidence in the pleasing powers of his purchase died hard. “It’s genuine—I forget just what, but it _is_ genuine. I thought you’d know.” “I _do_ know—it’s one of the cheapest kinds there are. Nevin, I can’t have it in here, you _must_ understand that. Why, I couldn’t eat my meals if I had to look in and see it. Can’t you take it back and change it?” “Change it!” Mildred had known, even as she spoke, that the suggestion was unforgivable. She could go to town merrily, day after day, exchanging goods, but her husband would have felt like a sneak thief if he had taken anything back to “change it.” “No, I can _not_!” His anger was at last aroused, and thoroughly. “If you don’t like the thing you can chuck it out into the street, for all I care. I tried to give you a pleasure, and this is what I get for it. I’ll never buy you another thing as long as I live!”