"Anyhow," said Matilda, "it's a great success, and they say it will run until after Easter." It did so: the tunes in it were whistled and sung in the streets, the comedians' gags became catchwords, the principal buffoon kicked off at a charity football match, and, upon inquiry, Old Mole found that clerks, schoolboys and students visited the theater once a week, and that among the young sparks of the town, sons of mill-owners and ironmasters, there was considerable competition for the favors of the chorus ladies. Some of these phenomena he remembered having observed in Thrigsby, and at least one of his old pupils had come to grief through a lady of the chorus and been expelled by his affrighted family to the Colonies. By the end of the fifth week he was thoroughly sick of it all, and he began to agree with Timmis that the success of the show was very far from justifying it. It was so completely lacking in character as to be demoralizing. His third visit left him clogged and thick-witted, as though he had been breathing stale air. It was a poison: and if it were so for him, what (he asked himself) must it be for young minds and spirits? . . . And yet Matilda throve in it. She liked the work and she now liked the company, who, being prosperous, were amiable, and they liked her. Most of all, she loved the independence, the passage from the solid, safe, warmly tender atmosphere with which her husband surrounded her to the heat, the rush and the excitement of the theater. When he left her at the stage door she would give a shrug of the shoulders that was almost a shake, give him a swift parting smile that he always felt might have been given to a stranger, and with a quick gladness dart through into the lighted passage. . . . Before many weeks had passed she had letters, flowers, presents, from unknown admirers. He asked Timmis if there was any harm in them, and the actor replied that it was the usual thing, that women had to look after themselves in the theater, and that these attentions pleased the management. They pleased Matilda: she laughed at the letters, decorated their rooms with the flowers, and left the presents with the stage doorkeeper, who annexed them. Old Mole definitely decided that he disliked the whole business and began to think enviously of James Boothroyd, who was religious and a devil, but did at least have his own way in his own house. To achieve that the first thing necessary was to have a house, and he half resolved to return to his old profession--not considering himself to be fit for any other. But he never rounded the resolution and he never broached his thoughts to Matilda. He told himself that by Easter it would be all over and they would go away, perhaps abroad, see the world. . . . Then he realized that apart from Matilda he had no desires whatever, that his affections were entirely engaged in her, and that, further, he was spasmodically whirled off his feet in a desire that was altogether