To the man this coming back to Chicago, returning to his work after the year and a half he had been away, was charged with a happy significance. As they drew nearer and nearer, an impatience possessed him to begin at once; that desire of the worker to start in immediately. He had worked some over there, had done a few things which were most satisfactory, but he wanted now to settle down to actual work in his old place, 'with his own things. He fell to wondering if they had changed the laboratory, resentful at the possibility. "Why look here, Ernestine," he suddenly burst forth, turning to her eagerly, "to-morrow's a school day, we're late getting home, everything is in swing--they're waiting for me, and, by Jove, I can just as well as not begin to-morrow!" A woman who never made one feel things in one's backbone might have resented the quick, eager plunge into work, but Ernestine knew the love of work herself, and her eyes brightened to his spirit. "But dear me, Karl," after a second's hesitation, "it seems you should take a day or two first." "Why?" he demanded. "Well,"--vaguely--"to get rested up." "Rested up!" He stretched forth his arm and then doubled it back, and they both laughed. "That's a joke--my getting rested up. Why I feel like a fighting cock!" "And crazy to get to work?" "Getting that way. Oh, I tell you, Ernestine, there's nothing like it." Again she did not mind; she understood. She looked at his glowing face, all alight with enthusiasm for the work to which he was going back. She was never tired of thinking how Karl's face was just what Karl's face should be--reflective of a clear-cut, far-seeing, deeply comprehending mind. It seemed all written there--all those things of mind and character, and something too of those other things--the things which were for her alone. Ernestine held that one could tell by looking at Karl that he was doing some great thing. "But see here, Dr. Hubers, a nice way you have of shirking your domestic duties! Who is going to help me settle this famous house Georgia tells about?" "I'll do it at night," he protested eagerly. "I'll work every night until the house is spick and span." Ernestine sighed. "I have a sad feeling that our house never will be spick and span. But we'll have some fun,"--eagerly--"fixing it up." "Of course we'll have fun fixing it up! Georgia's sure to be on hand, and I'll make old Parkman get busy too--do him good." "I don't care about knowing a lot of men--" "Well I should _hope_ not" "You didn't let me finish. I was going to say that Dr. Parkman is one man I do want to know."