Then he wrote a sonnet against his own perfidy and accepted confession as atonement and plenary indulgence. He was one of those who, when they have cried, “I have sinned,” hear a mysterious voice saying, “Poor sufferer, go and sin some more.” So he did, and he went the way of millions of lazy-minded, lazy-moraled husbands while Kedzie went the way of men and women who succeed by self-exploitation and count only that bad morals which is also bad business. And that was the status of the matrimonial adventure of the Gilfoyles for the present. It made no perceptible difference to anybody that they were married--least of all to themselves--for the present. But of course Kedzie was obscurely preparing all this while for a tremendous explosion into publicity and into what is known as “the big money.” And that was bound to make a vast difference to Gilfoyle as well as to Mrs. Gilfoyle. In these all-revolutionary days a man had better be a little polite always to his wife, for in some totally unexpectable way she may suddenly prove to be a bigger man than he is, a money-getter, a fame or shame acquirer--if only by way of becoming the president of a suffrage association or a best-seller or an inventor of a popular doll. And again, all this time--a very short time, considering the changes it made in everybody concerned--Ferriday was Kedzie's alternate hope and despair, good angel and bad, uplifter and down-yanker. Sometimes he threatened to stop the picture and destroy it unless she kissed him. And she knew that he could and would do almost anything of that sort. Had not his backers threatened to murder him or sue him if he did not finish the big feature? At such times Kedzie usually kissed Ferriday to keep him quiet. But she was as careful not to give too many kisses as she had been not to put too many caramels in half a pound when she had clerked in the little candy-store. Nowadays she would pause and watch the quivering scale of policy intently with one more sweet poised as if it were worth its weight in gold. The ability to stop while the scale wavers in the tiny zone of just-a-little-too-little and just-a-little-too-much is what makes success in any business of man--or woman-kind. It was not always easy for Kedzie to withhold that extra bonbon. There were times when Ferriday raised her hopes and her pride so high that she fairly squealed with love of him and hugged him. That would have been the destruction of Kedzie if there had not been the counter-weight of conceit in Ferriday's soul, for at those times he would sigh to himself or aloud: “You are loving me only because I am useful to you.” This thought always sobered and chilled Mr. Ferriday. He worked none the less for her and himself and he tried in a hundred ways to surprise the little witch into an adoration complete enough to make her forget herself, make her capable of that ultimate altruism to which a woman falls or rises when she stretches herself out on the altar of love.