al whose law others had groped at, but he
would be the first to formulate; caught and fondled the secret of the
whole great Design; reduced it to a rule-of-thumb to do his bidding;
bestrode the whole world like a great Colossus....

From which flight he descended with a thud to observe that it was
quarter of two o'clock, and the dining-room was cold with the dying down
of the Latrobe, and the excellent reading-lamp in the death-throes of
going out.

He went upstairs in the dark, annoyed with himself for having overstayed
his bedtime. Long experimentation had shown him that the minimum of
sleep he could get along with to advantage was six and one-half hours
nightly. This meant bed at 1.30 exactly, and he hardly varied it five
minutes in a year. To his marrow he was systematic; he was as definite
as an adding-machine, as practical as a cash register. But even now, on
this exceptional night, he did not go straight to bed. Something still
remained to be accomplished: an outrage upon his sacred Schedule.

In the first halcyon days at Mrs. Paynter's, before the board question
ever came up at all, the iron-clad Schedule of Hours under which he was
composing his great work had stood like this:

8.20 Breakfast
8.40 Evolutionary Sociology
1.30 Dinner
2 Evolutionary Sociology
7 Supper
7.20 to 1.30 Evolutionary Sociology

But the course of true love never yet ran smooth, and this schedule was
too ideal to stand. First the _Post_ had come along and nicked a clean
hour out of it, and now his Body had unexpectedly risen and claimed yet
another hour. And, beyond even this ... some devilish whim had betrayed
him to-night into offering his time for the service and uses of the
landlady's daughter in the puling matter of algebra.

No ... _no!_ He would not put that in. The girl could not be so selfish
as to take advantage of his over-generous impulse. She _must_ understand
that his time belonged to the ages and the race, not to the momentary
perplexities of a high school dunce.... At the worst it would be only
five minutes here and there--say ten minutes a week; forty minutes a
month. No, no! He would not put that in.

But the hour of Bodily Exercise could not be so evaded. It must go in.
On land or sea there was no help for that. For thirty days henceforward
at the least--and a voice within him whispered that it would be for much
longer--his Schedule mus