ng continually to get this thing
changed and that thing altered. Now you're thrown out half a day here
and half a day there, and the new men are nosing round as if they
suspected you would make way with something and meant to catch you at
it."

"We must have patience," says Wilmarth, in that extremely irritating,
hopeless tone. "Mr. Grandon _is_ interested in his wife's behalf,
though it is said he has a fortune of his own, and the new method must
be made to pay him, if every one else suffers. I am not a rich man, and
should be sorry to lose what I thought was so sure in this concern."

Rising finds his position an extremely disagreeable one. The men are
not only curt, but evince a distrust of him, are unwilling to follow
his suggestions, and will keep on in their old ways. Lindmeyer finds
himself curiously foiled everywhere. It seems as if some unknown agency
was at work. What he puts in order to-day is not quite right to-morrow.
All the nice adjustment he can theorize about will not work
harmoniously, economically. So passes away a fortnight.

"Mr. Grandon," he says, honestly, "I seldom make a decided blunder
about these matters, but I can't get down to the very soul of this.
There is a little miss somewhere. I said I could tell you in a month,
but I am afraid I shall have to ask a further fortnight's grace. I
never was so puzzled in my life. It is making an expensive experiment
for you, but I _do_ think it best to go on. I don't say this to
lengthen out the job. There is plenty of work for me to go at."

Grandon sighs. He finds it very expensive. It is money on the right
hand and the left, and with a costly house and large family the income
that was double his bachelor wants melts away like dew. He is not
parsimonious, but his instincts and habits have been prudent. He is
making inroads upon his capital, and if he should never get it back?
His father, it is true, has advised against entangling his private
fortune, but it cannot be helped now. To retreat with honor is
impossible and would be extremely mortifying. He will not do that, he
resolves. But how if he has to retreat with failure?

All these things trouble him greatly and distract his attention. He
sits up far into the night poring over his own work that was such
pleasure a few months ago, and he can hardly keep his mind on what so
delighted him then. There is quite too much on every hand, and he must
add to it family complications. His beautiful home is