"Yes, dear. This afternoon I've been to the Institute with the boys to let them see the plans."
"They are well spoken of. I saw Wright to-day for a moment. He stopped to congratulate me, but I couldn't tell what he really thought. Well, after all the trouble with them, I got pretty much what I wanted, thanks to Everett and the doctor. Everett's been a good friend all through. The idea of their kicking so hard because the thing was going to cost a little more than they had made up their minds to spend on the building! Pemberton thinks he knows all about architecture. It's a pity he couldn't have drawn the plans himself."
"But you saved your design. There were only a few changes, I thought."
"Yes, I've won the second round all right."
In his joy over the thought he put his strong arms about his wife and lifted her bodily from the floor, as he had often done, boyishly, in the years before. Holding her close to him he kissed her lips and neck. She returned his kisses, but the touch of her lips was cool. She seemed limp in his arms, and he felt vaguely the want of something. She was less loving, less passionate than ever before. He missed the abandon, the utter self-forgetfulness, the rush of ecstatic emotion, which from the first moment of their love had made her for him all woman, the woman of women.... He let her slip from his embrace and looked at her. Was it age? Was it the penalty of living, which dampens the fire of passion and dulls desire? He was troubled, distressed for the loss of something precious that was getting beyond his reach, perhaps had gone forever.
"Oh!" he exclaimed. "It's bad to be always on the dead push. Come! Let's go out somewhere and have dinner and a bottle of champagne the way we used to."
She hesitated a moment, unwilling to disappoint him.
"I can't very well to-night, Francis. I promised Morton Carr I should be home this evening. He wants me to help him raise some money for his new building, and we were to discuss it."
"Oh!" he said, his egotism subtly wounded. "I remember you said something about it."
Late in March the corner-stone for the Jackson Institute was laid. It was a desolate winterish day, and the prairie wind chilled to the bone the little group of interested people seated on the platform erected for the occasion. There were brief speeches by Judge Phillips and Dr. Everest, and an address by a celebrated college president on the "new education." To Helen, who sat just behind him in sight of the piles of excavated sand and the dirty brick walls of the neighboring stores, the scene was scarcely in harmony with the orator's glowing generalizations. "The mighty energies of this industrial cosmopolis will now respond to the higher call of man's ideals.... On industry rests thrift, and on thrift must rest all education." As the neat periods slipped forth, Cook, who was standing by the mason's windlass, caught Helen's eye and smiled. He looked brisk and happy, and she could fancy him calling out: "Hey! What does the guy know about industry? But ain't this the best yet? F. J. Hart is all right!"