It was clearly a case of incipient "incompatibility." It was "the mistake of a lifetime" just discovered, though she had borne his children and held his respect for fifteen years.

He still felt the warmth of Mrs.Dillingham's hands within his own, the impression of her confiding clasp upon his arm, and the magnetic influence of her splendid presence.

Reason as he would, he felt defrauded of his rights; and he wondered whether any combination of circumstances would ever permit him to achieve them.

As this amounted to wondering whether Mrs.Belcher would die, he strove to banish the question from his mind; but it returned and returned again so pertinaciously that he was glad to order his horses and ride to his factory.
Before night it became noised through the village that the great proprietor had been to the oil regions.

The fact was talked over among the people in the shops, in the street, in social groups that gathered at evening; and there was great curiosity to know what he had learned, and what opinions he had formed.