to build on Beacon Street?" He handed her the new cheque,
where she stood over him, and then leaned back in his chair
and looked up at her.

"I don't want you should begin at all. What do
you mean, Silas?" She rested against the side of his desk.

"Well, I don't know as I mean anything. But shouldn't
you like to build? Everybody builds, at least once
in a lifetime."

"Where is your lot? They say it's unhealthy, over there."

Up to a certain point in their prosperity Mrs. Lapham
had kept strict account of all her husband's affairs;
but as they expanded, and ceased to be of the retail nature
with which women successfully grapple, the intimate knowledge
of them made her nervous. There was a period in which she
felt that they were being ruined, but the crash had not come;
and, since his great success, she had abandoned herself
to a blind confidence in her husband's judgment, which she
had hitherto felt needed her revision. He came and went,
day by day, unquestioned. He bought and sold and got gain.
She knew that he would tell her if ever things went wrong,
and he knew that she would ask him whenever she was anxious.

"It ain't unhealthy where I've bought," said Lapham,
rather enjoying her insinuation. "I looked after that
when I was trading; and I guess it's about as healthy
on the Back Bay as it is here, anyway. I got that lot