own troubles; happy for us that it is so. Jeanne, obliged to plan and calculate, to exert herself, indeed, to the utmost, was too tired when she could claim a moment's repose, to realise fully all the change that had come into her life; but when all was finished, and their future arranged in all its undoubted monotony; when this wedded pair settled down to an unending companionship, what should have constituted the supreme happiness of this woman became an insupportable torment.
One day their solitude was broken in upon by a friend, the society dame under whose auspices Jeanne had made her debut in the Parisian world. Her daughter was going to be married, and she was giving a grand party on the occasion of the signing of the contract. She insisted on having Jeanne at this great function. "The poor child was killing herself." She believed in conjugal devotion; but one might have too much of that sort of thing. A pretty benefit she was doing her husband by killing herself, all through taking too much care of him. Karl prayed Jeanne to accept the invitation. "He was very well now, and she required some recreation." She fancied he showed a kind of satisfaction in the thought of passing a whole evening without her company—one word would have held her; but he insisted, and she accepted. Karl thought she was not very difficult to persuade.
Jeanne felt out of place in the midst of this world of society, by which, however, her appearance was hailed with pleasure. She saw more curiosity than good feeling in the attitude of her old friends, who lavished their attentions upon her. Time passes quickly in Paris; there were those there who, not calculating how many months had elapsed since the accident, looked upon her almost in the light of a woman who was neglecting her duty to her sick husband. Several times she was on the point of bursting into tears when someone asked her about him.
She stole away early, tortured by remorse, tormented also by a vague feeling which was gradually becoming more definite to her. Her place was no longer with those who live only for amusement, to whom life is one long carnival. Before her rose her duty, grave, and stern, and menacing, admitting of no dividing interest claiming her.
She glided softly into her husband's chamber with a beating heart; she was ready to greet one word of tenderness with an outburst of pity, near neighbour to love. The heroic sacrifice seemed no longer an impossibility: if she could be sure of Karl's affection all would yet be well.
"She gazed at him a long time."
The room, dimly lighted by a night-lamp and the dying fire, was all silent. Karl was asleep. She came closer to the bed and gazed at him a long time; then something cruel slid into her thought. He was not really asleep; but was only pretending, so that he might not have to talk to her; the short, laboured breathing was not the regular breathing of natural slumber; the body, also, was too rigidly immovable. She retired noiselessly; but in an instant all the
