elt that this would not do. His revenge had turned upon himself. He had
half a mind to send for Suzette, and forgive her, and plead with her to
come back again. The door opened: she of whom he thought stood before
him, more marked and meagre than he; and the old tyranny mounted to his
eyes as he looked upon her. He knew that she had come to be pardoned, to
explain, and he determined that she should suffer to the quick.

PART V.

TYRANNY.

If this history of Ralph Flare that we are writing was not a fiction, we
might make Suzette give way at once under the burden of her grief, and
rest upon a chair, and weep. On the contrary, she did just the opposite.
She laughed.

Human nature is consistent only in its inconsistencies. She meant to
break down in the end, but wished to intimidate him by a show of
carelessness, so she first said quietly: "Monsieur Ralph, I have come to
see to my washing; it went out with yours; will you tell the proprietor
to send it to me?"

"Yes, madame."

"May I sit down, sir? It is a good way up-stairs, and I want to breathe
a minute."

"As you like, madame."

He was resting on the sofa; she took a chair just opposite. There was a
table between them, and for a little while she looked with a ghastly
playfulness into his eyes, he regarding her coldly and darkly; and then,
she laughed. It was a terrible laugh to come from a child's lips. It was
a woman's pride, drowning at the bottom of her heart, and in its last
struggle for preservation sending up these bubbles of sound.

We talk of tragic scenes in common life; this was one of them. The
little room with its waxed, inlaid floor, the light falling bloodily in
at the crimson curtains and throwing unreal shadows upon the spent fire,
the disordered furniture, the unmade bed; and there were the two actors,
suffering in their little sphere what only _seems_ more suffering in
prisons and upon scaffolds, and playing with each other's agonies as not
more refined cruelty plays with racks and tortures.

"You are pleased, madame," said Ralph.

"No, I am wondering what has changed you. There are black circles around
your eyes; you have not shaved; the bones of your cheeks are sharp like
your chin, and you are yellow and bent like a dry leaf."

"I have had an excess of money lately. Being free to do as I like, I
have done so."

She looked furtively around the room. "Somebody has gone away from here
this morning--is it true?"

He laughed s