een his and mine, and never yours at all."

"Hush, Sibylla! You don't know how these allusions hurt me," he
interrupted, in a tone of intense pain.

"They are true," said Sibylla.

"But not--forgive me, my dear, for saying it--not the less unseemly."

"Why do you grumble at me, then?"

"I do not grumble," he answered in a kind tone. "Your interests are
mine, Sibylla, and mine are yours. I only tell you the fact--and a fact
it is--that our income will not stand these heavy calls upon it. Were I
to show you how much you have spent in dress since we were married--what
with Paris, London, and Heartburg--the sum total would frighten you."

"You should not keep the sum total," resentfully spoke Sibylla. "Why do
you add it up?"

"I must keep my accounts correctly. My uncle taught me that."

"I am sure he did not teach you to grumble at me," she rejoined. "I look
upon Verner's Pride as mine, more than yours; if it had not been for the
death of my husband, you would never have had it."

Inexpressibly vexed--vexed beyond the power to answer, for he would not
trust himself to answer--Lionel prepared to quit the room. He began to
wish he had not had Verner's Pride, if this was to be its domestic
peace. Sibylla petulantly threw the French book from her lap upon the
table, and it fell down with its page open.

Lionel's eyes caught its title, and a flush, not less deep than the
preceding flush, darkened his brow. He laid his open palm upon the page
with an involuntary movement, as if he would guard it from the eyes of
his wife. That she should be reading that notorious work!

"Where did you get this?" he cried. "It is not a fit book for you."

"There's nothing-the matter with the book as far as I have gone."

"Indeed you must not read it! Pray don't, Sibylla! You will be sorry for
it afterwards."

"How do you know it is not a fit book?"

"Because I have read it."

"There! _You_ have read it! And you would like to deny the pleasure to
me! Don't say you are never selfish."

"Sibylla! What is fit for me to read may be most unfit for you. I read
the book when I was a young man; I would not read it now. Is it
Benoite's?" he inquired, seeing the name in the first page.

"Yes, it is."

Lionel closed the book. "Promise me, Sibylla, that you will not attempt
to read more of it. Give it her back at once, and tell her to send it
out of the house, or to keep it under lock and key while it remains
within it."

Sibylla hesi