r lost her calm and considered
him an inferior being. His dejection made him think of his family, of
his sick wife, and the duties that bound him to her, and he felt the
bitter joy of the man who sacrifices himself, taking up his cross.

His mind was made up. He would flee from the woman. He would not see her
again.

III

And he did not see her; he did not see her for two days. But on the
third there came a letter in a long blue envelope scented with a perfume
that made him tremble.

The countess complained of his absence in affectionate terms. She needed
to see him, she had many things to tell him. A real love-letter which
the artist hastened to hide, for fear that if any one read it, he would
suspect what was not yet true.

Renovales was indignant.

"I will go to see her," he said to himself, walking up and down the
studio. "But it will be only to give her a piece of my mind, and have
done with her once and for all. If she thinks she is going to play with
me, she is mistaken; she doesn't know that, when I want to be, I am like
stone."

Poor master! While in one corner of his mind he was formulating this
cruel determination to be a man of stone, in the other a sweet voice was
murmuring seductively:

"Go quickly, take advantage of the opportunity. Perhaps she has
repented. She is waiting for you; she is going to be yours."

And the artist hastened to the countess's anxiously. Nothing. She
complained of his absence with affected sadness. She liked him so much!
She needed to see him, she could not have any peace as long as she felt
that he was offended with her on account of the other afternoon. And
they spent nearly two hours together in the private room she used as an
office, until at the end of the afternoon the serious friends of the
countess began to arrive, her coterie of mute worshipers and last of
all Monteverde with the calm of a man who has nothing to fear.

The painter left the house. Nothing out of the ordinary had happened
except that he had twice kissed the countess's hand; the conventional
caress and nothing more. Whenever he tried to go farther, moving his
lips along her arm, she checked him imperiously.

"I shall be angry, master, and not receive you any more alone! You are
not keeping the agreement!"

Renovales protested. They had not made any agreement; but Concha managed
to calm him instantly by asking about Milita, praising her beauty,
inquiring for poor Josephina, so good, so