the expression
of her sister-in-law's eyes. Her heart beat with an almost joyous
expectation, for if she had wished to see Osmond overtopped the
conditions looked favourable now. Of course if Isabel should go to
England she herself would immediately leave Palazzo Roccanera; nothing
would induce her to remain there with Osmond. Nevertheless she felt
an immense desire to hear that Isabel would go to England. "Nothing's
impossible for you, my dear," she said caressingly. "Why else are you
rich and clever and good?"

"Why indeed? I feel stupidly weak."

"Why does Osmond say it's impossible?" the Countess asked in a tone
which sufficiently declared that she couldn't imagine.

From the moment she thus began to question her, however, Isabel drew
back; she disengaged her hand, which the Countess had affectionately
taken. But she answered this enquiry with frank bitterness. "Because
we're so happy together that we can't separate even for a fortnight."

"Ah," cried the Countess while Isabel turned away, "when I want to make
a journey my husband simply tells me I can have no money!"

Isabel went to her room, where she walked up and down for an hour. It
may appear to some readers that she gave herself much trouble, and it is
certain that for a woman of a high spirit she had allowed herself easily
to be arrested. It seemed to her that only now she fully measured the
great undertaking of matrimony. Marriage meant that in such a case as
this, when one had to choose, one chose as a matter of course for one's
husband. "I'm afraid--yes, I'm afraid," she said to herself more than
once, stopping short in her walk. But what she was afraid of was not her
husband--his displeasure, his hatred, his revenge; it was not even her
own later judgement of her conduct a consideration which had often held
her in check; it was simply the violence there would be in going when
Osmond wished her to remain. A gulf of difference had opened between
them, but nevertheless it was his desire that she should stay, it was
a horror to him that she should go. She knew the nervous fineness with
which he could feel an objection. What he thought of her she knew, what
he was capable of saying to her she had felt; yet they were married, for
all that, and marriage meant that a woman should cleave to the man with
whom, uttering tremendous vows, she had stood at the altar. She sank
down on her sofa at last and buried her head in a pile of cushions.

When she raised he