nevitable end. And it was this
fear which, at rare intervals, broke the taciturn dejection in which he
was sunk, by giving rise to appalling fits of violence. But after a
scene of this kind, he would half suffocate her with remorse. And this,
perhaps, worked destruction most surely of all: the knowledge that,
despite the ungovernable aversion she felt for him, she could still
tolerate his endearments. Not once, as long as they had been together,
had she refused to be caressed.

But the impossibility of the life they were leading broke over Louise
at times, with the shock of an ice-cold wave.

"If you have any feeling left in you--if you have ever cared for me in
the least--go away now!" she wept. "Go to the ends of the earth--only
leave me!"

He was giddy with headache that day. "To whom? Who is it you want now?"

One afternoon as he lay there, the landlady came in with a telegram for
him, which she said had been brought round by one of Frau Krause's
children--she tossed it on the table, as she spoke, to express the
contempt she felt for him. Several minutes elapsed before he put out
his hand for it, and then he did so, because it required less energy to
open it than to leave it unopened. When he had read it, he gave a short
laugh, and threw it back on the table. Louise, who was in the other
part of the room, came out, half-dressed, to see what the matter was.
She, tool laughed at its contents in her insolent way, and, on passing
the writing-table, pulled open the drawer where she kept her money.

"There's enough for two. And you're no prouder in this, I suppose, than
in anything else."

The peremptory summons home, and the announcement that no further
allowance would be remitted, was not a surprise to him; he had known
all along that, sooner or later, he would be thrown on his own
resources. It had happened a little earlier than he had expected--that
was all. A week had still to run till the end of the month.--That
night, however, when Louise was out, he meditated, in a desultory
fashion, over the likely and unlikely occupations to which he could
turn his hand.

A few days later, she came home one evening in a different mood: for
once, no cruel words crossed her lips. They sat side by side on the
sofa; and of such stuff was happiness now made that he was content.
Chancing to look up, he was dismayed to see that her eyes were full of
tears, which, as he watched, ran over and down her cheeks. He slid to
his knee