information, and his judgment as to the soundness or unsoundness of a
financial enterprise was almost unerring. His little secret
transactions on the Bourse, where he had his _commissionaires_, always
yielded him ample returns; and when an opportunity presented itself,
which he had long foreseen, of buying a suburban garden at a bankrupt
sale, he found himself, at least preliminarily, at the goal of his
ambition. From this time forth, Mr. Hahn rose rapidly in wealth and
power. He kept his thumb, so to speak, constantly on the public pulse,
and prescribed amusements as unerringly as a physician prescribes
medicine, and usually, it must be admitted, with better results. The
"Haute Noblesse" became the favorite resort of fashionable idlers,
among whom the military element usually pre-ponderated, and the flash
of gilt buttons and the rattle of swords and scabbards could always be
counted on as the unvarying accompaniment to the music.

With all his prosperity, however, Mr. Hahn could not be called a happy
man. He had one secret sorrow, which, until within a year of his
departure for the Tyrol, had been a source of constant annoyance: Mrs.
Hahn, whom he had had the indiscretion to marry before he had arrived
at a proper recognition of his own worth, was not his equal in
intellect; in fact, she was conspicuously his inferior. She had been
chamber-maid in a noble family, and had succeeded in marrying Mr. Hahn
simply by the fact that she had made up her mind not to marry him. Mr.
Hahn, however, was not a man to be baffled by opposition. When the
pert Mariana had cut him three times at a dancing-hall, he became
convinced that she was the one thing in the world which he needed to
make his existence complete. After presenting him with a son, Fritz,
and three rather unlovely daughters, she had gradually lost all her
pertness (which had been her great charm) and had developed into a
stout, dropsical matron, with an abundance of domestic virtues. Her
principal trait of character had been a dogged, desperate loyalty. She
was loyal to her king, and wore golden imitations of his favorite
flowers as jewelry. She was loyal to Mr. Hahn, too; and no amount of
maltreatment could convince her that he was not the best of husbands.
She adored her former mistress and would insist upon paying respectful
little visits to her kitchen, taking her children with her. This
latter habit nearly drove her husband to distraction. He stamped his
feet, he to