nimal, man?

"Look at that woman, Madame de Mascaret. God intended her to live in a
cave, naked or wrapped up in the skins of wild animals. But is she not
better as she is? But, speaking of her, does any one know why and
how her brute of a husband, having such a companion by his side, and
especially after having been boorish enough to make her a mother seven
times, has suddenly left her, to run after bad women?"

Grandin replied: "Oh! my dear fellow, this is probably the only reason.
He found that raising a family was becoming too expensive, and from
reasons of domestic economy he has arrived at the same principles which
you lay down as a philosopher."

Just then the curtain rose for the third act, and they turned round,
took off their hats and sat down.

IV

The Comte and Comtesse Mascaret were sitting side by side in the
carriage which was taking them home from the Opera, without speaking but
suddenly the husband said to his wife: "Gabrielle!"

"What do you want?"

"Don't you think that this has lasted long enough?"

"What?"

"The horrible punishment to which you have condemned me for the last six
years?"

"What do you want? I cannot help it."

"Then tell me which of them it is."

"Never."

"Think that I can no longer see my children or feel them round me,
without having my heart burdened with this doubt. Tell me which of
them it is, and I swear that I will forgive you and treat it like the
others."

"I have not the right to do so."

"Do you not see that I can no longer endure this life, this thought
which is wearing me out, or this question which I am constantly asking
myself, this question which tortures me each time I look at them? It is
driving me mad."

"Then you have suffered a great deal?" she said.

"Terribly. Should I, without that, have accepted the horror of living
by your side, and the still greater horror of feeling and knowing that
there is one among them whom I cannot recognize and who prevents me from
loving the others?"

"Then you have really suffered very much?" she repeated.

And he replied in a constrained and sorrowful voice:

"Yes, for do I not tell you every day that it is intolerable torture to
me? Should I have remained in that house, near you and them, if I
did not love them? Oh! You have behaved abominably toward me. All the
affection of my heart I have bestowed upon my children, and that you
know. I am for them a father of the olden time, as I was for you a