hile, I asked what had become of him, I was told that he was in
the library with Alma, and that they were alone.

Two hours passed.

To justify and fortify myself I thought how badly my husband had behaved
to me. I remembered that he had married me from the most mercenary
motives; that he had paid off his mistress with the money that came
through me; that he had killed by cruelty the efforts I had made to love
him; that he had humiliated me by gross infidelities committed on my
honeymoon. I recalled the scenes in Rome, the scenes in Paris, and the
insults I had received under my own roof.

It was all in vain. Whether God means it that the woman's fault in
breaking her marriage vows (whatever her sufferings and excuse) shall be
greater than that of the man I do not know. I only know that I was
trembling like a prisoner before her judge when, being dressed for
dinner and waiting for the sound of the bell, I heard my husband's
footsteps approach my door.

I was standing by the fire at that moment, and I held on to the
mantelpiece as my husband came into the room.

SEVENTY-SIXTH CHAPTER

He was very pale. The look of hardness, almost of brutality, which
pierced his manner at normal moments had deepened, and I could see at a
glance that he was nervous. His monocle dropped of itself from his slow
grey eyes, and the white fat fingers which replaced it trembled.

Without shaking hands or offering any other sort of salutation he
plunged immediately into the matter that was uppermost in his mind.

"I am still at a loss to account for this affair of your father's," he
said. "Of course I know what it is supposed to be--a reception in honour
of our home-coming. That explanation may or may not be sufficient for
these stupid islanders, but it's rather too thin for me. Can you tell me
what your father means by it?"

I knew he knew what my father meant, so I said, trembling like a sheep
that walks up to a barking dog:

"Hadn't you better ask that question of my father himself?"

"Perhaps I should if he were here, but he isn't, so I ask you. Your
father is a strange man. There's no knowing what crude things he will
not do to gratify his primitive instincts. But he does not spend five or
ten thousand pounds for nothing. He isn't a fool exactly."

"Thank you," I said. I could not help it. It was forced out of me.

My husband flinched and looked at me. Then the bully in him, which
always lay underneath, came uppermost