ch
steps, and I stood on them while speaking to her. I congratulated her
on her splendid equipage.

"It is very superb, I know," she replied, but a shade came over her
face. "Is it not trying, Babache, to have one's lightest word taken
seriously? Here is the story of this coach. I had a handsome
one--fine enough for any one--but happening to say one day, in pure
carelessness, that I should like to have a gilt coach, Gaston orders
this one for me, secretly, and it arrives this morning, to my
astonishment. Moreover, in order to do it, Gaston, himself, went
without some horses he needs. He is by no means so well mounted as he
should be."

"At least, Madame," I replied, "few wives have your cause of
complaint."

I noticed then some dissatisfaction in Francezka's face; the pursuit
of pleasure, night and day, is bound to leave its marks on the
strongest frame, and the best balanced nerves. I suspected Francezka
was in the mood to find fault.

"Yes," she replied to my last words, "few wives can complain of too
great complaisance on the part of their husbands. But it is, surely,
not a comfortable way to live, for a woman, to watch and weigh her
words with her husband, lest he act upon the most lightly expressed
wish. Depend upon it, Babache, a great passion is a great burden."

Francezka said this to me--Francezka, less than a year after Gaston's
return. Oh, how strange a thing is a great passion after all!

In a minute or two more, I heard Gaston's voice over my shoulder. He
was standing on the coach step below me, and looked smiling and
triumphant.

"I see you approve of this equipage," said he to me. "It is not
unworthy even of Francezka."

I agreed with him; admired the horses--six superb roans--and then the
time came to move on, and I sprang to the ground, while Gaston stepped
into the coach.

As I walked away, I reflected that the money to pay for the gilt
coach and six came out of Francezka's estate. But Gaston, I knew, had
the management of it; and it is not the husband of every heiress who
is satisfied to keep indifferent horses for himself, and provide his
wife with six for her coach, and four for her outriders, to say
nothing of the finest coach in Paris.

But was Francezka happy? Her air that day did not indicate it, but
rather weariness, and disgust of the pleasures she followed so
assiduously. It is never a sign of happiness to follow pleasure
madly.

In walking and riding about the streets of Par