love my husband?
But the time came when I knew that I couldn't cheat myself any
longer, that I was alive, that I was not to blame, that God has
made me so that I must love and live. And now what does he do?
If he'd killed me, if he'd killed him, I could have borne
anything, I could have forgiven anything; but, no, he.... How
was it I didn't guess what he would do? He's doing just what's
characteristic of his mean character. He'll keep himself in the
right, while me, in my ruin, he'll drive still lower to worse
ruin yet..."

She recalled the words from the letter. "You can conjecture what
awaits you and your son...." "That's a threat to take away my
child, and most likely by their stupid law he can. But I know
very well why he says it. He doesn't believe even in my love for
my child, or he despises it (just as he always used to ridicule
it). He despises that feeling in me, but he knows that I won't
abandon my child, that I can't abandon my child, that there
could be no life for me without my child, even with him whom I
love; but that if I abandoned my child and ran away from him, I
should be acting like the most infamous, basest of women. He
knows that, and knows that I am incapable of doing that."

She recalled another sentence in the letter. "Our life must go
on as it has done in the past...." "That life was miserable
enough in the old days; it has been awful of late. What will it
be now? And he knows all that; he knows that I can't repent that
I breathe, that I love; he knows that it can lead to nothing but
lying and deceit; but he wants to go on torturing me. I know
him; I know that he's at home and is happy in deceit, like a fish
swimming in the water. No, I won't give him that happiness.
I'll break through the spiderweb of lies in which he wants to
catch me, come what may. Anything's better than lying and
deceit.

"But how? My God! my God! Was ever a woman so miserable as I
am?..."

"No; I will break through it, I will break through it!" she
cried, jumping up and keeping back her tears. And she went to
the writing table to write him another letter. But at the bottom
of her heart she felt that she was not strong enough to break
through anything, that she was not strong enough to get out of
her old position, however false and dishonorable it might be.

She sat down at the writing table, but instead of writing she
clasped her hands on the table, and, laying her head on them,
burst into t