ose and her almost
transparent eyelids and then over her arms that lay so peacefully
relaxed on the bed coverings. Her face and the pure skin of her arms
were bathed in light as if in clear water. But something glistened like
fine pure gold in the light, and here and there outshone it. On Maria's
eyelids, above her brow, beside her cheeks, about her throat, and even
where the bedclothes scarcely hid her breast. It was the dead woman's
gleaming hair and eyelashes.

"Yes, you were beautiful," said Stephen Fausch. His eye wandered
over her form with an observant and thoughtful expression similar to
the look he had worn a few days before, when he was studying the beauty
of the bronze figure. But together with the strangely happy calm with
which he enjoyed his wife's beauty, the bull-like stubbornness and a
self-willed indifference plainly appeared on his brow and in his
bearing. This he had constantly shown to Maria, ever since he had
discovered her own and his brother's unfaithfulness. He had in fact
treated her as a servant. And yet Maria could have told how he had
formerly adored her, as one person rarely adores another. This she had
seen long ago when he used to visit her in her native village, which
was a couple of hours distant from his own house; he would come almost
daily, in all weathers, and often at night, in case he had had no free
time during the day! His persistence had finally prevailed and won her
consent. And afterward, during the years of their married life, before
Ludwig had come home! Although he was a rough fellow and had his bad
times, yet he had petted and indulged her--for he had loved her!
But--ever since the trouble with his brother, he had, as it were,
pushed her out of his way with his heavy shoes, and yet he held her
once more to her duties and kept her close to him, making her feel that
he was the master, whose heavy hand could drive her where he chose.
Even now, when she was dead, he would not let himself feel either pity
or grief for her; only the strange joy that he took in her beauty found
its place side by side with the sullen resentment that he felt against
her. This joy was so great, that after a while, he went slowly out into
the passageway and called his maid, beckoned to her, and with his ugly
hand, pointed toward the bed.

"See how beautiful she is," and smoothed a fold of the coverlet that
seemed to him to break the perfection of the picture.

The maid began to sob, indeed she ha