carried away with rage.

"You lie! you lie! you wretch! You are jealous of her! You have got a
judgment against her husband! Senecal is already mixed up in your
affairs. He detests Arnoux; and your two hatreds have entered into a
combination with one another. I saw how delighted he was when you won
that action of yours about the kaolin shares. Are you going to deny
this?"

"I give you my word----"

"Oh, I know what that's worth--your word!"

And Frederick reminded her of her lovers, giving their names and
circumstantial details. Rosanette drew back, all the colour fading from
her face.

"You are astonished at this. You thought I was blind because I shut my
eyes. Now I have had enough of it. We do not die through the treacheries
of a woman of your sort. When they become too monstrous we get out of
the way. To inflict punishment on account of them would be only to
degrade oneself."

She twisted her arms about.

"My God, who can it be that has changed him?"

"Nobody but yourself."

"And all this for Madame Arnoux!" exclaimed Rosanette, weeping.

He replied coldly:

"I have never loved any woman but her!"

At this insult her tears ceased to flow.

"That shows your good taste! A woman of mature years, with a complexion
like liquorice, a thick waist, big eyes like the ventholes of a cellar,
and just as empty! As you like her so much, go and join her!"

"This is just what I expected. Thank you!"

Rosanette remained motionless, stupefied by this extraordinary
behaviour.

She even allowed the door to be shut; then, with a bound, she pulled him
back into the anteroom, and flinging her arms around him:

"Why, you are mad! you are mad! this is absurd! I love you!" Then she
changed her tone to one of entreaty:

"Good heavens! for the sake of our dead infant!"

"Confess that it was you who did this trick!" said Frederick.

She still protested that she was innocent.

"You will not acknowledge it?"

"No!"

"Well, then, farewell! and forever!"

"Listen to me!"

Frederick turned round:

"If you understood me better, you would know that my decision is
irrevocable!"

"Oh! oh! you will come back to me again!"

"Never as long as I live!"

And he slammed the door behind him violently.

Rosanette wrote to Deslauriers saying that she wanted to see him at
once.

He called one evening, about five days later; and, when she told him
about the rupture:

"That's all! A nice piece of bad luck!"

She thou