ey were; the ring was much too large on her finger, and this he
remembered having noticed before; but why had he not reflected on what
it meant?

Her hands lay stretched out on either side of the body which seemed to
him so slender beneath the coverlet and sheet. The lace about her wrists
was unrumpled, as though she had not stirred since she was dressed for
the morning, and that must now be several hours since.

"Why, Amalie," he burst out, and knelt down at her bedside.

"It was not thus I meant it," replied she, but in so soft a whisper that
under other circumstances he could not have heard it.

"What do you mean by 'thus,' Amalie? Oh, try once more to answer me!
Amalie!"

He saw that she wanted to reply, but either could not, or else had
thought better of it. Tears filled her eyes and trickled down her
cheeks, filled her eyes and were shed again, her lips quivered, but as
noiselessly as this occurred, just so still she lay. Finally she raised
her large eyes to his face. He bowed closer to her to catch the words:
"I would not take them from--you," spoken in a whisper as before; the
word "you" was uttered by itself, and in the same low tone as the rest,
encompassed with a tenderness and a mournfulness which nothing on earth
could exceed in strength.

He dared not question further, although he failed to understand his
wife. He only comprehended that something had occurred that same
forenoon which had turned the current of life to that of death. She lay
there paralyzed. Her immobility was that of terror; something
extraordinary had weighed her down to this speechless silence, had
crushed her. But he also comprehended that behind this noiseless
immobility there was an agitation so great that her heart was ready to
burst; he knew that there was danger, that his presence increased the
danger, that there must be help sought; in other words, he comprehended
that if he did not go away himself, his face as it must now look was
enough to kill her. He never knew how he got away. He can remember that
he was on a stairway, for he recollects seeing a picture that his wife
herself must have hung up, it was one representing St. Christopher
carrying the child Jesus over a brook. He found himself lying on the
sofa in the large sitting-room, with something wet on his brow, and a
couple of people at his side, of whom one was Stina. He struggled for a
long time as with a bad dream. At the sight of Stina his terror
returned. "Stina,