re; and when, driven to extremity, he sought
to chastise her, she screamed so that the whole barracks ran to the
rescue.

In the end Heppner completely gave up troubling about her. He went his
own way, going out evening after evening, enjoying himself after his
fashion. He hardly ever gave his wife money enough for housekeeping.
When he did come home it was he who was the aggressor now, and the
reproaches of his wife were indifferent to him.

Thus things went on for months. It was not exactly pleasant for
Heppner; but one can get used to anything. He seemed only to grow
handsomer and more robust, while his wife became daily thinner and
uglier. Finally she did him an ill turn by falling sick. The doctor
declared her case to be hopeless from the first, and gave her but a
short time to live. But even the approach of death did not silence her
evil tongue.

Once the wretched wife went to Wegstetten, the captain of their
battery, in the vain hope that he might be able to help her.

"Just consider a little, Frau Heppner," he suggested, "whether you
yourself may not be somewhat to blame. For it is impossible that a man
so regular in his duties, who never has to be found fault with, can be
as violent as you make out. You exaggerate a bit, my good woman."

After this she resigned herself angrily to her miserable fate.

Wegstetten was not wrong in his praise of Heppner. Outside his own
quarters Heppner was a blameless non-commissioned officer; one who knew
his duties as well as any, and was strictly obedient to rules and
regulations. He handled the men smartly, his brutal, leonine voice
being audible all over the parade-ground; yet he never permitted
himself any undue licence of speech.

In general, if his men took the trouble to try, he got on well enough
with them. It was a satisfaction to him to command a well-drilled body
of men; if they behaved themselves he showed them thorough good-will.
Only now and then he would fix on a man and worry him to the utmost
permissible limit in a grim, cold way almost past endurance. It would
always be one of the weaker sort; pale-faced lads he could never
endure. And occasionally in other ways the rough animal nature of the
man would show itself. If any one got hurt, Heppner was the first to
run up--not to help, but to see the blood; he would watch it flow with
unmistakable pleasure in his eager eyes.

His special forte was the breaking-in of chargers. In the riding-school
he was th