, Mrs. Dexter?" said her husband, coming
forward, and making a motion as if about to offer his arm.

"Not yet if you please, Mr. Dexter," was smilingly answered. "I am
too much interested in this good company. Come, sit down here," and
she made room for him on the sofa.

But he stood still.

"Then amuse yourself a little longer," said his wife, in a gay
voice. "I will be ready to go with you after a while."

Mr. Dexter moved away, disappointed, and commenced pacing the floor
of the long parlor. At every turn his keen eyes took in the aspect
of the little group, and particularly the meaning of his wife's
face, as it turned to Mr. Hendrickson, either in the play of
expression or warm with the listener's interest. The sight half
maddened him. Three times, in the next half hour, he said to his
wife, as he paused in his restless promenade before her--

"Come, Jessie."

But she only threw him a smiling negative, and became still more
interesting to her friends. At last, and of her own will, she arose,
and bowing, with a face all smiles and eyes dancing in light, to Mr.
Hendrickson and Mrs. Florence, she stepped forward, and placing her
hand on the arm of her husband, went like a sunbeam from the room.

CHAPTER XV.

"MADAM!"

They had reached their own apartments, and Mrs. Dexter was moving
forward past her husband. The stern imperative utterance caused her
to pause and turn round.

"We leave for home in the morning!" said Mr. Dexter.

"_We_?" His wife looked at him fixedly as she made the simple
interrogation.

"Yes, _we_!" was answered, and in the voice of one who had made up
his mind, and did not mean to be thwarted in his purpose.

"Mr. Dexter!" his wife stood very erect before him; her eyes did not
quail beneath his angry glances; nor was there any sign of weakness
in her low, even tones. "Let me warn you now--and regard the warning
as for all time--against any attempt to coerce me into obedience to
your arbitrary exactions. Your conduct to-night was simply
disgraceful--humiliating to yourself, and mortifying and unjust to
your wife. Let us have no more of this. There is a high wall between
us, Mr. Dexter--high as heaven and deep as--." Her feelings were
getting the rein and she checked herself. "Your own hands have built
it," she resumed in a colder tone, "but your own hands, I fear, have
not the strength to pull it down. Love you I never did, and you knew
it from the beginning; love you I never