same time to remain
faithful to his vows, betrayed itself in her bitter smile, her cold,
uncomplaining gentleness.

Georges was wofully unhappy. He loved his wife now. The nobility of her
character had conquered him. There was admiration in his love, and--why
not say it?--Claire's sorrow filled the place of the coquetry which was
contrary to her nature, the lack of which had always been a defect in
her husband's eyes. He was one of that strange type of men who love to
make conquests. Sidonie, capricious and cold as she was, responded to
that whim of his heart. After parting from her with a tender farewell,
he found her indifferent and forgetful the next day, and that continual
need of wooing her back to him took the place of genuine passion.
Serenity in love bored him as a voyage without storms wearies a sailor.
On this occasion he had been very near shipwreck with his wife, and the
danger had not passed even yet. He knew that Claire was alienated
from him and devoted entirely to the child, the only link between them
thenceforth. Their separation made her seem lovelier, more desirable,
and he exercised all his powers of fascination to recapture her. He
knew how hard a task it would be, and that he had no ordinary, frivolous
nature to deal with. But he did not despair. Sometimes a vague gleam in
the depths of the mild and apparently impassive glance with which she
watched his efforts, bade him hope.

As for Sidonie, he no longer thought of her. Let no one be astonished at
that abrupt mental rupture. Those two superficial beings had nothing to
attach them securely to each other. Georges was incapable of receiving
lasting impressions unless they were continually renewed; Sidonie, for
her part, had no power to inspire any noble or durable sentiment. It was
one of those intrigues between a cocotte and a coxcomb, compounded of
vanity and of wounded self-love, which inspire neither devotion nor
constancy, but tragic adventures, duels, suicides which are rarely
fatal, and which end in a radical cure. Perhaps, had he seen her again,
he might have had a relapse of his disease; but the impetus of flight
had carried Sidonie away so swiftly and so far that her return was
impossible. At all events, it was a relief for him to be able to live
without lying; and the new life he was leading, a life of hard work
and self-denial, with the goal of success in the distance, was not
distasteful to him. Luckily; for the courage and determinat