one!" the starched bosom of his
shirt seemed swollen by indignation.

Mr. Treffry, with a heavy hand on the table, eyed him sideways. Dawney
said slowly:

"B---is a beast; I'm sorry for the poor woman; but what can she do
alone?"

"There is, no doubt, a man," put in Sarelli.

Herr Paul muttered: "Who knows?"

"What is B---going to do?" said Dawney.

"Ah!" said Herr Paul. "He is fond of her. He is a chap of resolution,
he will get her back. He told me: 'Well, you know, I shall follow
her wherever she goes till she comes back.' He will do it, he is a
determined chap; he will follow her wherever she goes."

Mr. Treffry drank his wine off at a gulp, and sucked his moustache in
sharply.

"She was a fool to marry him," said Dawney; "they haven't a point in
common; she hates him like poison, and she's the better of the two. But
it doesn't pay a woman to run off like that. B---had better hurry up,
though. What do you think, sir?" he said to Mr. Treffry.

"Eh?" said Mr. Treffry; "how should I know? Ask Paul there, he's one of
your moral men, or Count Sarelli."

The latter said impassively: "If I cared for her I should very likely
kill her--if not--" he shrugged his shoulders.

Harz, who was watching, was reminded of his other words at dinner, "wild
beasts whom I would tear to pieces." He looked with interest at this
quiet man who said these extremely ferocious things, and thought: 'I
should like to paint that fellow.'

Herr Paul twirled his wine-glass in his fingers. "There are family
ties," he said, "there is society, there is decency; a wife should be
with her husband. B---will do quite right. He must go after her; she
will not perhaps come back at first; he will follow her; she will begin
to think, 'I am helpless--I am ridiculous!' A woman is soon beaten. They
will return. She is once more with her husband--Society will forgive, it
will be all right."

"By Jove, Paul," growled Mr. Treffry, "wonderful power of argument!"

"A wife is a wife," pursued Herr Paul; "a man has a right to her
society."

"What do you say to that, sir?" asked Dawney.

Mr. Treffry tugged at his beard: "Make a woman live with you, if she
don't want to? I call it low."

"But, my dear," exclaimed Herr Paul, "how should you know? You have not
been married."

"No, thank the Lord!" Mr. Treffry replied.

"But looking at the question broadly, sir," said Dawney; "if a husband
always lets his wife do as she likes, how would the thing wor