et breathing not reaching my ear, that I felt
impelled to stretch out my hand beneath the coverlet and touch hers ever
so softly. I did so.

Her hand was instantly and silently withdrawn. She was awake, then.

"Margot," I said, "did I disturb you?"

There was no answer.

The movement, followed by the silence, affected me very disagreeably.

I lit the candle and looked at her. She was lying on the extreme edge
of the bed, with her blue eyes closed. Her lips were slightly parted. I
could hear her steady breathing. Yet was she really sleeping?

I bent lower over her, and as I did so a slight, involuntary movement,
akin to what we call a shudder, ran through her body. I recoiled from
the bed. An impotent anger seized me. Could it be that my presence was
becoming so hateful to my wife that even in sleep her body trembled when
I drew near it? Or was this slumber feigned? I could not tell, but I
felt it impossible at that moment to remain in the room. I returned to
my own, dressed, and descended the stairs to the door opening on to the
terrace. I felt a longing to be out in the air. The atmosphere of the
house was stifling.

Was it coming to this, then? Did I, a man, shrink with a fantastic
cowardice from a woman I loved? The latent cruelty began to stir within
me, the tyrant spirit which a strong love sometimes evokes. I had been
Margot's slave almost. My affection had brought me to her feet, had
kept me there. So long as she loved me I was content to be her captive,
knowing she was mine. But a change in her attitude toward me might rouse
the master. In my nature there was a certain brutality, a savagery,
which I had never wholly slain, although Margot had softened me
wonderfully by her softness, had brought me to gentleness by her
tenderness. The boy of years ago had developed toward better things, but
he was not dead in me. I felt that as I walked up and down the terrace
through the night in a wild meditation. If my love could not hold
Margot, my strength should.

I drew in a long breath of the wet night air, and I opened my shoulders
as if shaking off an oppression. My passion for Margot had not yet drawn
me down to weakness; it had raised me up to strength. The faint fear
of her, which I had felt almost without knowing it more than once, died
within me. The desire of the conqueror elevated me. There was something
for me to win. My paralysis passed away, and I turned toward the house.

And now a strange thing hap