"Is not this my home? What have
I----"

"Go to your lover!" he interrupted fiercely. "Tell him that your husband
is no longer your tool. He will take you in."

A burning color streamed into her delicate cheeks, and a sudden passion
blazed in her eyes. She drew herself up to her full height and turned
upon him with the dignity of an empress.

"Listen to me one moment," she said. "Ask yourself whether you have ever
tried to make my life a happy one. Did I ever pretend to care for books
and solitude? Before I married you I told you that I was fond of change
and gaiety and life, and you promised me that I should have it. Ask
yourself how you have kept that promise. You deny me every pleasure, and
drive me to seek them alone. I am weary of your jealous furies, and
your evil temper. As God looks down upon us at this moment, I have been
a faithful wife to you; but if you will add to all your cruelties this
cowardly, miserable indignity, then I will never willingly look upon
your face again, and what sin I do will be on your head, not mine. Will
you stand aside and let me pass?"

"Never!" he answered. "Never!"

She drew her mantle round her shoulders, and turned her back upon him
with a contemptuous gesture.

"You have made me what I shall be," she said. "The sin be with you. For
several weary years you have made me miserable. Now you have made me
wicked."

She walked away into the perfumed darkness, and presently he heard the
gate close behind her. He listened frantically, hoping to hear her
returning steps. It was in vain. All was silent. Then he felt his limbs
totter, and he sank back on a couch, and buried his face amongst the
cushions.

CHAPTER XXX

BENJAMIN LEVY RUNS HIS QUARRY TO EARTH

The slumberous afternoon wore slowly away. A slight breeze rustled
amongst the cypresses and the olive trees, and the air grew clearer. The
sun was low in the heavens, and long shadows lay across the brilliant
patches of flowers, half wild, half cultivated, and on the moss-grown
walks.

Still Bernard Maddison made no movement. It may have been that he shrunk
from what was before him, or it may have been that he had some special
purpose in thus calling up those broken visions of the past into his
mind. For, as he sat there, they still thronged in upon him, disjointed
and confused, yet all tinged with that peculiar sadness which seemed to
have lain heavy upon his life.

Again the memory of those long lonely days of