, and never gave her more than she needed at the moment
because money was no longer safe from her husband in her hands.

She used what time she had from her housekeeping and her children in
doing different pieces of work which Valentine, as her agent, sold for
her. The money that she thus received she used partly--she herself
would rather go hungry even though she could not see her children do
so--to adorn the living-room with all kinds of things that she knew
that Apollonius loved. And yet she knew that Apollonius never came in
there, that he never saw it. But then, she would not have done it if
she had known that he would see it. Her husband saw it as often as he
came into the room. Nothing escaped his eyes that might act as an
excuse for his anger and his hatred. Then he began to abuse
Apollonius, and in such terms as if he too must now show how much it
is possible to acquire of another person's manner.

If the children were present it was his wife's first care to send them
away. They must not witness his roughness and learn to despise their
father--not for his sake but for their own. He did not betray how glad
he was to be rid of the "spies." He feared that the children would
complain of him to Apollonius. He did not think that his wife would
complain herself, although he assumed that she and Apollonius met each
other. Everything that he saw in the room was to him a fresh proof of
his shame. How could he believe that it was for any other purpose than
to be noticed by Apollonius? Then, when she told him that he might
abuse her, only not Apollonius, the keen eye of jealousy showed him
what pleasure she took in suffering for Apollonius. He reproached her
with it, and she did not deny it. She said to him: "Because he suffers
for me and for my children. He gives what he has been at great pains
to save to take the place of the weekly sum of which the father has
robbed his children."

"And he tells you that? He tells you that!" said the man, laughing
with savage joy at having trapped her into a confession that she met
him.

"Not he," returned his wife angrily, because the man she despised was
judging Apollonius by himself. "Old Valentine told me." She went on to
tell him that Valentine had sold as his own the watch that Apollonius
had brought with him from Cologne. Apollonius had forbidden him to
tell her.

"And also to tell you that he forbade him?" laughed her husband. And
there was something of contempt in his lau