he country, and the unhappy woman could only wait and suffer
till morning. Balthazar, who had forgotten the hour at which the gates
closed, would come tranquilly home next day, quite unmindful of the
tortures his absence had inflicted on his family; and the happiness of
getting him back proved as dangerous an excitement of feeling to his
wife as her fears of the preceding night. She kept silence and dared not
question him, for when she did so on the occasion of his first absence,
he answered with an air of surprise:--

"Well, what of it? Can I not take a walk?"

Passions never deceive. Madame Claes's anxieties corroborated the rumors
she had taken so much pains to deny. The experience of her youth had
taught her to understand the polite pity of the world. Resolved not to
undergo it a second time, she withdrew more and more into the privacy of
her own house, now deserted by society and even by her nearest friends.

Among these many causes of distress, the negligence and disorder of
Balthazar's dress, so degrading to a man of his station, was not the
least bitter to a woman accustomed to the exquisite nicety of Flemish
life. At first Josephine endeavored, in concert with Balthazar's valet,
Lemulquinier, to repair the daily devastation of his clothing, but
even that she was soon forced to give up. The very day when Balthazar,
unaware of the substitution, put on new clothes in place of those that
were stained, torn, or full of holes, he made rags of them.

The poor wife, whose perfect happiness had lasted fifteen years, during
which time her jealousy had never once been roused, was apparently and
suddenly nothing in the heart where she had lately reigned. Spanish
by race, the feelings of a Spanish woman rose within her when she
discovered her rival in a Science that allured her husband from her:
torments of jealousy preyed upon her heart and renewed her love.
What could she do against Science? Should she combat that tyrannous,
unyielding, growing power? Could she kill an invisible rival? Could
a woman, limited by nature, contend with an Idea whose delights are
infinite, whose attractions are ever new? How make head against the
fascination of ideas that spring the fresher and the lovelier out of
difficulty, and entice a man so far from this world that he forgets even
his dearest loves?

At last one day, in spite of Balthazar's strict orders, Madame Claes
resolved to follow him, to shut herself up in the garret where his