as three hours--"

"I was sure of it--at Madame de Fischtaminel's!"

"No, at our notary's, as he had got me a purchaser; but we could not
come to terms: he wanted our villa furnished. When I left there, I went
to Braschon's, to see how much we owed him--"

"You made up this romance while I was talking to you! Look me in the
face! I'll go to see Braschon to-morrow."

Adolphe cannot restrain a nervous shudder.

"You can't help laughing, you monster!"

"I laugh at your obstinacy."

"I'll go to-morrow to Madame de Fischtaminel's."

"Oh, go wherever you like!"

"What brutality!" says Caroline, rising and going away with her
handkerchief at her eyes.

The country house, so ardently longed for by Caroline, has now become
a diabolical invention of Adolphe's, a trap into which the fawn has
fallen.

Since Adolphe's discovery that it is impossible to reason with Caroline,
he lets her say whatever she pleases.

Two months after, he sells the villa which cost him twenty-two thousand
francs for seven thousand! But he gains this by the adventure--he finds
out that the country is not the thing that Caroline wants.

The question is becoming serious. Nature, with its woods, its forests,
its valleys, the Switzerland of the environs of Paris, the artificial
rivers, have amused Caroline for barely six months. Adolphe is tempted
to abdicate and take Caroline's part himself.

A HOUSEHOLD REVOLUTION.

One morning, Adolphe is seized by the triumphant idea of letting
Caroline find out for herself what she wants. He gives up to her the
control of the house, saying, "Do as you like." He substitutes the
constitutional system for the autocratic system, a responsible ministry
for an absolute conjugal monarchy. This proof of confidence--the object
of much secret envy--is, to women, a field-marshal's baton. Women are
then, so to speak, mistresses at home.

After this, nothing, not even the memory of the honey-moon, can be
compared to Adolphe's happiness for several days. A woman, under such
circumstances, is all sugar. She is too sweet: she would invent the art
of petting and cosseting and of coining tender little names, if this
matrimonial sugar-plummery had not existed ever since the Terrestrial
Paradise. At the end of the month, Adolphe's condition is like that of
children towards the close of New Year's week. So Caroline is beginning
to say, not in words, but in acts, in manner, in mimetic expressions:
"It's difficult to