teeth, and could talk with some eloquence
about heart-sorrows she had never known. And he, he who lay there with
his career like a stream which is poisoned at its source, might, had he
guided his own destinies with anything but the judgment of a fool, have
found himself just such a companion as he had but now parted from,
and have known in her a life-long comrade, an undying solace and
inspiration. Oh, fool! and fool! and fool! through all the wretched,
lonely hours of night--fool! and fool! and again fool unutterable!

Annette, on the morrow, was repentant and pitiable. The contrabandist
supplies had been of a very limited nature, and now they were over she
suffered a more than common misery of reaction from excess. For a while
she was sullen, and sulked in her own chamber; but when her headache had
worn itself out, she began to creep listlessly about the hotel Paul and
the Baroness had spent a second evening _tete-a-tete_ and Paul's first
judgment of the sympathetic nature of her character had been admirably
confirmed.

Husband and wife had had but one interview with each other since the
latest outbreak, and this had not tended to improve their relations or
to sweeten the temper of either one or die other. Paul had not mentioned
the existence of his wife to the Baroness until he had learned of the
lady's intention to make a stay of some length in Montcourtois. Then
he had said to himself dismally: She will think I have hidden something
from her unless I mention Annette; and he had named her in a mere
instinct of self-protection.

'My wife,' he had said simply, 'would be very happy and honoured to meet
you, but she is confined to her room by a slight indisposition which I
hope will pass away in a little time.'

'I shall hope, then, to make her acquaintance to-morrow,' said the
Baroness, and thereupon they got back to transcendentalisms and soul
solitude, and made up their minds how sweet a thing it would be if
only it were possible for any one human creature to know and thoroughly
understand another. With this unfailing battle-horse ready to prance
into the arena under the Baroness's poetic spur, they were never in
danger of being gravelled for lack of matter, but found each other's
society mutually and beautifully stimulative to the heart and mind.
After Paul's short and unhappy interview with Annette, the Baroness
requested the pleasure of his society upon a drive she proposed to
take. He acceding with great wil