CLEMENTINA descended the stairs in some anxiety, and on setting foot in the street, breathed a sigh of relief. She went off at a brisk pace down the Calle del Siete de Julia, across the Plaza Mayor, and on through the Calle de Atocha. On reaching this, she suddenly remembered the youth who had previously followed her, and turned her head in anxiety. No one. There was nothing to alarm her. No one was in pursuit. At the door of one of the best houses in the street she stopped, looked hastily and stealthily both ways, and went in. A hardly perceptible sign of inquiry to the porter, was answered by his hand to his cap. She flew to the back staircase, to escape any unpleasant meeting no doubt, and ran up in such a hurry that on reaching the second floor she was quite breathless, and pressed one hand to her heart. With the other, she knocked twice at one of the doors, which was instantly and noiselessly opened; she rushed in as if the enemy were at her heels.

"Better late than never," said a young man who had opened it, and who carefully shut it again.

He was a man of eight-and-twenty or thirty, above the middle height, slightly built, with delicate and regular features, a colour in his cheeks, a moustache curled up at the ends, a pointed chin-tuft, and black hair carefully parted down the middle. He looked like a toy soldier—that is to say, he was of the effeminate military type. His face was not unlike those of the dolls on which tailors display ready-made clothing, and was not less unpleasing and repulsive. He wore a pearl-grey velvet morning jacket, elaborately braided, and slippers of the same material and colour, with initials embroidered in gold. It was evident at a glance that he was one of those men who care greatly for the decoration of their person; who touch up every detail with as much finish and attention as a sculptor bestows on a statue; who believe that curling and gumming their moustaches is a sacred and bounden duty; who accept the fact that the Supreme Creator has bestowed on them a fascinating presence, and do their best to improve on His work.

"How late you are!" he exclaimed once more, fixing on her face a conventional gaze of sad reproach.

The lady rewarded him with a gracious smile, saying at the same time in a tone of raillery, "It is never too late if luck comes at last."

She took his hand and pressed it fondly; then, still holding it, she led him along the passages to a small room which seemed to be the young man's study. It was a luxurious den, artistically decorated; the walls were hung with dark blue plush curtains, held up by rings on a bronze rod under the cornice; there were arm-chairs of various shapes and sizes, a writing-table in walnut-wood ornamented with wrought-iron, and by the side of it a book-stand with a few books—about two dozen perhaps. Suspended by silken cords from the ceiling, and against the walls, were horse-trappings and several saddles, common and military, with their stirrups hanging down; curbs of many ages and lands, whips, fine woollen horse-cloths richly embroidered, gold and silver spurs, all very handsome and in perfect order. The hippic tastes of the owner of this "study" were no less evident in the corridor which led to it from the door; everywhere there were portraits of horses saddled or stripped. Even on the writing-table, the inkstand, paper-weights, and paper-knife were decorated with horse-shoes stirrups, or whips. Through an arch with columns, only half-closed by a handsome tapestry curtain representing a youth in powder kneeling to a lady À la Pompadour, a handsome mahogany bedstead with a canopy was visible.

On reaching this little room the lady let herself drop gracefully into a pretty little lounging chair, and went on in a light jesting tone: "So you are not glad to see me?"

"Very. But I should have been glad to see you sooner. I have been waiting for you above an hour and a half."

"And what then? Is it such a sacrifice to wait an hour and a half for the woman who adores you? Have you not read how Leander swam every evening across the Hellespont to see his beloved? No, you have never read that nor anything else. Well, I believe that knowledge would not suit you. Books would spoil that pretty colour in your cheeks, and undermine the strength and agility with which you ride and drive. Besides, some men were born only to be handsome and strong and to amuse themselves, and you are one of them."

"Come, come. It seems to me that you regard me as an idiot ignorant even of my alphabet?" exclaimed the young man somewhat piqued and distressed, as he stood in front of her.

"No, my dear, no!" she replied, laughing, and seizing one of his hands she kissed it with a sudden impulse of tenderness. "Now you are insulting me. Do you think I could love an idiot? Take this," she went on, taking off her hat. "Put my hat on the bed with the greatest care. Now come here, wretch that you are. You are so touchy that you forget you began by being rude to me. An hour and a half! What then? Come close; kneel down; wait till I pull your hair for you."

But the young man, instead of obeying her, drew up a smoking chair, and perched himself on it in front of her.

"Do you know what kept me? Why that tiresome boy who followed me again."

And as she spoke she suddenly grew serious: a well-defined frown puckered her pretty brows.

"It is insufferable," she went on. "I do not know what to do. Whenever I stir, morning or evening, this shadow haunts me. I had to take refuge at Mariana's; then, having gone there I had no choice but to stay a little while. Papa came in, and to avoid his escorting me home I had to wait till he went first. So you see."

"A pretty fellow is that boy!" exclaimed the man, with a laugh.

"Very much so! It would be very amusing if he found out where I come, and every one were to hear of it, and it were to reach my husband's ears. Laugh away, laugh away!"

"Why not? Who but you would think of objecting to so platonic an admirer? Have you had any note from him? Has he ever spoken a word to you?"

"That would not matter in the least. It is the persecution which jars on my nerves. He is just such a boy as would be capable out of mere spite, if he detected me entering this house, of writing an anonymous letter. And you know the peculiar position in which I stand with regard to my husband."

"There is not a chance of it. Those who write anonymous notes are not admirers, but envious women. Shall I meet him face to face and give him a fright?"

"How can you ask such a question!" exclaimed Clementina, indignantly. "Listen Pepe, you are a man of feeling, and have plenty of intelligence, but you sadly lack a little more delicacy to enable you to understand certain things. You should give rather less time to your club and your horses, and cultivate your mind a little."

"Is that your opinion?" cried Pepe, angered extremely by this reproof.

"Well, if you wish that I should not tell you such things, there are others which you should not say."

Pepe Castro shrugged his shoulders scornfully, and rose from his chair. He paced the room two or three times with an air of abstraction, and stopped at last in front of a little picture which he took down to dust it with his handkerchief. Clementina watched him with anger in her eyes. She suddenly started to her feet as if moved by a spring; but then, controlling her petulance, she quietly went into the adjoining room, took her hat off the bed, and began to put it on in front of a looking-glass, very deliberately, though the slight trembling of her hands still betrayed the annoyance she was repressing.

"There," she presently exclaimed, in a tone of indifference, "I am going. Do you want anything out?"

The young man turned round, and exclaimed with surprise: "Already!"

"Already," replied she with affected determination.

Castro went up to her, put his arm round her neck, and raising the red veil with the other hand, kissed her on the temple.

"It is always the same," said he. "I get the broken head and you want to wear the bandage."

"What is that you are saying?" she replied in some confusion. "I am going because I have another visit to pay before dinner."

"Come Clementina, you cannot make believe, even if you wish it. You must understand that I cannot listen to insults and laugh, and you insult me at every moment."

"I really do not understand you; I do not know what insults or make believe you allude to," she replied, with affected innocence.

Pepe tried coaxingly to take her hat off again, but she repelled him with an imperious gesture. He then put his arm round her waist and led her to the sofa; he sat down and taking her hands kissed them again and again with passionate affection. She stood upright and would not be softened. However, he was so vehement and so humble in his endearments, that at last she snatched away her hands and exclaimed, half laughing, but still half vexed:

"Have done, have done: I am tired of your whining—like a Newfoundland dog! You are abject. I would be torn in pieces before I would humiliate myself like that."

She took her hat off, and went herself to place it on the bed.

"When a man is as much in love as I am," replied the youth somewhat abashed, "he does not regard anything as a humiliation."

"Really and truly, boy?" said she, smiling and taking him by the chin with her slender pink fingers; "I do not believe it. You are not the stuff that lovers are made of. Well, I will put you to the proof. If I told you to do a thing that might cost you your life, or, which is worse, your honour—a few years in prison—would you do it?"

"I should think so!"

"Well then—well then, I want you to kill my husband."

"How barbarous!" he exclaimed in dismay, opening his eyes very wide.

The lady looked at him steadily for a few minutes with scrutinising, sarcastic eyes. Then with a sharp laugh, she exclaimed:

"You see, miserable man, you see! You are a fine gentleman of Madrid, a member of the Savage Club. Neither for me nor any other woman would you exchange your dress-coat and white waistcoat for a prison uniform."

"You have such strange ideas."

"Well, well. Go on in the way which your pusillanimous nature points out to you, and do not get into mischief. You will understand that I only spoke in jest; but it has confirmed me in the opinion I had already formed."

"But if you have so poor an opinion of my devotion, I do not know why you should love me," said the young man, again somewhat piqued.

"Why I love you? For the same reason for which I do everything—Caprice. I saw you one day in the Park of the Retiro, breaking in a horse splendidly, and I took a fancy to you. Then, two months later, I saw you at the fencing gallery at Biarritz, crossing foils with a Russian, and that finally bewitched me. I got you introduced to me, I did my best to please you—I did in fact please you—and here we are."

Pepe made up his mind to endure with patience her half cynical tone of raillery, and by dint of talking she presently dropped it. Clementina when she was content, was affectionate and gay, and ready to yield to impulses of generosity; her face, as singular as it was beautiful, never indeed softened to sweetness, but it had a kind, maternal expression which was very attractive. But if her nerves were irritated, and her opinions or wishes were crossed, the under-current of pride, obstinacy and even cruelty, which lay beneath, came to the surface, and her blue eyes shot flashes of fierce sarcasm or fury.

Pepe Castro, who was neither illustrious nor clever, had nevertheless the art of amusing her with the gossip of society, and innuendoes against those persons for whom she had a marked antipathy. The means were coarse but the effect was excellent. The Condesa de T——, a lady whom Clementina hated mortally for some displeasure she had once done her, was desperately hard up; she had gone to borrow of Z—— the old banker, who had granted the loan, but at a percentage which had made the lady stare. The MarquÉs de L——, and his wife, for whom also she had an aversion, had, before he was in office, given entertainments to the electors at their country house, with splendid banquets; but as soon as he was made Minister, though they still gave parties there was no buffet. Julita R——, a very pretty girl who, again, was no favourite with the haughty lady, had been turned out of doors by the M—— s for having been found in their son's room—a lad of fifteen. This and much more of the same kind fell from the lips of the generous youth, with a scornful humour which put the fair one into a better temper. This was Pepe Castro's sole talent of an intellectual character; his other accomplishments were purely physical.

The clouds had cleared from Clementina's brow. She was now loquacious, smiling, and lavish of caresses; during the hour she remained with her lover, he was amply indemnified for the stabs she had given him on first arriving, as happy as their tÊte-À-tÊte could make him.

It had already long since become dusk. The youth lighted the two lamps on the chimney-piece, without calling the servant—his only servant, and the only living soul with him in his rooms.

Pepe Castro was the son of a noble house of Arragon; his elder brother bore a well-known title, and his sister had married into a family of rank. He had been educated at Madrid; at the age of twenty he lost his father. For a time he lived with his elder brother, but it was not long before they quarrelled, since the elder, who was economical to avarice, could not endure Pepe's wasteful extravagance. He then tried living under his sister's roof, but at the end of a few months incompatibility of temper between himself and his brother-in-law led to such violent disputes, that it was said in the Madrid clubs and drawing-rooms that they had cuffed and cudgelled each other soundly; a duel was only prevented by the interference of some of the more respectable members of the family. Then, after living for some time at an hotel, he decided on furnishing rooms. He engaged a servant, had his breakfast brought in from an eating-house, and dined sometimes at Lhardy's and sometimes with one or another of his numerous friends. His stables were in the immediate neighbourhood, Calle de las Urosa, and were not ill-furnished: two saddle horses, one English and one cross-bred; two teams, one foreign and one Spanish; a Berline, a cart, a mail-phaeton, and a break; it was a channel through which his fortune was rapidly running away, though it was not the principal one. He had, in fact, left the greater portion on the gaming-tables at the club, and by no means a small part bad been grabbed by certain smart damsels, whom he had promoted in a few hours to the rank of fashionable courtesans. This, however, was a fact he always denied, thinking it might diminish his prestige as a lady-killer; but it is nevertheless a fact, like everything else herein set down.

All this is as much as to say that Pepe Castro was at this moment a ruined man; nevertheless, he went on living in the same comfort and style. His losses and his borrowing cost him a great deal: loans from his brother on the mortgage of estate he could not sell, post-obits to merciless usurers on his prospects from an old and infirm uncle, accepted for three times their cash value; jewels given him by his sister, who could not give him money; exorbitant charges run up by the importers of carriages and horses; bills with the tailor, the perfumer; with Lhardy, the restaurant-keeper, with every one in short.

It seemed impossible that a man could live easy in such a tangle of toils and nets. And nevertheless, our young gentleman enjoyed the same beautiful serenity of mind and lightness of heart as many others of his comrades and acquaintances, who, as we shall have occasion to see, were no less ruined, though less fascinating.

"I have a surprise in store for you," said Clementina, as she again put on her hat and tidied her hair in front of the glass.

The handsome puppy sniffed the air, like a hound that scents game, and he went up to Clementina.

"If it is a pleasant one let me see it."

"Yes, and no less if it is an unpleasant one, rude boy. Everything I can do ought to be pleasant to you."

"No doubt, no doubt.—Let me see," he went on, trying to conceal his eagerness.

"Very well; bring me my muff."

Castro flew to obey. Clementina, when she had it in her hands, sat down on the sofa with an affectation of calm, and flourishing it in the air, she exclaimed: "Now you will not guess what I have in this muff?"

Her eyes were bright with glee and pride at the same time. Castro's sparkled with anxiety; the colour mounted to his cheeks, and he replied in a tone between assertion and inquiry:

"Fifteen thousand pesetas."[C]

The lady's triumphant expression instantly changed to one of wrath and disgust.

"Go—go away—Pig!" she furiously cried, giving him a hard box on the ear with the handsome muff. "You think of nothing but money. You have not a grain of delicacy."

"I thought——" The change in Pepe's face was no less marked; it was more gloomy than night.

"Of money, yes; I tell you so. Well then, no. Nothing of the kind. Nothing but a little tie-pin, which—fool that I am—I bought at Marbini's as I came along, to show you that I am always thinking of you."

"And I thank you from the bottom of my heart, my sweet pigeon," said the young man, making a supreme effort to recover from his sudden dejection, and producing, as a result, a forced and bitter smile. "Why do you fly into such pets? Give it me. But I know what a bad opinion you have of me."

Clementina would not give him her present. Pepe begged for it humbly; still there was in his entreaties a shade of coldness, which to the keen intuition of a woman, betrayed very plainly the disappointment at the bottom of his soul.

"No, no! My poor little pin that you despise so—I can see it in your face. It shall go into the box where I keep memorials of the dead."

She rose from her seat and pulled down her veil. Pepe was pressing in his endeavours to be attentive, and to mollify her wrath. At last, when she had almost reached the door, she suddenly turned about and drew out of her muff a neat little jewel-box, which she gave to her lover, looking him straight in the face meanwhile.

The young man's eyes opened, resting on the box with an expression of delight; then they met those of his mistress. They gazed at each other for a minute, she with a look of mischievous triumph, he with gratitude and suppressed joy.

"I always said so! No one in the world knows what love means, but you, my darling. Come here; let me thank you, let me worship you on my knees."

He dragged her to the sofa, made her sit down, and falling on his knees, kissed her gloved hands with rapture.

"Mercy, what madness!" cried the lady quite bewildered. "What a whirlwind round a trifle."

"It is not for the money, my darling, not for the money; but because you have such an original way of doing things. Because you are such a trump, such an angel!" He clasped her knees, he grovelled before her, and kissed her feet—or, to be exact, her boots.

"What an abject thing you are, Pepe!" said she, laughing.

"I don't care what you call me; I am yours, your slave till death. I owe you not only happiness, but honour. You cannot think what I have gone through these two days, over that cursed debt!" he said, in a voice of genuine emotion.

"And will you go and gamble any more, eh? Gamble, and lose it all, you wretch," said she, tumbling his hair and spoiling the beautiful parting down the middle.

"No—I swear it on my word of honour."

"On your word, and on your money, wretched man? Well, I am off," she added, with a fond little pat, and she went to look at the clock on the chimney-piece. "Mercy! How late it is—I must fly. Good-bye."

She ran to the door, waving her hand to her lover, without looking at him. He could only clutch it, and kiss the tips of her fingers.

He rushed to open the door for her, but her hand was already on the lock; indeed, she was in a fury, because her feeble efforts would not turn it.

"By-bye—till Saturday!" said she, in a whisper.

"Till the day after to-morrow."

"No, no—till Saturday."

She ran downstairs with the same cautious haste as she had used in coming up, nodded imperceptibly to the porter, and went out. She walked as far as the Plaza del Angel; there she took a hackney coach to drive home.

It was now past six; the lights in the shops had been blazing for an hour or more. She sat as far back in the corner as she could and gazed without interest or curiosity at the streets she passed through. Her face had resumed its characteristic expression of scornful haughtiness, qualified by a certain degree of disdain and absent-mindedness.

Her refined elegance, her arrogant mien, and, above all, the severe majesty of her exceptional beauty stamped Clementina beyond question as one of the most distinguÉes women of Madrid. At the same time, though she was recognised as such, figuring in all the drawing-rooms of the aristocracy, in all the lists of fashionable persons which the papers publish on the day after a ball, a race, or any other entertainment, by birth-right she was far from belonging to such a set. Her origin could not have been more humble. Her mother had been an Irish girl, the mistress of a cooper, who had landed at Valencia in search of work. Her name was Rosa Coote; she was extraordinarily handsome, and would have been even more so if she had cared for dressing or adorning her person; but the squalor in which the illicit home was kept had made her neglectful and dirty. The Valencia waif and the handsome Irish girl came to an understanding behind the cooper's back. Salabert was quite young and a brisk youth; he was not, like the girl's present protector, a victim to drunkenness. Rosa abandoned her former lover to go off with him. Within a few months, Salabert, who saw an opening for going to Cuba as steward on board a steamboat, in his turn deserted her. The Irishwoman, expecting then the birth of the offspring of this connection, wandered about for some time without any protector or means of living till she became acquainted with a carpenter, who ultimately made her his lawful wife. Clementina grew up as an intruder in this new home. Her mother was a violent and irascible creature, with bursts of tenderness which she kept exclusively for her legitimate children. Clementina she seemed to hate, and avenged on her her father's offence with cruel injustice.

A fearful childhood was that of Clementina.

If some details of it could but have been known in Madrid; if, only in some brief vision, the scenes through which this proudest and most arrogant of dames had passed could have been placed before the eyes of her fashionable acquaintance, who would have envied her? What tortures, what refinement of cruelty! At the age of four or five she was made the watchful nurse of two brothers younger than herself, and if she neglected the smallest particular of her duties the punishment followed at once, but not such punishment as was due—a slap, or her ears pulled. No, it was premeditated to hurt her as much and as long as possible; after flogging her with a strap the wounds were washed with vinegar, she was made to tread for hours on hard peas, to wear shoes that pinched her feet, to go without water, she was thrashed with nettles.

More than once, on hearing the hapless child's outcries, the neighbours had intervened and had remonstrated with the unnatural mother. But nothing ever came of it beyond a noisy discussion, in which the passionate Irishwoman, in sputtering Valencian, poured out her wrath on the gossips of the quarter, and afterwards vented her fury on the cause of the squabble. She was always declaring that she would send the child to the workhouse, but this was opposed by the carpenter, who prided himself on being a kind-hearted and merciful man, and who sometimes interfered to mitigate her punishment, though he generally left it to his wife "to correct her daughter," as he said to the neighbours who blamed him. His educational notions clashed with his more kindly instincts, and when they got the upper hand, alas, for the poor little girl!

Certain details of these horrible torments were sickening. On one occasion Clementina had been to the well and broken the pitcher. It was the third within a month. The child dared not go home, and sought refuge with a neighbour. The woman took her to her mother, but did not leave her till she had extorted a promise that she should not be punished. And in point of fact her mother did not punish her by any ordinary process of chastisement; her cries might have led to a disturbance. She formed the diabolical idea of holding the girl's head over a foul sink, till she was half asphyxiated and fainted away. The worst days for the wretched child were when she had dropped asleep at her prayers. The cruel Irishwoman was a bigot, and this offence she never forgave. On one occasion, she beat her so mercilessly for repeating her prayers half asleep before going to bed, that the carpenter, who was peacefully eating his supper in the kitchen, heard her cries, and went up to the bedroom, where he rescued her from her mother, who would otherwise perhaps have been the death of her.

This course of incredible cruelties ended at last in one which led to the interference of justice. The unnatural mother, at her wit's end how to torture the girl, burnt her legs with a candle. A neighbour happening to hear of it told others, and the scandal in the quarter produced a stir; they appealed to justice, informed against the Irishwoman, and the crime being proved, she was condemned to six months' imprisonment, while the girl was placed in an asylum.

About a year later Salabert came to Valencia, not yet a potentate, but with some money. On hearing what had occurred he went to see his daughter at the school for poor girls, whence he removed her to one where he paid for her education, and at long intervals went to see her. His generous deed was highly lauded, and he knew how to make it tell, setting himself up in the eyes of those who knew him as a living model of paternal devotion, in shining contrast to the brutality of his deserted mistress.

Not long after, he married, and settled in Madrid. His wife was the daughter of a dealer in iron bedsteads and spring mattresses, in the Calle Mayor. She was plain and sickly, but gentle and affectionate, with fifty thousand dollars for her portion. At the end of three or four years of married life, finding her health increasingly delicate, DoÑa Carmen lost all hope of having any children, and knowing that her husband had an illegitimate daughter in a Convent at Valencia, she proposed, with rare generosity, to have her at home and treat her as their child. Salabert accepted gladly; he went to fetch Clementina, and thenceforward a complete change came over the girl's fate.

She was at this time aged fourteen, and already a marvel of beauty, a happy combination of the refined and delicate northern type with the severer beauty of the Valencian women. Undeveloped as yet, in consequence of the cruel experiences of her childhood followed by the quiet routine of a convent, under this change of climate and mode of life she acquired in two or three years the commanding stature and majestic proportions we have seen. Her moral nature left much more to be desired. Her temper was irritable, obstinate, scornful, and gloomy. Whether she was born with these characteristics or they were the result of the misery and sufferings of her wretched infancy it would be hard to decide. In the convent, where she was never ill-treated, she was not much loved by her teachers or her companions; her character was suspicious, and her heart devoid of tenderness. Her companions' troubles not only did not touch her; but brought a cruel smile to her lips, which filled them with aversion. Then, from time to time, she had fits of fury, which made her both feared and hated. On one occasion, when a young girl had spoken to her in offensive terms, she had clutched her by the throat and nearly strangled her. And it was quite impossible afterwards to induce her to beg pardon, as the mother superior required her to do; she preferred a month of solitary confinement rather than humble herself.

The first months of her life in her father's house were a period of trial for kind DoÑa Carmen. Instead of a bright young creature, grateful for the immense favour she had done her, she found herself confronted with a little heartless savage, devoid of affection or docility, extravagant and capricious to the last degree, who never laughed heartily excepting when a servant had an accident, or a groom was kicked by a horse. But the good woman did not lose courage. With the unfailing instinct of a generous heart she understood that if no love could spring from the soil it was because nothing had been sown in it but the seeds of hate. The softer affections exist in every human soul, as electricity exists in every body; but to detect them, to rouse a response, they must be treated for a length of time with a strong current of kindness. This was what DoÑa Carmen did to her stepdaughter. For six months she kept her in a warm atmosphere of affection, a close net of delicate thoughtfulness, and unfailing proofs of lively and loving interest. At last Clementina, who had begun by being first disdainful and then indifferent, who would pass hours together locked in her own room and never go near her stepmother but when she was sent for, who never had made any advances, but lived in absolute reserve, suddenly succumbed, feeling the vital and mysterious throb which binds human beings to each other, as it does all the bodies of the created universe. The change was strange and violent, like everything else in that strangely compounded temperament. At the most unlooked-for moment she fell on her knees before DoÑa Carmen, professing such deep respect, such passionate affection, that the good woman was amazed, and had great difficulty in believing in her sincerity. The revelation of lovingkindness had burst at length on the girl's soul; her icy heart had melted under the motherly warmth of the large-hearted woman; the divine essence of love henceforth had a home where hitherto the essence of Satan alone had dwelt.

It was a perfect miracle. Instead of spending her life in her room, she would never leave her stepmother's; she now called her "Mamma" with a fervour, a joy, a determination, such as are only to be seen in the devout when they appeal to the Virgin. And Clementina's feeling for her father's wife was in truth devotion. Amazed to find that so gentle, so tender a being could exist in this world, she was never tired of gazing at her, as though she had dropped from heaven. She would read her thoughts in her eyes, anticipate her smallest wishes, let no one serve her but herself; and, like every lover, insisted on the exclusive possession of the object of her affection. The slightest sign of disapproval on DoÑa Carmen's part was enough to disconcert her and plunge her into the deepest grief. The haughty creature, who had made herself generally odious, would humble herself with intense satisfaction before her stepmother. It was the humiliation of the mystic prostrated by an irresistible spiritual impulse. When she felt the good woman's hand caress her face she fancied it was the touch of God Himself, and hardly dared to touch those thin, transparent fingers with her lips.

But it was only to her stepmother that she had so entirely changed. To all else, including her father, she still displayed the same scornful coldness, the same proud and obstinate temper. If now and again she seemed sweeter and more tractable, it was due, not to her own will, but to some express command of DoÑa Carmen's; and as soon as this command was at an end, or forgotten, she was the same malevolent being once more. The servants hated her for the insufferable pride which she showed as soon as she realised her position as her father's heiress, and for her total lack of compassion if they did wrong.

The greatest sufferer was the English governess whom her father had engaged for her. She was an elderly woman, but she had a mania for dressing and tricking herself out like a girl. This harmless weakness was so constantly the theme of Clementina's mockery, that only necessity could have made the poor woman endure it. All the secrets of her toilet were mercilessly revealed for the amusement of the servants, and her physical defects, mimicked by the young lady's waiting-maid, were the laughing-stock of the kitchen. On a certain grand occasion, a day when there was a dinner-party, Clementina hid the old maid's false teeth, which she had left on the dressing-table after washing them. Her discomfiture may be imagined. But she took an innocent revenge by calling her "SeÑorita Capricho" and setting her as an exercise to translate from English into French certain maxims and aphorisms of scorching application, as: "Pride is the leprosy of the soul; a proud girl is a leper whom all should avoid with horror." "Those who do not respect their seniors can never hope to be respected," and the like.

Clementina laughed at these innuendoes; sometimes she would even dare to substitute some phrase of her own for that of her governess. Where she should have translated: "There is nothing so odious and contemptible as haughtiness in the young," she would write: "There is nothing so ridiculous and laughable as presumption in the old." Miss, as she was called, took offence, and complained to DoÑa Carmen, who would appeal to her stepdaughter, reproving her gently, and Clementina, seeing her grieved and annoyed, would smoothe her brow and kiss her lovingly. And all was well till next time. In fact Miss Anna and the servants were no doubt in the right when they said that the SeÑora would be the ruin of the girl. DoÑa Carmen, living in fearful solitude of soul, was so captivated and gratified by the warm affection her stepdaughter was always ready to lavish on her that she had no eyes for her faults, and even if she had, would not have found the courage to correct them.

At eighteen Clementina was one of the loveliest and wealthiest women of Madrid. Her father's fortune grew like the scum of yeast. He was regarded as one of the great bankers of the city, and was not known to have any other heir, nor was it likely that he would have one. The young aristocrats of family or wealth—the best known members of the Savage Club—began to flutter about her with the most pressing and eager attentions. If she appeared at a party a group of men fenced her round; if she went to church, another and a larger party stood in a row awaiting her exit; if she drove out in the Castellana Avenue, a cavalcade of admirers galloped beside her carriage as a guard of honour; at the theatre pairs of opera-glasses were invariably fixed upon her. The name of Clementina Salabert was to be heard in all the conversations of the gilded youth of Madrid, to be seen in print in every drawing-room chronicle, and was registered in the capital as that of one of the brightest stars of the firmament of fashion. She took up and dropped one lover after another without a thought, thus earning the reputation of a flirt and feather-brain. But this never interferes with a girl's chance of adorers; on the contrary, the self-love of men prompts them to pay great attentions to women of that stamp, in the hope, born of vanity, of being the nail to fix the weather-cock. Nor did she suffer any serious damage from a coarse and malignant rumour which, all through Madrid, connected her in a strange friendship with a young and famous bull-fighter. In this affair DoÑa Carmen's simplicity and weakness played a leading part. Not only did the good lady allow the man to visit at her house, and sit at her table, but she even accompanied the pair in public on more than one occasion. This, and her having cheered him at the death of several bulls, gave scandal—as busy in the capital as in the provinces—sufficient pretext for an attack on the envied beauty. But as it could bring forward nothing but bold suspicion and vague conjecture, and as, on the other side, there were positive facts which far outweighed them, the calumny did not diminish the number of her adorers. Its only use was as an outlet for the bile of some rejected one.

At this age, and often after, Clementina's manners betrayed a strong infusion of Bohemianism—of the free and easy airs and sarcastic coolness of the adventuresses of Madrid. A similar tendency may be observed, in a more or less exaggerated form, in all the upper circles of Madrid Society; it is a mark which distinguishes it from that of other countries. And in this tendency, which is everywhere conspicuous from the palace to the hovel, there is some good; it is not wholly evil. In the first place it implies a protest against the perpetual falsehood which the increasing refinement and complication of social formalities inevitably entail. Propriety of conduct and moderation of language are highly praiseworthy no doubt, but in an exaggerated form they result in the cold courtesy of a diplomate at a foreign Court. Men and women, crushed under the weight of so much formality, become artificial beings, puppets, whose acts and words are all set forth in a programme. To exclude liberty and familiarity from society is to undermine human nature; to prohibit frankness of speech is to destroy the charm which ought to exist in all human intercourse.

Moreover, an instinct of equality underlies this assertion of freedom, and cannot fail to make it attractive to every lover of Nature and truth. A lady is not a bundle of fine clothes, of foregone conclusions and ready-made phrases; she is, above all else, a woman in whom culture has, or ought to have, tempered impetuosity of character and impulses of vanity, but not to have impaired the genuineness of Nature by transforming her in society into a cold dry doll, devoid of grace and originality. It must not be supposed that the perfect refinement and elegance proper to the scenes where the upper classes meet are unknown in Madrid. They are constantly observed by almost every Spanish woman of family; but, happily, they are united with the vivacity, grace, and spontaneity of the Spanish race, making our fair ones, in the opinion of impartial observers, the most accomplished, gracious, and agreeable women in Europe—excepting, perhaps, the French.

Clementina had a somewhat exaggerated taste for this freedom of word and action. She had acquired it no one knows how—by contagion in the atmosphere perhaps—since women in her position are not in the habit of spending their time with the commoner sort. She had had a waiting maid, born and brought up in Maravillas, and it was from her, in her moments of excitement, that Clementina picked up the greater part of her slang and sayings. Then came her friendship with the torero above-mentioned; an acquaintance with various young men who cultivated that style; the lower class of theatres, where the manners and customs of the lower classes of the Madrid populace are set on the stage—not without grace; and her intimacy with Pepe Frias, and some other fast women of fashion, finally gave her the full Bohemian flavour. She was an enthusiast for bull-fights. It was a perfect marvel if she missed one, sitting in her private box with the orthodox white mantilla and red carnations. And she would discuss the chances, and fulminate criticisms, and bestow applause; and was regarded by the habituÉs as a keen and eager connoisseur. The national sport, exciting and bloody, was quite after her mind, violent and indomitable as she was by nature. When she saw other women covering their eyes or showing weakness over the fortunes of the arena, she laughed sardonically, as doubting the genuineness of their horror.

Among the many adorers and suitors who successively and rapidly rose and fell in her favour, there was one who succeeded in securing her notice, at any rate, for a rather longer time than the rest. His name was Tomas Osorio. He was a young man of twenty-eight or thirty, rich, small and delicate, with a pleasing face and a lively, determined temper. Either of deliberate purpose, or from genuine independence of character, he made a deeper impression than his peers. When he first paid attention to her he did not cringe nor completely abdicate his own will. In some differences on important points in the course of his long courtship—for it lasted not less than two years—he firmly maintained his dignity. He was, like her, irritable, haughty and scornful; purse-proud too, and with a spiteful wit which stood him in good stead with women. Thanks to these qualities, Clementina did not tire of him so soon as of the rest. But at the end of the two years, within a few days of the marriage, it was broken off in a very public and almost scandalous manner. All Madrid was talking of it, and commentary was endless. The conclusion arrived at was that it was the gentleman who had taken the first steps towards the rupture, and this report, whether true or false, reached Clementina's ears, and was such a stab to her pride that she was almost ill with rage.

Another year went by. She had other suitors, off and on, and Osorio, on his part, courted other damsels. But in both, notwithstanding, the memory of the past survived. She was burning for revenge. So long as that man was going about the world, so perfectly content as he seemed, she felt herself humiliated. He, on the contrary, in spite of his affected indifference, was still consumed by love, or rather by desire. Clementina had captivated his senses, had pierced his flesh, and, do what he would, he could not extract the dart. She was always in his thoughts, always before his eyes, provoking his passion. The longer the time that elapsed the fiercer the fire burned within him, and the greater were the effort and the anguish of keeping up a haughty and indifferent demeanour when they happened to meet. Clementina, with a penetration common in women, had no difficulty in guessing that her former love still cherished a secret passion for her, and felt a malicious joy. Thenceforward she dressed and adorned herself for him alone—to bewitch him, to fascinate him, to make him drain the bitter cup of jealousy.

From this moment dated her fame as an elegant woman. Clementina was indeed, in this matter, a great artist. She knew how to dress so that her clothes should never by their colour or quality attract attention to the prejudice of her face. Understanding that what a woman wears should be not a uniform, but an adornment to set off the perfections which nature has bestowed upon her, she was no blind slave of fashion; when she thought it unbecoming to her beauty she boldly defied it or modified it. She avoided glaring hues, a profusion of trimmings, and elaborate styles of hair-dressing; she regarded and treated her person as a statue. Hence a certain tendency, constantly evident in her costume, towards drapery, and amplitude of flowing folds. Her fine, majestic figure gained greatly by this style of dress, which, though it became rather pronounced after her marriage, was never exaggerated beyond the limits of good taste. She was fond of wearing white, and this, with a simple manner of dressing her hair like that of the Milo Venus, made her appear in the drawing-rooms of Madrid like a beautiful Greek statue. One thing she did which, though highly censurable from a moral point of view, is not so as a matter of art. She wore her dresses very low. Her bust was superb; it might have been moulded by the Graces to turn the head of a god. The vain desire to display her beauty, unchecked by the wholesome control of a mother, led her on more than one occasion to incur the severest comments of society. Poor DoÑa Carmen, besides knowing nothing of social custom, was so lenient to her stepdaughter's fancies and caprices, that she accepted them as quite reasonable, and as undoubted evidence of her indisputable elegance and taste.

However, her vanity brought its own punishment. On one occasion when she made her appearance at a ball given by the Alcudias, the Marquesa said as she greeted her:

"Very pretty, very nice, Clementina. Your dress is lovely; but it is too low, my dear. Come with me and let us set it right."

She took the girl up to her room and, with motherly kindness, arranged some gauzy material to cover what really ought not to be displayed. Clementina managed to conceal her mortification, ascribing the fault to the dressmaker; but she felt so humiliated by the lecture, and the pitying smile which accompanied it, that she never again could endure to see the prudish Marquesa.

Under this constant fanning Osorio's flame waxed fiercer and fiercer, and he could no longer keep it to himself. At last he confided in his sister, who was fairly intimate with the young lady; he begged her to sound the way, and ascertain whether he might once more make advances without fear of a rebuff. Mariana undertook the commission. Clementina heard her with ill-disguised triumph, but sat demure until SeÑora de CalderÓn had poured out all her story, and assured her that Tomas was burning with devotion. Then she replied ambiguously, and with laughter: "She would think it over. She was deeply aggrieved by the reports that had been spread as to their rupture, but at any rate, he was not to give up all hope."

She did reflect seriously as to the means of satisfying the demands of her wounded pride, and at the end of a few days she announced to Mariana her ultimatum. If she was to consent to give her hand to Osorio, he must beg it of her parents on his knees, in the presence of such witnesses as she might choose.

Such a preposterous idea would never have occurred to any Spanish woman of pure race, and only the admixture of British blood could have led her to conceive of such a monstrous refinement of arrogance.

When Osorio was informed of the conditions imposed by his ex-fiancÉe he flew into a violent rage, and swore defiantly that he would be cut in pieces before he would suffer such degradation. The matter dropped, and things went on as before. But as, in spite of his utmost efforts, the serpent of desire gnawed at his heart with increasing virulence, the poor wretch at the end of two months had fallen into utter dejection; he was really dying of love; he could not tear himself from Madrid, and once more he besought his sister to open negotiations. Clementina, quite sure of having him in her power, was inflexible; either he must pass beneath these strange Caudine forks, or there was no hope.

And Osorio submitted.

What could he do?—The extraordinary ceremony was carried out one evening at the lady's residence. On reaching the house Osorio found assembled about a score of women whom Clementina had chosen from among the most envious of her acquaintances, or those who had been most malignant as to the cause of their former quarrel. He adopted the best conduct he possibly could in such a case: grave and solemn, with a certain ease of language and manner, betraying a suspicion of irony, as if he were performing a comedy for the benefit of a crazy person. He gave a brief preliminary sketch of their former engagement; confessed himself to blame; praised Clementina in extravagant terms—with so little moderation indeed that he seemed to be speaking sarcastically—and professed himself unworthy to aspire to her hand. Finally declaring that as she was so worthy to be adored, and the joy of winning her so great, he thought it but a small thing to ask her of her parents on his knees. At the same time he fell on one knee. DoÑa Carmen hastened to raise him, and embraced him effusively. Clementina even pressed his hand, better pleased by the grace and dignity with which he had got through the ordeal, than gratified in her conceit. In truth, on this occasion she felt for him, what she never felt again, a tiny spark of love. If any one suffered humiliation from this scene it was she herself, from the light and easy dignity with which her lover carried it off. But this was a trifle; a woman enjoys nothing more keenly and deeply than the superiority of the man who mollifies her. Clementina was happy that evening.

But though Osorio had come so well out of the ordeal, he never forgave her the intention to humiliate him; he was as proud as she. The insane passion she had inspired for a time smothered every other. His honeymoon was as brief as it was delicious. The shock of two such characters, both equally obstinate and proud, was inevitable. It soon came in the form of a series of petty annoyances which instantly extinguished the feeble sparks of affection which her husband had struck in the young wife's heart. In him passion survived longer. The knowledge each had of the other made them cautious, for fear of a more formidable collision which must have led to disaster. But this too came at last. Report said that Osorio, tired of his wife's indifference and scorn, had insulted her beyond forgiveness. Whether or no the story as it was told was true in all its details, their union at any rate was practically at an end for ever. Osorio forfeited his own right to interfere with his wife on the score of conduct, and could only look on while Clementina unblushingly and confessedly accepted the attentions of every man who offered them. He certainly, to parry the ridicule to which he was thus exposed, threw himself into excesses of dissipation, raising women from the lowest ranks to figure as his mistresses.

At home the husband and wife spoke no more to each other than was absolutely necessary. To escape the discomfort of a tÊte-À-tÊte at table, they always had some guest. In public they made a show of the most natural and friendly relations; Osorio would sometimes go late to fetch his wife from the theatre or party to which she had been. But every one understood the facts of the case. Clementina, as a rule, would go out on her lover's arm; they would stand talking in the lobby in the sight of all the world, while waiting for the carriage; she stepped in; before it drove off they would yet exchange a few confidential and incoherent remarks interrupted by gay laughter. Morality—fashionable morality—was satisfied, so long as the lover did not drive off in the same carriage, though a few minutes later they might meet again at some rendezvous.

When Clementina reached home it was half-past six o'clock. The driver whistled; the porter came out of his lodge and opened the gate first, and then the door of the hackney coach. He paid the man. The lady, without uttering a syllable, went through the garden, which though small was exquisitely kept, and up the outside steps of white marble, screened by a verandah, which extended across half the front of the house. The house itself was not very large, but handsome and artistic, of white stone and fine brickwork. It had been built by Osorio about four or five years since. As the plans had been fully discussed and considered, the rooms were well arranged, and this made it more comfortable than his brother-in-law's, though that was three or four times as large.

She asked a servant in the anteroom: "Where is Estefania?"

"It is some time since I last saw her, SeÑora."

She crossed a magnificent hall, lighted by two large lamps with polished vases borne by bronze statues, went along the corridor, and up the stairs leading to the first floor, meeting no one on her way. At the door of the drawing-room leading to her boudoir, she met Fernando, a page of fourteen in a smart livery.

"Estefania?" she asked.

"She must be in the kitchen."

"Tell her to come up at once."

She entered the boudoir, and going up to a long mirror resting on two pillar-feet of gilt wood, she took off her hat. The room was a small one, hung with blue satin bordered with wreaths in carton-pierre. On the chimney-piece, covered also with blue satin, stood a clock and two fine candelabra, the work of a silversmith of the last century. The carpet was white with a blue border; in the middle of the room there was a causeuse upholstered in gold colour, the armchairs were gilt, two large feather pillows lay on the floor. In one corner was the mirror, in another a Pompadour writing-table of inlaid wood; in the other two were columns covered with velvet, to support the lamps which now lighted the room. On one side this room opened into Clementina's drawing-room, and then into her bedroom. On the other side, a door led into a small drawing-room, where she was at home to her friends on Tuesday afternoons, and where cards were played at night by an intimate circle. Only a few very confidential friends were ever admitted to her boudoir, calling at the hours when she was "Not at home." Here those long and secret colloquies were held which women so greatly relish, in which they pour out their whole mind, with swift transition from the profoundest depths to the frivolities of the day and details of dress and fashion.

Within a few seconds of her taking off her hat Estefania came in. She was a pale young girl, with pretty black eyes; dressed suitably to her rank but with care and finish; over her skirt she wore a holland apron trimmed with white edging.

"You might have been ready for me, child. Where had you hidden yourself?" said her mistress, in a tone at once cross and indifferent.

"I was in the kitchen. I went to put a few stitches into Teresa's skirt; she had torn it on a nail," replied the girl, with affected servility.

Clementina made no reply, absorbed, no doubt, in thought. Standing in front of the mirror to take off her cloak, she gazed at herself with the perennial interest which a pretty woman feels in her own face.

"Did you go to Escobar's?" she asked at length.

"Yes, SeÑora."

"And what did he say?"

"That he has no silk so thick of that colour, but that he would send for it if the SeÑora wishes."

"Turura! That journey won't kill him! And to the milliner's?"

"Yes, they will send the caps on Saturday."

"Did you inquire after Father Miguel?"

"No, I had not time. It is such a long way."

"A long way! Why, did you not go in the carriage?"

"No, SeÑora. Juanito said that the mare was not shod."

"Then why did he not put in one of the Normandy horses?"

"I do not know. Whenever you tell me to take the carriage he finds some excuse."

"So it seems. Never mind, child; I will see to it. What next, SeÑor Juanito, with your masterful airs?"

But as she glanced up at the maid's face in the glass she thought she noticed something strange about her eyes, and turned round to see her better. In fact, Estefania's eyes were red with weeping.

"You have been crying, child?"

"I—no, SeÑora, no."

The denial was evidently a subterfuge. The lady had not to press her much to make her confess even the cause of her tears.

"The head cook, SeÑora," she whimpered out, "who used to take my part—when I say anything he bursts out laughing or says something rude, and the others, of course, as they are jealous because you are good to me, and to flatter the cook—the others laugh too; and because I said I should tell you, he said all manner of horrid things, and turned me out of the kitchen."

"Turned you out! And who is he to turn you out?" exclaimed her mistress vehemently. "Tell him to come here. I must give him a rowing, as well as Juanito, it seems! If we do not take care, the servants will rule this house instead of the masters."

"SeÑora, I dare not. If you would send Fernando!"

"Do as you please, but bring him here."

She had worked herself up into high wrath at the girl's story. Estefania was her favourite, whom she petted above all the other servants, and made the confidant of many of her secrets. The girl's fawning and flattery had won her heart so completely that, without being aware of it, she had allowed a large part of her will to go with it. It was, in fact, Estefania who ruled the house, since she ruled its mistress. The servant who could not win her good graces might prepare sooner or later to lose his place. And what happened was the necessary result in all such cases: the mistress's favourite was hated by all the rest of the household, not only from envy—the disgraceful passion which exists, in a greater or less degree, in every human being—but also because the nature that is hypocritical and time-serving to superiors, is inevitably haughty and malevolent to inferiors.

The chef, on being called by Fernando, to whom Estefania gave the message, soon made his appearance at the door of the boudoir wearing the insignia of his office, to wit, a clean apron and cap, both as white as snow. He was a man of about thirty, with a fresh and not bad-looking face, and large black whiskers. The frown on his brow and the anxious expression in his eyes betrayed that he knew why he had been sent for. Clementina had seated herself on the ottoman. Estefania withdrew into a corner, and when the cook came in she fixed her eyes on the floor.

"I hear, Cayetano, that after behaving very rudely to my maid, you turned her out of the kitchen. I have, therefore, sent for you to tell you that I will not allow any servant to behave badly to another; nor are you permitted to turn any one out so long as you are in my house."

"SeÑora, I did nothing to her. It is she who treats us all badly—teasing one and nagging at another, till there is no peace," the cook replied, with a strong Gallician accent.

"Well, even if she teases one and nags at another, you have not any right to insult her. She is to tell me, and there is an end of it," replied his mistress sharply, and mimicking his accent.

"But you see——"

"I see nothing. You hear what I say; there is an end of it," and she waved her hand imperiously.

The cook, with his face scarlet and quivering with rage, stood without stirring for a few seconds. Then, before he withdrew, he boldly fixed his wrathful gaze on the girl, who kept her eyes on the carpet with a bland hypocrisy which betrayed the triumph of her self-importance.

"Tell-tale!" he said, spitting out the words rather than speaking them.

The lady rose from her seat, and, bursting with rage at this want of respect, she exclaimed:

"How dare you insult her before my face? Go, instantly. Get out of my sight!"

"SeÑora, what I say is, that the fault is hers."

"So much the better. Go!"

"We will all go—out of the house, SeÑora. We can none of us put up with that impudent minx!"

"You go forthwith, as though you had never come! You may find yourself another place, for I will never allow any servant to get the upper hand of me."

The cook, in some dismay at this prompt dismissal, again stood rooted to the spot; but, suddenly recovering himself, he turned on his heel, saying with dignity:

"Very well, SeÑora, I will."

But when he was gone Clementina still muttered: "An insolent fellow is that Gallician! I don't believe any one but I gets such servants!"

Then, suddenly pacified by a new idea, she said:

"Come, now, I must dress; it is getting late."

She went into her dressing-room, followed by Estefania, who, contrary to what might have been expected, looked grave and gloomy. Clementina hurriedly began to remove her walking-dress and change it for a simple dinner-dress, such as she wore at home to receive a few friends in the evening—always very light in hue, and cut open at the throat, though with long sleeves. At a sign from the mistress the maid brought out a "crushed-strawberry" pink dress from the large wardrobe with mirrors, which lined all one side of the room. Before putting it on she arranged her hair, and exchanged her bronze kid boots for shoes to match the dress. The pale girl meanwhile never opened her lips; her face grew every moment sadder and more anxious. At last, on her knees to put on her mistress's shoes, she raised beseeching eyes to her face and said timidly:

"SeÑora, may I entreat you—not to send Cayetano away?"

Clementina looked at her in amazement.

"Is that it? After you yourself——"

"The thing is," said Estefania, turning as red as her complexion would allow, "if you send him away the others will take offence."

"And what does that matter?"

But the girl insisted very earnestly with urgent and persuasive entreaties. For a time the lady refused, but as the matter was unimportant, and she perceived, not without surprise, the interest and even anxiety of her favourite for the cook's reprieve, she presently yielded, desiring Estefania to make the necessary explanations. On this the girl's face immediately cleared; she was as bright as a bird, and began to help her mistress to dress very deftly and briskly.

Two taps at the door made them both start.

"Who is there?" called the lady.

"Are you dressing, Clementina?" was asked from outside.It was her husband's voice. Her surprise was not the less; Osorio very rarely came to her rooms when she was alone.

"Yes, I am dressing. Is there any one downstairs?"

"As usual—Lola, Pascuala and Bonifacio. I want to speak to you. I will wait for you here in the drawing-room."

"Very well; I will come."

Until her toilet was complete Clementina spoke no more; her expression was one of gloomy anticipation, which her maid could not fail to observe. Her fingers, as she gave the last touches to the folds of her skirt, trembled a little, like those of a young lady dressing for her first ball.

Osorio was, in fact, waiting for her in the little drawing-room beyond the boudoir. He was lounging at his ease in an arm-chair, but, on seeing his wife, he rose, and dropped the end of the cigar he was smoking into the spittoon. Clementina saw that he was paler than usual. He was the same neat and dapper little man, with a bad complexion, as when he had married; but in the course of these twelve years his temper had been greatly spoiled. He had many wrinkles on his face, his hair and beard were streaked with grey, and his eyes had lost their brightness. He closed the door which his wife had left open, and going up to her said, with affected ease: "My cashier handed me to-day a cheque from you, for fifteen thousand pesetas. Here it is."

He took out his pocket-book, and from it a half-sheet of scented satin paper which he held out to her. She looked at it for a moment with a grave and gloomy face, but did not wince. She said not a word.

"A fortnight ago he gave me one for nine thousand. Here it is." The same proceedings, the same silence.

"Last month there were three: one for six thousand, one for eleven thousand, and one for four thousand. Here they are."

Osorio flourished the handful of papers before his wife's eyes; then, as this did not unlock her lips, he asked: "Do you acknowledge it?"

"Acknowledge what?" she said, shortly.

"That these documents are correct."

"They are, no doubt, if they bear my signature. I have a bad memory, especially for money matters."

"A happy gift," he replied with an ironical smile, as he went through the papers in his pocket-book. "I, too, have often tried to forget them. Unfortunately my cashier makes it his business to refresh my memory. Well," he went on as his wife said no more, "I came up solely to ask you a question—namely: Do you suppose that things can go on like this?"

"I do not understand."

"I will explain. Do you suppose that you can go on drawing on my account every few days such sums as these?"

Clementina, who had been pale at first, had coloured crimson.

"You know better than I."

"Why better? You ought to know the amount of your fortune."

"Well, but I do not know," she replied, sharply.

"Nothing can be more simple. The six hundred thousand dollars which your father paid over when we were married, being invested in real estate, produce, as you may see by the books, about twenty-two thousand dollars a year. The expenses of the house, without counting my private outlay, amounts to about three times as much. You can surely draw your own conclusions."

"If you are vexed at your money being spent you can sell the houses," said Clementina with scornful brevity, her colour fading to paleness again.

"But if they were sold I should none the less be responsible for the whole value. You know that?"

"I will sign you any paper you like, saying that I hold you responsible for nothing."

"That is not enough, my dear. The law will never release me from responsibility for your fortune, so long as I have any money. Moreover, if you spend it in pleasure"—and he emphasised the word—"it may be all very well for you, but deplorable for me, because I shall still be compelled to supply you with—necessaries."

"To keep me, in short?" she said with a bitter intonation.

"I wished to avoid the word; but it is no doubt exact."

Osorio spoke in an impertinent and patronising tone, which piqued his wife's pride in every possible way. Ever since the violent differences which had led to their separation under the same roof, they had had no such important interview as this. When, in the course of daily life, they came into collision, matters were smoothed over with a short explanation, in which both parties, without compromising their pride, used some prudence for fear of a scandal. But the present question touched Osorio in a vital part. To a banker money is the chief fact in life.

His personal pride, too, had suffered greatly in the last few years, though he had not confessed it. It was not enough to feign indifference and disdain of his wife's misconduct; it was not enough to pay her back in her own coin, by flaunting his mistresses in her face and making a parade of them in public. Both fought with the same weapons, but a woman can inflict with them far deeper wounds than a man. The misery he suffered from his wife's disreputable life did not diminish as time went on; the gulf which parted them grew wider and deeper. And so revenge was ready to seize this opportunity by the forelock.

Clementina looked him in the face for a moment. Then, shrugging her shoulders and with a contemptuous curl of her lips, she turned on her heel and was about to leave the room. Osorio stepped forward between her and the door.

"Before you go you must understand that the cashier has my orders to pay you no cheques that do not bear my signature."

"I understand."

"For your regular expenses I will allow a fixed sum on which we will agree. But I can have no more surprises on the cash-box."

Clementina, who had been about to quit the room by the ante-chamber, turned to go to her boudoir. Before leaving the room she held the curtain a moment in her hand, and facing her husband she said, with concentrated rage, "In that you are as mean a cur as your brother-in-law, only he never made believe, like you, to be generous."

She dropped the curtain, and slammed the door in his face.

Osorio made as though to follow her; but he instantly stopped short and yelled, rather than spoke, so she might hear him:

"Oh, yes! I am a mean cur, because I do not choose to maintain a crew of hungry puppies. I leave that to the hags who choose to pet them!"

This brutal speech seemed to have eased his mind, for his lips wore a smile of triumphant sarcasm.

Five minutes later they were both in the dining-room, laughing and jesting with a small party of guests.