dignified a kind. It was altogether a more serious matter, and partook
rather of the nature of those subtle and cruel feelings which are

awakened by a kick or a horse-whipping.
He felt very sick--physically sick--as though he had bitten through

something nauseous. Life, that to a well-ordered mind should be a
matter of congratulation, appeared to him, for a second or so,

perfectlyintolerable. He picked up the paper at his feet, and sat
down with the wish to think it out, to understand why his wife--his

wife!--should leave him, should throw away respect, comfort, peace,
decency, position throw away everything for nothing! He set himself to

think out the hidden logic of her action--a mentalundertaking fit for
the leisure hours of a madhouse, though he couldn't see it. And he

thought of his wife in every relation except the only fundamental one.
He thought of her as a well-bred girl, as a wife, as a cultured

person, as the mistress of a house, as a lady; but he never for a
moment thought of her simply as a woman.

Then a fresh wave, a raging wave of humiliation, swept through his
mind, and left nothing there but a personal sense of undeserved

abasement. Why should he be mixed up with such a horrid exposure! It
annihilated all the advantages of his well-ordered past, by a truth

effective and unjust like a calumny--and the past was wasted. Its
failure was disclosed--a distinctfailure, on his part, to see, to

guard, to understand. It could not be denied; it could not be
explained away, hustled out of sight. He could not sit on it and look

solemn. Now--if she had only died!
If she had only died! He was driven to envy such a respectable

bereavement, and one so perfectly free from any taint of misfortune
that even his best friend or his best enemy would not have felt the

slightest thrill of exultation. No one would have cared. He sought
comfort in clinging to the contemplation of the only fact of life that

the resolute efforts of mankind had never failed to disguise in the
clatter and glamour of phrases. And nothing lends itself more to lies

than death. If she had only died! Certain words would have been said
to him in a sad tone, and he, with proper fortitude, would have made

appropriate answers. There were precedents for such an occasion. And
no one would have cared. If she had only died! The promises, the

terrors, the hopes of eternity, are the concern of the corrupt dead;
but the obvioussweetness of life belongs to living, healthy men. And

life was his concern: that sane and gratifying existence untroubled by
too much love or by too much regret. She had interfered with it; she

had defaced it. And suddenly it occurred to him he must have been mad
to marry. It was too much in the nature of giving yourself away, of

wearing--if for a moment--your heart on your sleeve. But every one
married. Was all mankind mad!

In the shock of that startling thought he looked up, and saw to the
left, to the right, in front, men sitting far off in chairs and

looking at him with wild eyes--emissaries of a distracted mankind
intruding to spy upon his pain and his humiliation. It was not to be

borne. He rose quickly, and the others jumped up, too, on all sides.
He stood still in the middle of the room as if discouraged by their

vigilance. No escape! He felt something akin to despair. Everybody
must know. The servants must know to-night. He ground his teeth . . .

And he had never noticed, never guessed anything. Every one will know.
He thought: "The woman's a monster, but everybody will think me a

fool"; and standing still in the midst of severe walnut-wood
furniture, he felt such a tempest of anguish within him that he seemed

to see himself rolling on the carpet, beating his head against the
wall. He was disgusted with himself, with the loathsome rush of

emotion breaking through all the reserves that guarded his manhood.
Something unknown, withering and poisonous, had entered his life,

passed near him, touched him, and he was deteriorating. He was
appalled. What was it? She was gone. Why? His head was ready to burst

with the endeavour to understand her act and his subtle horror of it.
Everything was changed. Why? Only a woman gone, after all; and yet he

had a vision, a vision quick and distinct as a dream: the vision of
everything he had thought indestructible and safe in the world

crashing down about him, like solid walls do before the fiercebreath
of a hurricane. He stared, shaking in every limb, while he felt the

destructive breath, the mysteriousbreath, the breath of passion,
stir the profound peace of the house. He looked round in fear. Yes.

Crime may be forgiven; uncalculating sacrifice, blind trust, burning
faith, other follies, may be turned to account; suffering, death

itself, may with a grin or a frown be explained away; but passion is
the unpardonable and secret infamy of our hearts, a thing to curse, to

hide and to deny; a shameless and forlorn thing that tramples upon
the smiling promises, that tears off the placid mask, that strips the

body of life. And it had come to him! It had laid its unclean hand
upon the spotless draperies of his existence, and he had to face it

alone with all the world looking on. All the world! And he thought
that even the bare suspicion of such an adversary within his house

carried with it a taint and a condemnation. He put both his hands out
as if to ward off the reproach of a defiling truth; and, instantly,

the appalled conclave of unreal men, standing about mutely beyond the
clear lustre of mirrors, made at him the same gesture of rejection and

horror.
He glanced vainly here and there, like a man looking in desperation

for a weapon or for a hiding place, and understood at last that he was
disarmed and cornered by the enemy that, without any squeamishness,

would strike so as to lay open his heart. He could get help nowhere,
or even take counsel with himself, because in the sudden shock of her

desertion the sentiments which he knew that in fidelity to his
bringing up, to his prejudices and his surroundings, he ought to

experience, were so mixed up with the novelty of real feelings, of
fundamental feelings that know nothing of creed, class, or education,

that he was unable to distinguish clearly between what is and what
ought to be; between the inexcusable truth and the valid pretences.

And he knew instinctively that truth would be of no use to him. Some
kind of concealment seemed a necessity because one cannot explain. Of

course not! Who would listen? One had simply to be without stain and
without reproach to keep one's place in the forefront of life.

He said to himself, "I must get over it the best I can," and began to
walk up and down the room. What next? What ought to be done? He

thought: "I will travel--no I won't. I shall face it out." And after
that resolve he was greatly cheered by the reflection that it would be

a mute and an easy part to play, for no one would be likely to
converse with him about the abominable conduct of--that woman. He

argued to himself that decent people--and he knew no others--did not
care to talk about such indelicate affairs. She had gone off--with

that unhealthy, fat ass of a journalist. Why? He had been all a
husband ought to be. He had given her a good position--she shared his

prospects--he had treated her invariably with great consideration. He
reviewed his conduct with a kind of dismal pride. It had been

irreproachable. Then, why? For love? Profanation! There could be no
love there. A shamefulimpulse of passion. Yes, passion. His own wife!

Good God! . . . And the indelicate aspect of his domestic misfortune
struck him with such shame that, next moment, he caught himself in the

act of pondering absurdly over the notion whether it would not be more
dignified for him to induce a general belief that he had been in the

habit of beating his wife. Some fellows do . . . and anything would be
better than the filthy fact; for it was clear he had lived with the

root of it for five years--and it was too shameful. Anything!
Anything! Brutality . . . But he gave it up directly, and began to

think of the Divorce Court. It did not present itself to him,
notwithstanding his respect for law and usage, as a proper refuge for

dignified grief. It appeared rather as an unclean and sinister cavern
where men and women are haled by adverse fate to writhe ridiculously

in the presence of uncompromising truth. It should not be allowed.
That woman! Five . . . years . . . married five years . . . and never

to see anything. Not to the very last day . . . not till she coolly
went off. And he pictured to himself all the people he knew engaged in

speculating as to whether all that time he had been blind, foolish, or
infatuated. What a woman! Blind! . . . Not at all. Could a

clean-minded man imagine such depravity? Evidently not. He drew a free
breath. That was the attitude to take; it was dignified enough; it

gave him the advantage, and he could not help perceiving that it was
moral. He yearned unaffectedly to see morality (in his person)

triumphant before the world. As to her she would be forgotten. Let her
be forgotten--buried in oblivion--lost! No one would allude . . .

Refined people--and every man and woman he knew could be so
described--had, of course, a horror of such topics. Had they? Oh, yes.

No one would allude to her . . . in his hearing. He stamped his foot,
tore the letter across, then again and again. The thought of

sympathizing friends excited in him a fury of mistrust. He flung down
the small bits of paper. They settled, fluttering at his feet, and

looked very white on the dark carpet, like a scattered handful of
snow-flakes.