And he, prone upon his back this warm September day, read this long
epistle from his new wife, then laid it down and closing his eyes murmured
softly, "What a strange little puss it is!" Lying in the dim light her
hand had created for him, he thought of his own troubles and hers, just as
she had stated them. The blood would flush up to his brow as her cool
ignoring of his surpassing attractions, to which all other women accorded
their full meed of praise, rose up before him. He of whom it had been said
if he beckoned with his finger women left their duties, gave up their very
life to do his pleasure!--he to have the girl he had honored by making his
wife, a little brown woman, plain and almost _passé_ (he was man enough
not to care for her poverty), show she cared no more for his love than he
did for hers I--was as indifferent to him as he to her! Indifference from
a woman was a new experience to him, and annoyed him.

Yet her quaint, frank letter touched him. What did she mean by dying soon
and letting him be free again? Poor little midge! was she dying of a
broken heart because a treacherous woman had fooled her out of a part of
her life? Poor little robin! she was his wife now, and he could heal the
worst heartache in any woman's breast. He had tried that thing before, and
succeeded, even if he broke the heart afterward. Die, indeed! Not if he
knew it: even Death should not have a little woman he meant to be good to.

And as he remembered all her faithfulness to him during these weary weeks
of pain, he thought, "By Jove! beauty's not all, for no woman, had her
face been like that of Phryne of Thebes, or her charms as entrancing as
the bewitching Dudu's, could have been more lovely in her kindness to me.
How brave and strong she has been! What a faithful little soul it is!
Always ready, day and night, to do just what I want done and in the way I
want it, never knocking things about or fidgeting round, but just
ready-handed, neat and bright. God knows, a handsome woman wouldn't have