life?"

"Go ask the scandal-mongers of New York," was the bitter reply: "_they_
are eloquent respecting the perfection of my connubial bliss."

"If she had been a kind and affectionate wife, if she had made him happy,"
muttered Horace as he ascended the stairs, "my task would have been a
harder one. Now my duty is clear, and my course lies smooth and straight
before, me."

The room into which he was ushered by Christine, the pretty French maid,
was a perfect marvel of elegance and extravagance. It was very small, and
on every part of it had been lavished all that the combined efforts of
taste and expenditure could achieve. The walls had been painted in fresco
by an eminent Italian artist, and bevies of rosy Cupids, trailing after
them garlands of many-hued flowers, disported on a background of a
delicate green tint. The same tints and design were repeated in the
Aubusson carpet, and on the fine Gobelin tapestry which covered the few
chairs and the one luxurious couch that formed the useful furniture of the
tiny apartment. Étagères of carved and gilded wood occupied each corner,
and, together with the low mantelshelf (which was upheld by two dancing
nymphs in Carrara marble), were crowded with costly trifles in Bohemian
glass, Dresden and Sèvres porcelain, gilded bronze, carved ivory and
Parian ware. An easel, drawn toward the centre of the room, supported the
one painting that it contained, the designs on the walls being unsuited
for the proper display of pictures. This one picture had evidently been
selected on account of the contrast which it afforded to the gay coloring
and _riante_ style of the decorations. It was a superb marine view by
Hamilton--a cloudy sunset above a stormy sea, the lurid sinking sun
flinging streaks of blood-red light upon the leaden waters that, in the