away while uttering a violent tirade against him for his supposed
suspicious proceedings.

That was the end of this truly odious British matron.

In after days Bastin, by some peculiar mental process,
canonised her in his imagination as a kind of saint. "So loving,"
he would say, "such a devoted wife! Why, my dear Humphrey, I can
assure you that even in the midst of her death-struggle her last
thoughts were of me," words that caused Bickley to snort with
more than usual vigour, until I kicked him to silence beneath the
table.



Chapter IV

Death and Departure


Now I must tell of my own terrible sorrow, which turned my life
to bitterness and my hopes to ashes.

Never were a man and a woman happier together than I and
Natalie. Mentally, physically, spiritually we were perfectly
mated, and we loved each other dearly. Truly we were as one. Yet
there was something about her which filled me with vague fears,
especially after she found that she was to become a mother. I
would talk to her of the child, but she would sigh and shake her
head, her eyes filling with tears, and say that we must not count