and I could not fancy myself leaving my house in the Old Market Place
without knowing where I was going to.

My real reason is so simple and clear that few will be content to accept
it. But I have no other, so what am I to do?

You know, like the rest of the world, that Richard and I have got on as
well as any two people of opposite sex ever can do. There has never been
an angry word between us. But one day the impulse--or whatever you like
to call it--took possession of me that I must live alone--quite alone
and all to myself. Call it an absurd idea, an impossible fancy; call it
hysteria--which perhaps it is--I must get right away from everybody and
everything. It is a blow to Richard, but I hope he will soon get over
it. In the long run his factory will make up for my loss.

We concealed the business very nicely. The garden party we gave last
week was a kind of "farewell performance." Did you suspect anything at
all? We are people of the world and know how to play the game...!

If I am leaving to-night, it is not altogether because I want to be
"over the hills" before the scandal leaks out, but because I have an
indescribable longing for solitude.

Joergen Malthe has planned and built a little villa for me--without
having the least idea I was to be the occupant.

The house is on an island, the name of which I will keep to myself for
the present. The rooms are fourteen feet high, and the dining-room can
hold thirty-six guests. There are only two reception-rooms. But what
more could a divorced woman of my age require? The rest of the