would sing for bread in the streets before she would go back to him;
and he knew she meant it.

Fearing his influence against her and his sworn revenge, she went to
Italy for a year, and hid in quiet villages until his passion should
somewhat have died, finding herself in the dreadful position, not only
of being betrayed by her mother, but quite unable to obtain any sort of
freedom without revealing the black stain upon her only near
relation.

She could not seek a divorce under the terrible circumstances, and she
was far too proud and spirited to touch a farthing of her husband's
money. It was like a dreadful chapter in her life, of which she could
only turn down
the page; never, never, obliterate nor escape from.

In the black days and weeks of despair which followed, she often felt
she must have lost her reason without Hal, and even to her she could
not tell the actual truth. Hal asked once, and then no more. Afterwards
it was like a secret, unnamed horror between them, from which the
curtain must not be raised.

For the rest there was the usual but intenser scene of remonstrance
between Dudley and Hal with the usual resentful and obdurate
termination. This time
Dudley even got seriously angry, unable to see anything but a foolish,
unprincipled woman reaping a just reward of her own sowing; and for
nearly a week his displeasure was such that he addressed no single word
to Hal if he could help it.