cynical enough to make herself repugnant by disclosing the unbeautiful secrets of the toilet.

Then for a moment he was released from his enchantment, and continued to think of flight till sleep had pity on him.

A couple of weeks passed in dull silence. He could not get rid of the thought that it was a pity about her, and when she was bored, it was his fault for the moment, because he was her husband—for the moment. To seek for others' society was now no longer possible, since his friends had been rejected, and she had no more pleasure in her own. They tried to go out each his own way but always returned home.

"You find it hard to be away from me, in spite of all!" she said.

"And you?" he answered.

She remained compliant and indifferent, no longer angry, so that they could talk, i.e. he ventured to answer.

"My jailor!" she said on one occasion.

"Who is in jail, you or I?" he answered.

When they perceived that they were each other's prisoners, they smiled at the relationship and began to examine the witchcraft of which they were victims. They went back in memory and lived over again the engagement period and their wedding journey. Consequently they lived always in the past, never in the present.

Then came the great moment he had waited for as a liberation—the announcement of her expecting to be a mother. Her longings would now have an object, and she would look forward instead of backward. But even here he had miscalculated.

Now she was angry with him, for her beauty would wither away, and it was no use his trying to comfort her by saying she would get up rejuvenated with recovered beauty, and that the crowning happiness awaited her. She treated him like a murderer, and could not look at him for his mere scent aroused her dislike. In order to obtain light on the matter, he asked their doctor. The latter laughed and explained to him that in such cases women always thought they smelt something;—this was either pure imagination or a physical perversion of the olfactory nerve.

When at last this stage was over, a certain calm succeeded which he was short-sighted enough to enjoy. Since he was now sure of having his wife in the house he perhaps showed that he was happy and thankful for it. But he should not have done so, for now she saw the matter from a new point of view.

"Ah! now you think you have me fast, but just wait till I am up again!"

The look which accompanied the threat gave him to understand what would happen. Now he began a battle with himself whether he should await the arrival of the child or go away first, in order to avoid the wrench of parting from it.

Since the married pair had entered into such a close relationship that one could hear the thoughts of the other, he could keep no secrets from her which she did not seize upon forthwith.

"I know well enough that you contemplate deserting us and casting us on the street."

"That is strange," he remarked; "it is you who have threatened the whole time to go off with the child, as soon as it came. So whatever I do is wrong; if I stay you go, and then I am both unhappy and ridiculous; if I go you are the martyr, and I am unhappy and a scoundrel to boot! That comes of having to do with women!"

How they got through the nine months was to him a puzzle. The last part of the time was the most tolerable, for she had begun to love the unborn child, and love imparted to her a higher beauty than she had before. But when he told her so, she did not believe him, and when she observed that he was lulling himself to sleep with dreams of perpetual happiness by her side she broke out again, saying: "You think you have got me safe now."

"My dear," he answered, "when we vowed to each other to be man and wife, I believed that I would belong to you and you to me, and I hoped that we should hold together so that the child should be born in a home, and be brought up by its father and mother."

And so on ad infinitum.

The child came, and the mother's joy was boundless. Ennui had disappeared and the man breathed freely, but he should have done so more imperceptibly. For two sharp eyes saw it and two keen looks said: "You think that I am tied by the child!"

On the third day the little one had lost the charm of novelty and was handed over to a nurse. Then dressmakers were summoned. Now he knew what was coming. From that hour he went about like a man condemned to death, waiting for his execution. He packed two travelling-bags which he hid in his wardrobe, ready to fly at the given signal.

The signal was given two days after his wife got up. She had put on a dress of an extremely showy cut and of the colour called "lamp-shade."

He took her out for a walk and suffered unspeakably when he saw that she whom he loved, attracted a degree of attention which he found obnoxious. Even the street urchins pointed with their fingers at the overdressed lady.

From that day he avoided going out with her. He stayed at home with the child, and lamented that he had a wife who made herself ridiculous.

Her next step to freedom was the riding-school. Through the stable the doors to society were opened for her. By means of horses one made acquaintances in the upper circles. Horses and dogs form the transition stage to the world from which one peers down in order to be able to discover the pedestrians on the dusty highways. The rider on horseback is six ells high instead of three, and he always looks as though he wished that those who walk should look up to him. The stable also was her means of introduction to a lieutenant who was a baron. Their hearts responded to each other, and since the baron was a clean-natured man, he decidedly refused to go through the stages of guest and friend of the house. Therefore they went off together, or rather, fled.

Her husband remained behind with the child.

IV

The baron jumped into the Stockholm express at Södertälje where he had arranged to meet her. Everything had been carefully arranged for them to be alone together at last, but Fate had other designs. When the baron entered the railway carriage he found his beloved sitting wedged in tightly among strangers, so tightly that there was no room for him. A glance in the adjoining coupe showed him that it was full also, and he had to stand in the corridor. Rage distorted his face, and when he tried to greet her with a secret and loving smile, he only showed his back teeth, which she had never seen before. To make matters worse, he had, in order not to be noticed, put on mufti. She had never seen him in this, and his spring coat looked faded, now that it was autumn. Some soft summer showers in the former year had caused the cloth to pucker near the seams, so that it lay in many small wave-like folds. Since it had been cut according to the latest fashion it gave him the appearance of having sloping shoulders which continued the neck down to the arms with the same ignoble outlines as those of a half-pint bottle. He perspired with rage, and a fragment of coal had settled firmly on his nose. She would like to have jumped up and with her lace handkerchief wiped away the black smut but dared not. He did not like to look at her for fear of displeasing her, and therefore remained standing in the corridor with his back towards her.

When they reached Katrineholm they had to dine if they did not wish to remain hungry till evening. Here the man and the hero had to show himself, and stand the ordeal or he was lost. With trembling calves and puckered face he followed his lady out of the train and across the railway lines. Here he fell on his knee, so that his hat slipped to the back of his head and remained sticking there like a military cap. But the position which made the latter look smart did not suit the unusual hat. In a word it was not his good day, and he had no luck.

When they entered the dining-saloon, they looked as though they had quarrelled inwardly, as though they despised each other, were