making himself as comfortable as possible on the seat opposite, took off his hat, leaned his head back and in a few moments was breathing audibly and regularly.

“He is asleep,” whispered his wife, and then, on the breath of a deep-drawn sigh, she added in the same low whisper, “Oh, God, have mercy on me.”

“What is it?” whispered Hannah timidly, her voice tender with sympathy.

“Hush! I am going to tell you everything. Wait till we get home. I am going to tell you all.”

She spoke excitedly, though still in a whisper, and it was evident that the agitation under which she labored was urging her on to actions in which the voice of discretion and prudence had no part.

Hannah, who had long ago suspected that her beautiful friend—whose face and voice, together with the luxury of her surroundings and dress had made her acquaintance seem like intercourse with a being from a higher sphere—was not happy, now felt an impulse of affectionate pity which made her move closer to her companion and rather timidly put her arm around her. In an instant she was folded in a close embrace, the bare white arm under the wrap straining her in an ardent pressure that drew her head down until it leaned against the breast of the taller woman, and felt the bounding pulses of her heart.

“I am so miserable,” whispered the soft voice close to her ear. “I am going to tell you about it. If I couldn’t talk to somebody to-night I feel as if I should go mad. Whether it’s right or wrong I’m going to tell you. I can’t bear it this way any longer. Oh, I am so unhappy—I am so unhappy.”

Hannah only pressed closer, without speaking. There was nothing that she could say. She felt keenly that in what seemed the brilliant lot of her beautiful friend there were possibilities of anguish which her commonplace life could know nothing of. So they drove along in silence until the carriage stopped at the door. Mr. Dallas was sleeping so soundly that it was necessary for his wife to waken him, and he got up, looking sleepy and confused, and led the way into the house, while the carriage rolled away, the wheels reverberating down the silent streets.

In the hall Hannah looked at her friend and saw that her face, though pale, was perfectly composed, and her voice, when she spoke to her husband, was also quiet and calm.

“Hannah is going to stay all night, you know,” she said. “You needn’t stay up for us. I will put out the lights.”

He nodded sleepily and went at once up-stairs, as the two women turned into the drawing-room. The lights in the chandelier were burning brightly and a great deep chair was drawn under them, upon which Mrs. Dallas sat down, motioning her friend to a seat facing her. She was wearing the dress in which she had sung the last act of the opera—a Greek costume of soft white silk with trimmings of gold. It was in this dress that she had roused the audience to such a pitch of admiration by her beauty, and seen close, as Hannah was privileged to see it now, there were a score of perfections of detail, in both woman and costume, which those who saw her from afar would not have been aware of. Hannah, who had an ardent soul within her very ordinary little body, looked at her with a sort of worship in her eyes.

Meeting this look, Mrs. Dallas smiled—a smile that was sadder than tears.

“Oh, Hannah, I am so unhappy,” she said. “I want to tell you but I don’t know how. Oh, my child, I am so miserable.”

Her utterance had still that little foreign accent that made it so pathetic, although, in spite of some odd blunders, she had become almost fluent in the English tongue. There was still no indication of tears in either her voice or her eyes, as she leaned back in the padded chair, her head supported by its top, and her long bare arms with their picturesque Greek bracelets resting wearily on its cushioned sides.

Hannah looked at her with the tenderness of her kind heart overflowing in great tears from her eyes and rolling down her cheeks. She pressed her handkerchief to her face in the vain effort to keep them back, but the woman for whom they fell shed no tears. She sat there calm and quiet in her youth and beauty and looked at the plain little school-teacher with a wistful gaze that seemed as if it might be envy.

“Tell me, Hannah,” she said presently, when the girl had dried her eyes and grown more calm, “tell me frankly, no matter how strange it may seem to you to have the question asked, what do you think of my husband?”

This startling question naturally found Hannah unprepared with an answer, and after clearing her throat and getting rather red, she said confusedly that she had seen so little of Mr. Dallas, her intercourse with him had been so slight, that she really did not feel that she knew him well enough to give an answer.

“You know him as well as I do,” his wife replied. “As he is to you—as you see him daily, exactly so he is to me. I have waited and waited for something more, but in vain. I have come at last to the conclusion that this is all.”

Hannah, between wonder and distress, began to feel the tears rise again. The other saw them and bent forward and took her hand.

“Don’t cry, poor little thing,” she said. “Yes—cry if you can. It shows your heart is soft still—mine is as hard as stone. Oh, God, how I have cried!” she broke off, in a voice grown suddenly passionate. “How I have laid awake at night and cried until my body was exhausted with the sobs. I have thought of my little white bed in the convent, where I slept so placidly, for every night of all those blessed, quiet, peaceful years, until my whole longing would be that I might once more lay myself down upon it and close my eyes forever. If an angel from Heaven had offered me a wish it would have been that one. Oh, Hannah, you do not know. You ought to be so happy. You are so happy. Do you know it? I didn’t know it, and I was never grateful for it, but always looking forward to being happy in the future, and oh, how I am punished!”

She wrung her hands together and bit the flesh of her soft lips, as if with a sense of anguish too bitter to be borne.

“I always thought,” said Hannah, in a husky voice that sounded still of tears, “that a woman who was beautiful and gifted and admired, and had a husband to take care of her, must be the happiest creature in the world. I used to look at you with envy, but I knew, before to-night, that you suffered sometimes.”

“Sometimes! Oh, Hannah, it is not sometimes—but always—continually—evening and morning—day-time and night-time, for when I sleep I have such dreams! The things that were my day dreams long ago come back to me in sleep, and when I wake and think of myself as I am, I know not why I do not die of it. Oh, Hannah, if you have dreamed of marriage, give it up. Live your life out as you are. Die a dear, sweet, good, old maid, teaching little children and being kind to them and taking care of your old mother. Oh, my dear, don’t call yourself lonely. Don’t dare to say it, lest you should be punished. There is no loneliness that a woman can know which can be compared to a marriage like mine. Oh, I am so lonely every moment that I live, that I feel there is no companionship for me in all this crowded world, for the bitterness of my heart is what no one can feel or share.”

“Why did you marry your husband?” said Hannah, surprised at her own boldness.

“Why? I am glad you asked me that. I will tell you, and perhaps you may be saved what I have suffered. If my mother