m
 
 THE LIBRARY 
 
 OF 
 
 THE UNIVERSITY 
 
 OF CALIFORNIA 
 
 LOS ANGELES 
 
 r"V^V',,"if.,'-''-».j 

 
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 ffJ.'^X 

 
 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME? 
 
 A Woman s Version of the Kreutzer Sonata 
 
 BY 
 
 MRS JAMES GREGOR 
 
 WITH A PROLOGUE TRANSLATED FROM THE RUSSIAN OE 
 
 PRINCE GALITZEN 
 
 SWAN SONNENSCHEIN & CO 
 
 PATERNOSTER SQUARE 
 
 1894
 
 TRANSLATED FROM THE GERMAN 
 
 HV 
 
 MARIE L; SHEDLOCK
 
 
 Thou shalt do no Murder 
 
 Ey 
 
 PRINCE G A LIT ZEN 
 
 E 
 
 1063614
 
 Thou shalt do no Murder 
 
 DEAR BROTHER — 
 I am sending you a sketch of the last years 
 of my hfe. I wrote it down in hours of misery — 
 such as I have never experienced in the same degree 
 since — for which I thank Heaven. I have only 
 hidden one thing in my life from you, and I am 
 about to disclose it to you now; indeed, I can never 
 quite explain it to myself why I kept it as a secret 
 from you. Perhaps I was ashamed to speak to you 
 of the trouble that was on my mind. If a grief be 
 too heavy, it cannot be discussed in conversation, 
 though, as you know very well, there are many people 
 capable of telling their sorrow to the first person they 
 happen to meet — indeed, they do not hesitate to speak 
 out before a dozen people who are total strangers to 
 them ; their sole motive for so doing seems to be 
 prompted by a petty sentimental feeling of wishing 
 to talk of their affairs. 
 
 I was silent during the space of five years, and you 
 suspected nothing. You are more intimate with me
 
 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 
 
 than any one else ; you are, in fact, my second self, 
 and I know when you read this you will say, " He 
 has acted rightly, as a good man would have done ; " 
 besides, I assure you, I require no encouragement : I 
 have no doubt in my mind that I have done what is 
 right. These pages have lain by me for a long time : 
 I could not make up my mind to send them to you. 
 But now I have done so. You asked me, in one of 
 your letters lately, whether I had read the " Kreuzer 
 Sonata," and you added, " Every body has read it : you 
 cannot escape from it any more than from influenza. 
 What do you think of it .^ " Well, when you have 
 read the accompanying pages, you will know what I 
 am forced to think of it.
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 YOU know the last time we were together, for 
 three whole months before my marriage : that 
 is twelve years ago. Do you remember what a 
 beautiful time that was for me ? It was glorious ! 
 I enjoyed happiness in anticipation, just as if the 
 coming peaceful joys had cast their rays upon us — 
 that is, upon Nadine and me. Before I met her, I 
 had never conceived the possibihty of meeting any 
 one who seemed created for me. I found in her all 
 that I needed. Whenever I discovered a new trait in 
 her character, I always felt it was the one indispen- 
 sable something which I had been awaiting. 
 
 At the first meeting, which took place at the 
 Princess Schawrow's house, where I was calling, I 
 was struck with her beauty. Her eyes charmed me : 
 they were so penetrating and true, and whilst her 
 mother was enlarging, in the most discursive manner, 
 on travels in Switzerland, and I was answering in a 
 most emphatic manner, I felt those eyes turned 
 towards me, and from their expression I knew she 
 was thinking, " Why do you pretend to feel the 
 
 s
 
 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 
 
 slightest interest in Switzerland ? " But I was quite 
 ready to listen to further descriptions of the bears at 
 Berne, and the dulness of the inhabitants at Geneva, 
 for it was so refreshing to look at Nadine. 
 
 But the Princess seemed evidently to think that I 
 had gazed at the young girl long enough, and asked 
 me whether, according to my opinion, the taking of 
 Constantinople was necessary to Russia or not. I 
 gave my answer, and took leave of the ladies. When 
 I reached the street, the spell which Nadine had 
 thrown over me was distinctly weaker, and twice I 
 could think of nothing but her mother's ugly earrings. 
 Three hours later I had completely forgotten both. 
 
 The next day I met her again. It was in the 
 theatre, and the opera Ritsselke was being performed. 
 When I rose, after the first act, I became conscious 
 of her presence. I bowed : the ladies returned my 
 greeting with a gracious smile, and I at once resolved 
 to go to their box. This time Nadine's personal 
 appearance made no impression upon me whatever. 
 I saw, of course, that she was pleasing, and that she 
 had a charming face ; but all this seemed to be in the 
 background. I was specially charmed with her con- 
 versation, so different from the ordinary talk between 
 the acts which one knows by heart beforehand. I 
 felt at once that one could talk with her on all 
 subjects, not only on music, on the weather, or on 
 Switzerland. Indeed, she confirmed this in no un-
 
 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 
 
 certain manner, for when I asked her "And do you 
 sing yourself?" she answered quickly, " No, I do not 
 sing ; I play the piano neither better nor worse than 
 most people ; I seldom go to the theatre ; I have- 
 heard Patti three times ; and I have not lost any 
 relations in the late war." 
 
 I looked at her in astonishment. 
 
 " You see," she said, by way of explanation, " these 
 questions were bound to come sometime. I have 
 answered them all, so we can now have a real talk." 
 
 " Nadine ! " her mother called out severely. 
 
 " Miss Nadine is perfectly right," I ventured to say,, 
 and tried to prove this in my behaviour, but she had 
 somewhat disconcerted me, and from sheer ill-luck no 
 brilliant remark suggested itself to me. 
 
 But my future mother-in-law kept the wheels of 
 small-talk rolling. She related her biography with- 
 out a pause. It appeared she was a widow — her 
 husband had died from a stroke of paralysis seven 
 years before. She possessed two estates, and a house 
 in Moscow and in dear St. Petersburg, where she had 
 been born and brought up ; her money was invested 
 in Government securities, and Nadine had received a 
 domestic education, " quine ce cede en rien a r education 
 de Sinolnoyl' 
 
 While her mother was speaking, Nadine looked 
 anxiously about. Probably the long tirade to which 
 I had been treated was a sort of circular addressed
 
 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 
 
 to all young men. I felt sorry for the girl when I 
 realized this. 
 
 " She is ashamed of it," I said to myself. 
 
 At this moment I noticed how well she was 
 dressed — particularly well, I thought. You know how 
 some women are remarkable for their neck, their hands, 
 their toilette, but this girl seemed to say, " Look 
 straight into my eyes, and then you will know me." 
 There are people who fall in love with a toilette, 
 because they look upon woman as the copy of a 
 fashion-plate. Such men would have been pleased 
 with Nadine's style, and her dress was striking. 
 
 During the next interval there came into the box a 
 Staff Officer with a hideous voice and a fair-haired 
 young man with a silken moustache. The latter was 
 very awkward in his manner, blushed at every 
 moment, and stammered when he answered. His 
 whole conversation was made up of answers, for he 
 was incapable of suggesting anything on his own 
 account. The Princess presented us to one another, 
 of course ; but, as often happens on such occasions, I 
 did not catch his name. Nadine was very indifferent 
 in her manner towards the Staff Officer ; she was on 
 terms of playful familiarity with the fair-haired young 
 man, towards me she showed herself, if possible, even 
 more amiable. You are perhaps surprised that I 
 should tell you all these details, but it is necessary 
 that I should do so.
 
 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 
 
 It was during this interval that I felt I had lost my 
 heart to Nadine. Everything in her appealed to me : 
 her face, her movements, and especially her voice, 
 which seemed to come from her heart, and which 
 moved me deeply. Though I could not look into 
 her inmost soul, I felt convinced that she could have 
 no faults. 
 
 You think I fell in love with her simply because 
 she was beautiful ? No, this was not the case. All 
 of us who move in society are accustomed to meet 
 many beautiful women and girls, but we do not fall 
 in love with them. Therefore beauty is not the cause 
 of this, for it is only a negative attraction ; that is, 
 only an absence of ugliness, and ugliness prevents 
 love. Besides, by exception, ugly women can be 
 very attractive. The chief thing is that the souls 
 should appeal to one another ; whoever denies this 
 and maintains that only physical charms attract us, 
 he is deeply to be pitied. When I left the box, I 
 made up my mind not to return. I began to feel 
 somewhat strained, but I found it was impossible to 
 remain in the theatre without going to them. I 
 therefore went away. At first I turned my steps 
 homewards, but I felt a sudden terror of sitting alone 
 in my vast bachelor quarters, where everything would 
 seem at variance with my present state of mind. 
 
 Yes, it was love — the beginning of love, a feeling 
 that resounded like loud music in my heart. All my
 
 lo WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 
 
 impressions seemed affected by the sound of this 
 music. You think me sentimental. No ; it was 
 something pure, the uneasiness of a new joy. I made 
 no pictures in my mind concerning the future. I 
 never even told myself that I should marry Nadine. 
 I only felt that in her company I should lead a new, 
 fair, and glorious life. 
 
 I did not go home, but made my way to join 
 Baebmatshow at supper. I had met him that morn- 
 ing in the street, and he had told me that in the 
 evening he was to bid farewell to his bachelor life 
 because he was to be married on the morrow to the 
 daughter of a fabulously rich merchant, of the name 
 of Jelesarno. After telling me this, he had begged 
 me to join him at Donon, where there would be 
 dinner and ladies, supper and ladies, etc. 
 
 I had accepted the invitation out of politeness, for I 
 had a great repugnance for the usual festivities held 
 by the gay little circle of the gilded youth of St. 
 Petersburg. It is these men who leave the impres- 
 sion that men of higher society spend their time in 
 low restaurants in the company of degraded women. 
 I need not say that I took no part in these indecencies. 
 I will give no description of what took place. You 
 know how horrible these festivities sometimes become, 
 not only because wine and spirits flow freely ; not only 
 because the men drink more than they can stand, but 
 principally because of the disgusting conversation in
 
 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME ii 
 
 whicli they indulge over their cups. Baebmatshow 
 himself was not very drunk : he had only reached the 
 stage when a man considers it quite unnecessary to 
 restrain himself in the expression of any feelings, 
 however coarse. When he saw that I looked round 
 angrily at the intoxicated assembly, he pretended to 
 be quite sober, drew me beside him on a couch, 
 dropped heavily down, and called for soda water. 
 
 " I am going to be married," he began in a serious 
 tone, as if he were announcing something novel. 
 
 " Yes, I know ; that is all right. I congratulate 
 you." 
 
 " I am not sure," he said, "whether there is not a 
 lurking irony in your congratulations. You despise 
 me, of course, because, having squandered my fortune, 
 I seek to redeem it by the merchant's millions, and 
 practically exchange them against the title of 
 Countess I offer his daughter." 
 
 " Such cases are not rare," I observed, by way of 
 saying something. 
 
 " Not rare ? This is better than ever. But I 
 cannot understand what evil people can see in this. 
 It is certainly not dishonourable. I take money, and I 
 give myself in exchange. Marriage is a mere hol- 
 low sound. Does one get engaged for love, or does 
 one enter the marriage contract for any such reason .^ 
 Don't talk such rubbish to me." 
 
 " You woo capital, titles, dignities and social
 
 12 - WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 
 
 position. Do you consider this any worse than 
 marrying for mere beauty's sake ? It is purer ? 
 That's all nonsense ! it is hicrh time we threw aside 
 these marinated ideals and admitted the truth. 
 Believe me, it is high time — for out of a hundred 
 marriages, ninety-nine are made for some motive of 
 self-interest. Let me say one word more : if I were 
 poor, as poor as a church mouse, and married for 
 5,000 roubles, you would not think of despising me, 
 though those 5,000 would not be more necessary to 
 me to live than these 5,000,000. Do you understand 
 me .'' It is a mere question of arithmetic, though you 
 insist upon treating it as a moral one and preaching 
 me a sermon. I repeat it — this is an arithmetical 
 question, not a moral one." 
 
 He seemed greatly pleased with his words, and 
 looked at me quite triumphantly. I did not answer, 
 because I was really quite indifferent as to the views 
 he held. I could not feel moved by his cynicism, 
 which was too coarse to appeal to me. 
 
 "As for love," he continued, "it is mere idle 
 chatter. In a year's time, or even after a month, 
 the love no longer exists ; you may believe my 
 words. Then comes disillusion, treachery, and a 
 rejoicing over a fresh scandal." 
 
 " Is this quite unavoidable, in your opinion } " I 
 could not help asking. " Is it not possible to con- 
 ceive a different state of thing's .'' " 
 
 o
 
 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 13 
 
 " In ninety-nine cases out of a hundred it is so. Let 
 us suppose you marry a beautiful girl, wlio has 
 pleased you on account of her pretty face, and be- 
 cause her clothes are elegant and produce a fine effect. 
 Supposing she gets small-pox, or that her dressmaker 
 takes it into her head to spoil her clothes. Ha, ha ! 
 what becomes of your love then } You beat a hasty 
 retreat." 
 
 He was evidently delighted with himself. His 
 common expression seemed to himself astonishingly 
 convincing. Was it worth while reminding him that 
 we could see hundreds of examples of honourable 
 and happy marriages around us at this moment, 
 and that he was looking at the world from his 
 own low standpoint ? Certainly not. But I felt if 
 he went on we should come to blows. I was in the 
 unpleasant situation of a man who is insulted without 
 any reason by a drunkard in the street. 
 
 Fortunately one of Baebmatschow's friends came 
 up at this moment, and the conversation took another 
 turn. I remained for a short while, and tried 
 to join the party in drinking, but gave it up, and 
 returned home.
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 HEN I awoke next day, I felt calm and in- 
 different. " I am certainly not in love," I 
 thought to myself; but scarcely had this thought 
 passed through my mind, than I felt a sort of tighten- 
 ing of my heartstrings ; it was as if something had 
 suddenly awakened that had hitherto slept. And 
 from that very moment I appeared to be borne down 
 by some outside overwhelming power. 
 
 I did not know whether that power was for good 
 or evil ; I only felt that I had entirely changed my 
 nature. 
 
 This feeling at my heart was mixed pleasure and 
 
 pain. I continually contrasted in my mind the two 
 
 evenings I had with Nadine. Each one of her words, 
 
 and the expressions of which she had made use, came 
 
 back to mind, and I felt as if I saw her and heard her 
 
 more distinctly than when I was in her presence. 
 
 " Why do I love her ? " I asked myself. Surely not 
 
 because she is beautiful ! I have met many more 
 
 beautiful girls, who have not moved me in the 
 
 14
 
 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME i =; 
 
 slightest degree. She has never given utterance 
 to anything at all remarkable ; indeed, she is very- 
 much like other girls, and yet she has crept into 
 my heart, she has found a chord there which had 
 hitherto remained untouched. Altogether I felt in 
 the most confused state of mind ; I was only clear on 
 one point, and that was, that I wished to marry her. 
 And I reflected how beautiful life would be if my 
 hopes in this respect were realized. 
 
 I was not yet able to paint the rosy future in 
 clear colours to my mind : I only felt a general im- 
 pression. It seemed to me as if some magic chord 
 had been struck in my heart, the separate notes of 
 which I was unable at present to distinguish. 
 
 But I knew the tones were fresh and pure. I 
 seemed to have torn myself completely away from 
 my past life, as if I were looking down upon 
 it from a higher plane. I saw much that was 
 unlovely in that past life, but I realized that 
 this had only been possible as long as my spiritual 
 nature had not been awakened ; now such things 
 were completely strange to me. Then anxiety came 
 upon me. I began to think my dream would never 
 be realized. What right had I to hope that she 
 would become my wife.? If she accepted me, it would 
 be out of love ; and why should I suppose that she 
 would bestow her affection on me rather than on that 
 Staff Officer ?
 
 i6 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 
 
 I remember the recollection of that man worried 
 me not a little. I do not know why I gave him the 
 preference and not the young, fair-haired man with the 
 silken moustache, or the nine or ten other young men 
 who were doubtless paying court to Nadinc without 
 my being aware of the fact. 
 
 I tried to console myself with the reflection that 
 he had a hideous voice, and that he was a very com- 
 monplace man ; but it was of no avail. Perhaps 
 she thought my voice ugly, and considered me a 
 coxcomb. My opinion went for nothing — only 
 Nadine's counted for anything. 
 
 Then very foolish thoughts came into my mind ; 
 and when I recall it now, I fall to pitying my poor 
 former self. This is why I linger over these details, 
 to which I have never before alluded. 
 
 My excitement became all the keener because of 
 my desire to go to the house. I nearly fell ill, and it 
 Avas with the greatest difficulty that I could postpone 
 my visit to the proper time demanded by the usage 
 of society. I was very nervous, lest my appearance 
 should cause Nadine astonishment. Perhaps the 
 Princess had only asked me out of politeness, and had 
 not reckoned on my presenting myself so soon. 
 
 It was, however, quite impossible to me to postpone 
 my visit to the following day. So I went with much 
 misgiving and trembling of heart, as if I were being 
 forced into it by some evil genius. I felt certain that
 
 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 17 
 
 the meeting would prove decisive, and I pictured to 
 myself that I should know my fate before I left the 
 house. ])ut I was mistaken. The visit was quite an 
 ordinary one, and passed off without anything par- 
 ticular taking place. 
 
 I paid something like twenty visits after this, with- 
 out bringing about any change in our relation to one 
 another, except that I was no longer merely in 
 love, but loved with all my heart. I learnt to know 
 Nadine. More than ten times I felt it was my duty 
 to speak, and the expression of her face seemed 
 encouraging, for though there was neither joy, love 
 nor pride in her face, yet she seemed to say : You 
 have spoken well and acted rightly. Others did not 
 see it in the same light : sometimes I thought she did 
 love me, and that on the morrow I would ask for her 
 hand. But when the morrow came, I found a changed 
 expression on her face. The old Princess was as 
 amiable towards me as she was to all the other guests. 
 Amongst these were five or six unmarried men, three 
 of whom were obviously in love with Nadine, but they 
 roused in me no particular jealousy, for it seemed 
 to fritter away when divided amongst them all. I 
 only knew that I should be terribly unhappy if she 
 became the wife of another. 
 
 At last I came to a decision : it was on Christmas 
 evening. The Princess had provided a Christmas tree 
 for her little nephews, and, as is the custom, she in- 
 
 C
 
 1 8 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 
 
 vited the " grown-ups," who, having gazed at the tree 
 in a hurried, nervous manner, hastened into the ad- 
 joining room, where the card tables were prepared. 
 Nadine was busy with the tree : she was distributing 
 the presents, and was very merry. 
 
 I was filled with the thought that some day she 
 would adorn just such another tree for her — for my 
 children. 
 
 " Nadine," I said, when she came to my side after 
 the distribution was over, " can you spare me a few 
 moments ? " 
 
 "Yes; what do you want?" she asked, astonished. 
 I was confused and afraid, as if I had been meditating 
 some wrong thing. 
 
 My thoughts must have betrayed themselves on 
 my face, for she looked at me attentively, and then 
 she blushed. I saw that she had understood, and 
 felt inexpressibly thankful that this was so. " Will 
 you be my wife.''" I asked softly. "I will," she 
 answered, in a slow, measured tone. I was surprised 
 at myself for being able to listen quietly to such an 
 answer. I wondered why I did not scream for joy, or 
 commit some other folly. The stream of happiness 
 that flowed through my heart was so overpowering 
 that it seemed to carry away with it all the grief I had 
 ever known in my life. 
 
 She saw this, and smiled ; then she waited for me 
 to say something. But I could not speak. I could
 
 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 19 
 
 only gaze upon her with the delicious consciousness 
 that she was mine — that even to me belonged the 
 thoughts and feelings that were sparkling in her eyes. 
 
 " Shall we go at once to my mother ?" she said at 
 last. 
 
 " At once ! " I said, in astonishment. It struck me 
 that this was childish and almost absurd. 
 
 But it was not absurd. We found the Princess 
 alone in the dining-room. She listened to the news 
 without displaying any excitement ; she only smiled, 
 and said she would give her consent. In a moment 
 the news spread among the guests, and they at once 
 offered their congratulations. Then they brought us 
 champagne — and somehow this seemed to me a touch 
 of prose after the poetry.
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 THEN began so fair a time in my life that no 
 subsequent events could ever efface its memory. 
 
 You must have noticed what a sense of comfort we 
 feel when we meet with a truly sympathetic person, 
 even when we hear nothing of special interest fall 
 from their lips. The sense of comfort we feel is 
 merely in the fact of our meeting them at all. This 
 is the feeling we both had, my wife and L Each was 
 happy in the fact that the other existed. At least, it 
 was the case with me, and I believe she felt the same. 
 
 Every impulse of my life was associated with hers : 
 her image filled all my thoughts, even though I was 
 not always conscious of it. Her soul was like a 
 coloured glass, through which I looked out on the 
 world. But mine was not the blind love that turns a 
 man into the slave of the woman. I was always the 
 element of strength, and she of pleasure. 
 
 You were away at that time travelling, if you re- 
 member. I was sorry at the time, for I often longed 
 to cry out to you, " Was there ever such joy ? " Now 
 I regret it still more.
 
 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 21 
 
 My work often detained me in St. Petersburg-, but 
 we always spent the summer in the country. The 
 Princess died during the first year of our marriage ; 
 she wandered in her mind considerably during the 
 last ilhiess. 
 
 Nadine mourned very deeply for some days, and 
 this sorrow seemed to bring us nearer to one another: 
 she felt that I was everything to her, and I was proud 
 that it was so. 
 
 We lived completely for one another. She never 
 showed any interest in my business occupations, 
 out of consideration for me ; and I liked to have 
 it thus, and to see her happy and merry. Our house 
 was always filled with guests, and we were always 
 giving balls, dinners, and pic-nics. You cannot think 
 how many fell in love with her, and considering her 
 beauty and intelligence, this was scarcely surprising. 
 But I give you my word for it, no pang of jealousy 
 ever entered into my heart — not because I believed it 
 impossible for her to go astray, but because I knew 
 she was incapable of deceiving me. When my wife 
 smiled on one, or nodded to another, or becffjed a third 
 to come as often as possible, there came to me 
 none of that petty jealousy such as a lackey might 
 indulge in. I say a lackey, and I condemn the feeling, 
 because an honourable man should not be capable of 
 such smallness. He considers everybody as honour- 
 able as himself, as long as he is cleverly deceived.
 
 22 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 
 
 I do not mean to intimate that my wife deceived 
 me at that time — no, she was absolutely free of blame ; 
 but there are so many who drive their wives into 
 guilt by showing suspicion. Of this I was not guilty. 
 She deceived me (yes, Vladimir, I now tell you what 
 you never suspected up to this day), because there was 
 this evil latent in her heart. But for this, she would 
 have been perfect. I was happy as long as I believed 
 her to be perfect, and as long as she would still respect 
 herself. 
 
 There is something in all of us that rebels against 
 perfection. I sometimes thought that she deliberately 
 
 forgot her dignity, for her treachery But we will 
 
 come to that later on. You know that I was always 
 of a religious nature. I seldom go to church, but I 
 am always convinced that there is a God above who 
 protects, saves, punishes, and loves us. For this 
 reason I feared nothing at that time. I knew that 
 evil and danger existed, but I thought they would not 
 come near me. Again I am wandering from the 
 point. I have not yet described to you the fulness of 
 my happiness. When a son was born to us, I felt that 
 I had realized the greatest joy that can fall to the 
 human lot : my whole life seemed to be bathed in the 
 sunshine of joy. Often in moments of depression I 
 had looked upon myself as useless in this world, for 
 the business I was managing could have been equally 
 well managed by thousands of others ; now all at
 
 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 
 
 once was revealed to me the end and object of my 
 life, for I felt my duty towards this little child, and 
 from the moment when I heard his first cry, I felt I 
 could devote myself entirely to him. From this time 
 onward I seemed to exist only in relation to the child. 
 Everything I did was done with a view to his future, 
 and this consciousness was a source of real joy to me 
 and raised me in my own eyes ! My wife was able to 
 nurse the child herself, and this was a further tie 
 between us. Of course we committed many follies at 
 first, for young parents are often ridiculous; but they 
 are not ridiculous when they tremble for the health of 
 their child, when they gaze with pale faces into the 
 cot where the little one is tossing about, neither know- 
 ing what is the matter with it. They are not 
 ridiculous when they are ready to sacrifice everything 
 for this same little creature, who is still too small to 
 distinguish his father and mother from strangers. 
 They are not ridiculous when they seek with faltering 
 voice the help of the physician, and when they joyfully 
 take all sorrow upon themselves, in order to bring 
 back a smile to the face of their child. 
 
 But there are bad fathers and bad mothers, who 
 behave to their children as a bitch to her young, who 
 will calmly look on while her puppies are being 
 strangled in the snow, and who, after a year, will not 
 know her young again. There are people who are 
 not capable of sacrificing their pleasure to their }oung,
 
 24 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 
 
 who often complain and say that children are so dis- 
 turbing and troublesome — these are contemptible 
 people. 
 
 Others, again, say : " Why should one worry about 
 children, or tremble for their health ? Everything 
 depends on the will of God. He alone can help our 
 skill, or that of the physician avails nothing." 
 
 And yet the same people, if a house were burning, 
 would all cry for help, and would not be content to 
 rely on Divine Providence. Lies, lies everywhere! 
 Let people lie if they cannot do anything else, or 
 if it is necessary, so that they may distinguish them- 
 selves by the originality of their views. But why 
 should they drag God's name into it? Why should 
 they use religion, the purest and highest good of our 
 lives, as a mantle to cover their base selfishness ? 
 Alas ! Schopenhauer and Hartmann are much more 
 often read than the Gospel. 
 
 You are perhaps surprised that I speak more of 
 myself than my wife, as if she were a secondary 
 person in my sad story. That is also egotism ! I 
 am painting the background from which my sorrows 
 stand out as \( she had suffered nothing. Does shame 
 bring with it no pain ^ 
 
 We are all so small, so very small, that we should 
 like to see ourselves through a microscope ; perhaps 
 my wife came to grief because married life offered 
 her less happiness than to me.
 
 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 
 
 For me this life was, as it were, a refuge from, and 
 to her an entry to, the world. I was resting from the 
 work of life which she was only beginning ; a spiritual 
 intercourse with her gave me fresh strength, but could 
 I do the same for her ? 
 
 You have often said that he who has sown his 
 wild oats before marriage should never enter into 
 that contract, because, in his relations with his wife, 
 he can never rid himself of his former guilt. 
 
 But you are mistaken in this, or at least you are 
 only right with respect to those men who marry for 
 the sake of beauty, or for those petty enjoyments 
 which are consecrated by law. Honourable marriages 
 — and they are not unfrequent — are not based on 
 love of this kind ; an ideal marriage cannot spring 
 from such a union. 
 
 1 loved my wife whether I saw her or not. My 
 love did not consist only of caresses, for upon love 
 was grafted friendship, which is more necessary than 
 love. I felt esteem for her and myself, and there 
 was absolute confidence between us. 
 
 It is said that such a condition of things is rare. 
 This is not true ; if it were not so, honourable people 
 would not enter into the contract of marriage, and 
 legitimate children would not exist ; as it is, it is 
 impossible to deceive honourable people ! Yes, but 
 not always. What happened to me does not happen 
 to all. It would be easier to say, "See, I was a good 
 man ; my wife had many merits," and so on.
 
 26 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 
 
 When my wife made up her mind to be unfaithful 
 to me, her conduct was bad and dishonourable, but 
 any escape from the consequence of it, or any revenge 
 for her conduct, would have been still more dis- 
 honourable. Have I any right to bespatter others 
 with the mud on my path ? Besides, if I were to 
 say " All women wished to deceive their husbands — 
 marriage is a foolish institution which has no exist- 
 ence in nature," nobody would say that my conscience 
 was clear ; on the contrary, I should merely be 
 dubbed as a stern moralist. 
 
 Most people care nothing about appearances, but 
 it would be unfair to judge from a flecked exterior 
 that the whole man was defiled. One may be able 
 to show clean garments, and yet have gone through 
 the mire. The former idea of honour was consistent 
 and uniform ; the present generation is clouded — 
 there are even some who take a dung-cart for the 
 car of Juggernaut, and who say, " Let us throvv 
 ourselves under the wheels." 
 
 I recall the words of the Apostle Paul in the first 
 epistle to Timothy : — 
 
 " Now the Spirit speaketh expressly, that in the 
 latter times some shall depart from the faith, giving 
 heed to seducing spirits, and doctrines of devils ; 
 
 "Speaking lies in hypocrisy; having their con- 
 science seared with a hot iron ; 
 
 " Forbidding to marry, and commanding to abstain
 
 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 27 
 
 from meats, which God hath created. . . . But 
 refuse profane and old wives' fables." 
 
 The belief of parents in the perfection of their 
 children used formerly to seem absurd to me. Each 
 one says: "My son is better, perhaps not more clever 
 or more beautiful, but better." 
 
 Now, I find simply that my son is " better " I see 
 myself perfected in him. Unconsciously I tried to 
 develop perfection in him ; all his faults appear to 
 me as passing errors, which will change or disappear 
 under good influence. And though I may be mis- 
 taken, yet, paradoxical as it sounds, I believe I am 
 ricrht. You who are childless cannot understand this. 
 Once our Professor, in one of his lectures, touched on 
 this point, as to why parents loved 'their children, or 
 children their parents, and he came to the conclusion 
 that it is not the duty of children to love their father 
 and mother, but it is the duty of father and mother 
 
 to love their children, because I need not 
 
 describe this any further, as you will understand. 
 And these words were spoken by a man who had 
 children of his own. It was coarse indeed ; but many 
 of my colleagues agree to this theory.
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 THIS happiness lasted more than four years, 
 then sorrow came suddenly and roughly, as 
 if it were weary of waiting. It appeared in the form 
 I least expected, as if Circumstances had wished to 
 fall upon me by stratagem, and serve to bring about 
 my humiliation. 
 
 You know we spent every summer in the country 
 on my estate at Gurkomer, for the castle was finer 
 there than on Nadine's estate ; besides, I did not care 
 to give up the superintendence of affairs there. Every 
 year there came to us a large number of guests who 
 helped to make our country life pleasant and joyful. 
 But this year wc had no guests except our immediate 
 neighbours, for all our acquaintances seemed to have 
 arranged to spend the hot season in St. Petersburg 
 or abroad. We felt no ennui ; Nicholas was four 
 years old. When I was not riding in the fields, I 
 began to show him his alphabet, and make letters for 
 him on the sand. 
 
 My supervision of the estate occupied me a great 
 
 28
 
 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 29 
 
 deal, and this season's hunting was very good ; snipe, 
 which are such rare visitors in these parts, came over 
 the sea in swarms. 
 
 My wife found the absence of guests very good, 
 and said it gave her more opportunity of attending 
 to her poultry yard and fruit garden. Kolja helped 
 her ; that is to say, he ate the fruit and chased the 
 hens. In any case, we did not need any one ; lone- 
 liness was a new and unusual thing to us. 
 
 Once I was coming back through the fields, after 
 giving my horse in charge of a workman, and was in 
 a particulary good humour, because I saw there was 
 no fear of storms. I saw my wife coming to meet 
 me. 
 
 "A telegram from Stebnitzius ! " she called from 
 the distance, waving the paper in the air. 
 
 "From Stebnitzius!" I said, smiling at her bright 
 face. " Who is that .? " 
 
 " Don't you know him .'' He studied for some years 
 at Heidelberg." 
 
 "In this case, of course I don't know him, for I 
 was not with you in Heidelberg. Therefore I could 
 not meet your friends there." 
 
 "No, I'm surely not mistaken; my mother intro- 
 duced him to you before our marriage. I think it 
 was at the theatre." 
 
 I certainly could not remember the fact, but I 
 attached no importance to that at the time. I looked
 
 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 
 
 at the telegram, which ran thus : " Shall arrive day- 
 after to-morrow, early train. — Stebnitzius." 
 
 While I was absently trying to find out from 
 the postal direction how long the telegram had 
 taken to come, Nadine told me that Stebnitzius had 
 returned to St. Petersburg after an absence of many 
 years, and had heard of her marriage, and how, as an 
 old acquaintance (for they had known each other 
 since their earliest childhood), he was waiving all 
 ceremony, and was coming to pay us a visit. 
 
 " You will see," she said, " he is an absurdly comi- 
 cal man, as awkward and shy as a young girl." 
 
 "Well, I should think they would have cured him 
 of that in Heidelberg." 
 
 My wife reflected a moment, and then she said, 
 " No, that cannot be." 
 
 We went into the house ; Kolja came running to 
 meet us, and chattered about his dog, with whom he 
 was always playing, and to whom he was very 
 attached. After I had kissed him, I turned to my wife. 
 
 "We must have a room prepared for him. Which 
 do you think of? " 
 
 " The grey room near the billiard room," she 
 suggested. 
 
 We left Kolja with the nurse, and went up to the 
 second story. 
 
 The grey room turned out to be in perfect order ; 
 even the clock was wound up. While we went down
 
 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 
 
 the stairs, I asked, " Why did he study at Heidelberg? 
 Were the Russian universities not efood enough for 
 him ? " Nadine explained to me that our future 
 guest was very deh'cate, and required a warm climate. 
 I immediately pictured to myself a young man of 
 sallow complexion, with watery eyes and narrow 
 chest. Being strong and healthy myself, I could not 
 bear delicate people, and I felt a dislike to this 
 Stebnitzius, on this account. We should probably 
 have to send for the doctor, and our house would 
 smell like an apothecary's shop. When my wife told 
 me his name was Avenir, I was quite disgusted, but I 
 said nothing to Nadine, out of regard for her feelings. 
 This friend of her youth must certainly be an idiot, 
 but she felt attached to him because they had once 
 played ball together. Explain it as you will— call it 
 foreboding, or refuse to believe it, but I could not get 
 Stebnitzius cut of my mind. His coming appeared 
 to me to be so strange. Why did he come } Who 
 had bid him do so .? At tea I said to Nadine, " Had 
 you had any news of Stebnitzius lately ? " 
 
 She laughed. 
 
 "No; why.?" 
 
 " But why does he come .? " I asked, somewhat 
 annoyed. 
 
 " I do not know myself," said my wife simply. 
 
 I could contain myself no longer, and said, " You 
 call that timid } Either he is an idiot "
 
 32 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 
 
 "Yes, he is very funny — very funny indeed." 
 When I was obh"ged to drive to the station to meet 
 our guest, Nadine begged me to be friendly to him. 
 I laughed. " Of course I shall be friendly to him. 
 How could you imagine I could be otherwise?" 
 
 During the quarter of an hour I took going from 
 the estate to the station, I tried many times to solve 
 the question as to why Stebnitzius's projected visit 
 was so disagreeable to me. As I could find no solu- 
 tion to the problem, I concluded I had become 
 somewhat of a misanthrope, and that I dreaded the 
 sight of new faces, for this sometimes happens in the 
 country. Nor did it strike me as strange that only a 
 month's sojourn in the country should have brought 
 this about. I had scarcely reached the station, when 
 the train arrived. A traveller stepped out on to the 
 platform whom I at once recognised as Stebnitzius, 
 for I remembered then seeing him five years ago in 
 the Princess's box during the interval between the 
 second and third act of Riisselke — he was the fair 
 man with the silken moustache. Now he was a 
 handsome, strong fellow with a tawny beard. Health 
 and self-confidence seemed to breathe from him, nor 
 could I detect anything particularly comical about 
 him. I went up to him and introduced myself. He 
 returned my greeting very politely, without the slight- 
 est shyness or hesitation, such as is often felt by new- 
 comers. I was somewhat disturbed by his calmness.
 
 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 33 
 
 I called the porter, gave him hasty orders, informed 
 Stebnitzius my wife would be delighted to see him, 
 and asked if he had much luggage. He stood calmly 
 on the platform, looked about him in an unconcerned 
 manner, and replied to my somewhat excited remarks 
 in quiet, polite tones ; his calmness began to get on 
 my nerves — " Some drunken beer-bibber," I said to 
 myself. He had a great deal of luggage ; he evidently 
 anticipated a long stay with us. We drove off. On 
 the way I took a somewhat careless and easy tone : 
 this seemed, however, to make very little impression 
 upon him. " I suppose he takes me for a fool," I 
 thought to myself angrily, and I resolved to turn the 
 tables upon him, and prove to him that he was the 
 fool, not I. " He's a regular Hodge," I grumbled to 
 myself as I looked at his broad stature. 
 
 It annoyed me that he should offer no explanation 
 for forcing his way into a family with whom he had 
 so slight an acquaintance. He doubtless considered 
 me in the light of a trifling detail who happened to be 
 part of my wife's surroundings. Nadine's reception 
 of him was most cordial, which annoyed me consider- 
 ably, for I could not conceive why one should show 
 any sort of attention to every booby that came one's 
 way. She expressed much surprise at the change in 
 his outward appearance, for which he accounted by 
 relating in detail the benefit he had derived from the 
 air in Heidelberg — he even drifted into descriptions 
 
 D
 
 34 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 
 
 of scenery. When we sat down to lunch, he refused 
 " Hqueurs " and wine, explaining that he confined 
 himself to beer. I sent for ale, and, for the nonce, 
 my angry mood gave way to a mocking one. He 
 struck me as a student of the " Fliegenden Blattern " 
 type, whose University life was spent in beer taverns. 
 
 He talked the whole time, telling stories in a mono- 
 tonous voice peculiar to himself My wife laughed, 
 and I could not help taking a certain amount of inter- 
 est in what he said ; and though I should like to have 
 asked him what he intended doing, and what plans he 
 had made for the future, I refrained from so doing, 
 lest he should really think I had any personal interest 
 in him. You can explain the matter as you please, 
 but from the moment of his arrival I felt beside myself. 
 
 After lunch he went to his rooms, to " smarten 
 himself up a bit," as he expressed it — which was quite 
 unnecessary, as he had changed already on the journey. 
 
 When I was alone with my wife, I said, " I don't 
 like that fellow : he looks as if he drank." 
 
 " Yes," she answered ; " I scarcely recognised him 
 as the same man, but you must be indulgent : good 
 manners are not a strong point in Heidelberg." 
 
 " Does he intend to introduce the manners of 
 Heidelberg here ? Did you notice that he never 
 even looked at Kolja at all .^ " 
 
 " Unmarried men never care for children," Nadine 
 explained.
 
 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 35 
 
 I shrugged my shoulders, and said : " Do as you 
 please, but this is not a guest at all to my taste. Pray 
 let him enjoy to the full all the pleasures our rural life 
 can afford, but I beg you will keep him out of my 
 way. He is your guest, and I wash my hands of 
 him entirely," 
 
 Nadine did not look best pleased, but she made no 
 answer. I drove to the farmyard, spent four hours 
 there, and only returned at dinner-time. Stebnitzius 
 received me most graciously. I use the word 
 " received " intentionally, for from his whole be- 
 haviour, and from the condescending politeness he 
 affected toward me, one would certainly have imagined 
 that he and not I were master of the house. 
 
 I admit that I was boiling over with rage as we sat 
 at table. I wished with all my heart that he would 
 say something rude, but he was amiable to excess ; 
 he even asked after Kolja, as to how old he was, and 
 whether he had begun to do lessons. Kolja did not 
 like him, and looked at him with a gloomy counten- 
 ance. My wife kept up a friendly tone, while I sat 
 there like a fool. I cannot now think why Stebnitzius 
 should have produced so intensely irritating an effect 
 upon me. 
 
 After lunch I went to the counting-house, quarrelled 
 with the steward — who was, after all, in no way re- 
 sponsible for the fact that I had a guest staying in 
 the house whose appearance displeased me. I had
 
 36 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 
 
 no inclination to go home and listen to Stebnitzius's 
 voice. 
 
 After tea, however, I somewhat recovered my spirits, 
 for a quarrel broke out between Stebnitzius and my- 
 self. He was one of those men who extol the West, 
 because the hotels are grander, the restaurants are 
 more lively, and the peasants more inclined to take 
 part in politics. It was quite easy to address the 
 most cutting remarks in the politest manner possible, 
 and to drive him into such a corner that his stupidity 
 would be apparent even to himself. 
 
 My wife was silent : she was not pleased, but I 
 was thoroughly content. 
 
 Imagine three weeks spent in this same stupid man- 
 ner. Stebnitzius had regularly settled down with us, 
 and apparently had no immediate intention of forsak- 
 ing us. The whole state of things was so distasteful to 
 me that I spent whole days away, under the pretext 
 of business or hunting — merely that I might not have 
 to see him. 
 
 I was angry with my wife, for, great Heavens ! 
 what could she have to talk to him about ? But I did 
 not ask her : there was no longer complete openness 
 between us. 
 
 Kolja also took a dislike to Stebnitzius, and was 
 afraid of his loud voice. Our guest himself was 
 quite at his ease, and not the least hurt by my 
 conduct.
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 IT seems to me that I have given purposely much 
 space to detail, so that I might avoid dwelling 
 too long on the principal matter. Even now my 
 anger is so terrible when I think of it, that I feel as 
 though I were living through it a second time. But 
 the time has come when I must tell you all. 
 
 It was at the beginning of August, in the middle 
 of the hot season. Once after dinner, when I had 
 been really rude to Stebnitzius, and my wife more 
 amiable than usual, I felt an irresistible desire to go 
 away — not to the fields, where the working people 
 would prevent me from thinking, but somewhere 
 where I should be quite undisturbed. I was suffering 
 unspeakably, without being able to assign any cause 
 for it. You must not imagine that I was jealous — 
 there was not the slightest trace of such a feeling in 
 my heart. If any one had told me that my wife loved 
 Stebnitzius, I should have shrugged my shoulders 
 and looked upon the matter as quite impossible. I 
 had too high an opinion of Nadine. I took my gun, 
 and went out to the stretch of marshy land over- 
 
 37
 
 \ 
 
 38 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 
 
 grown with bush which lies behind our park. You 
 know how often you wandered unsuccessfully over 
 this ground with your gun. The evening before, snipe 
 had been seen in that direction. 
 
 I wished to be alone and think over matters : it 
 troubled me to think of any breach between my wife 
 and myself. To think that such folly — to think that 
 a want of friendly feeling on my part for the friend of 
 her youth should bring any bitterness of heart against 
 me! I made a firm resolution to control myself, and 
 to be more amiable to him. 
 
 The pointer Tifon came running up to me, looking 
 at me in so friendly a manner, and wagging his tail 
 so joyfully, that I was seized with a desire to hunt. 
 I sprang over the moat which runs round the park, 
 and went with the dog towards the marsh. It was 
 seven o'clock ; the heat began to abate. I became 
 more easy in my mind, and I said to myself, " What 
 a good thing Stebnitzius does not hunt, or I should 
 have him on my hands here." There were really 
 snipe to be found there. After I had shot down one 
 or two, I noticed it was getting dark, and it was time 
 to go home. 
 
 I marched on with Tifon again towards the park — 
 I stumbling over the mounds of earth, Tifon scram- 
 bling joyfully through them, heaping them up again. 
 Suddenly he stopped before a great bush, and raised 
 himself up. "Another shot," I thought, and put up
 
 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 39 
 
 my gun. Tifon sprang forward, and a hare rushed 
 out I was so astonished that a few seconds elapsed 
 before I took aim. I cannot, even to-day, think 
 without a shudder of that hare's piercing cry. The 
 poor animal stopped short, beat about with its paws, 
 and began to cry out with a voice like a child's. 
 Fortunately Tifon finished it off, or else I think it 
 would have escaped, for it did not occur to me to send 
 a second shot through its head. 
 
 I turned my steps homeward in a very bad temper: 
 a weight lay on my mind as if I had committed 
 murder. Why had I shot the hare ? Did I need it t 
 in any case, it was more necessary to a hungry wolf 
 than to me. My nerves were so overwrought that 
 I assure you that I resolved never to hunt any more. 
 
 I rushed through the park, sprang over the moat, 
 and took a short cut through the orchard. 
 
 Tifon wasfcred his tail and ran home. I often think 
 what a misfortune would have happened if I had had 
 him with me — he would have barked — and then ? I 
 must tell everything in order as far as it is possible 
 to do. 
 
 The night came on apace. I walked slowly over 
 the soft ground of the alley, upon which the moon, 
 shining through the rows of trees cast broad shadows. 
 My nerves refused to be quieted, and the soft night 
 seemed to excite them still more, just as a fractious 
 child cries more violently when caressed by its
 
 40 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 
 
 mother. I could not get the sound of that hare's cry 
 out of my head. Suddenly I stood still — at the bend 
 of the broad walk, ten steps before me, my wife and 
 Stebnitzius were walking towards the house, folded in 
 each other's embrace, speaking in that trembling, sup- 
 pressed voice which whispers, " I love you." I can- 
 not think how I had time to formulate my thoughts 
 so clearly. 
 
 My first impulse was to raise my gun, but then the 
 thought of my son came upon me with unspeakable 
 pain, and the image of his pert, laughing little face 
 came before me. How could I kill his mother } Yes, 
 one can kill such a mother and her paramour — there 
 the thought broke off as if some awful, fearful 
 obstacle stood in the way ; the words, " Thou shalt do 
 no murder," flashed suddenly through my mind, then 
 following straight upon them came the remembrance 
 of that trite saying, " Qiii va a cJiasse perd sa place^^ 
 and I remembered a picture in a Paris newspaper 
 representing the bloody revenge of an injured husband, 
 and then there came upon me a wild, enervating fury. 
 I wanted to raise the gun, or throw it away, but I 
 could not do it ; there came upon me a horror of all 
 things and all men — a feeling as if everything were 
 breaking up about me. Then came shame and grief ; 
 if they had seen me, I should have run away. 
 
 At last I pulled myself together, and murmured, 
 " They are talking there together."
 
 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 41 
 
 I sat down on a seat, and began to follow them 
 with my eyes, without any thought in my mind, 
 except that they would soon turn into the long alley, 
 and I should no longer be able to see them. Again 
 I saw the embrace, and then they turned into the 
 wide path. Then I stood up and hurried home. 
 For the first time I realized how truly wretched I 
 was, and that I must put an end to this misery. 
 What that end would be I did not know ; I think 
 my mind was wandering for a time. 
 
 "Why should all happen in this way," I thought, 
 " in so common and coarse a manner 1 " 
 
 And I began to think to whom was I addressing 
 this question, and I thought of you and of the last 
 time we were together, and in an incongruous way I 
 remembered how anxious you were because you 
 thought you had lost your precious eye-glass. 
 
 I was miserable indeed, and my heart was bereft, 
 but I felt incapable of action. And yet I felt sure 
 my energy would return when it was needed. 
 
 " But I will do no murder," I whispered, fearing 
 all the time I was capable of it. 
 
 The left barrel of my gun was still loaded, and I 
 wished to take the cartridge out, but my trembling 
 fingers were powerless to do so. I fired into the air, 
 and the sound resounded on all sides. " What if I 
 had aimed at them ? " I thought. 
 
 I rushed on over the little bridge, trying not to look
 
 42 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 
 
 at the water : there were only fifteen steps to the 
 house. " I will go on and begin," I said to myself, 
 and I repeated the words over and over to myself. I 
 did not know what I meant to do. 
 
 I was afraid of my future words and deeds : I felt 
 they were such that I should remember them to the 
 very end of my days. 
 
 I felt a stifling feeling about my heart : I could 
 scarcely breathe. On, on to the bitter end ! 
 
 I found Stebnitzius a {e\v steps from the house on 
 the open space into which all the alleys led, and 
 where the carriage drove up. I was filled with a 
 fiendish joy ! He came up to me and said mockingly, 
 " And what sort of game have you shot ? Some 
 species of night bird, I suppose .-' " 
 
 I interrupted him by seizing him by the hand. I 
 felt inclined to strike him, to wound him : I was 
 simply shaken with fury. 
 
 " Out with you ! " I cried. 
 
 He looked quite surprised, and tried to draw his 
 hand away, but he was not able. Never before had 
 I so much rejoiced in my strength. With a sharp 
 movement I crushed his fingers together. He cried 
 out in a cowardly, whining voice. I was reminded 
 of the hare's moaning. 
 
 "What is the meaning of this?" he asked, in a 
 frightened voice. " Are you out of your mind .-'" 
 
 " Out with you ! " I cried, crushing his hand more
 
 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 43 
 
 heavily ; " out with you, and don't be caught here 
 again ! I know all." 
 
 I hissed out these words into his ears, which was 
 more effective than any striking could have been. 
 
 Then I took him by the collar like a dog, and 
 literally threw him outside the gates. My strength 
 seemed increased threefold. Had he offered any re- 
 sistance, I would have struck him with the butt end 
 of my gun. 
 
 But Stebnitzius disappeared into the darkness 
 without one word. He probably thought this the 
 safest course ; he would have feared a duel. 
 
 When I was alone, a sigh of contentment escaped 
 me. But suddenly I felt the increased pain in my 
 heart. I must now go to my wife. There was no 
 escaping ; so I went into the house, while the wish 
 within me grew stronger and stronger — the wish to 
 go away as far as possible out of it all, that I might 
 hide my shame. 
 
 " Where is my wife ? " I asked the lackey when he 
 relieved me of my gun and hunting pouch. 
 
 " With the young master." 
 
 The fact that she was with her son aggravated my 
 anger. I imagined that she suspected the danger, 
 and had tried to seek protection in Kolja's presence. 
 
 " We shall see," I said to myself, with a scornful 
 smile, and went to the nursery. 
 
 The room was only lighted by one flickering light.
 
 44 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 
 
 In the half darkness I saw my wife beside the child's 
 bed. 
 
 When she saw me, she whispered, " Hush ! he has 
 just gone to sleep : the heat has exhausted him." 
 
 " Yes, yes," I murmured involuntarily ; the atmo- 
 sphere influenced me. " Come with me, come away 
 quickly." 
 
 I took her by the hand, and led her to my study. 
 She offered no resistance, and suspected nothing. 
 
 When we reached my room, I bade her sit down, 
 and I struck a light. 
 
 My hands did not even tremble. 
 
 It was oppressively hot and sultry. 
 
 " What has happened .-* " she asked, when she saw 
 how pale I was. 
 
 I did not answer at once. I did not know how to 
 begin, or how I ought to begin. I looked at her, 
 and noticed her sharp glances. I remembered I had 
 always thought her eyes so truthful, and the remem- 
 brance was very painful. 
 
 " You ask me what has happened," I said in a cold 
 voice, which sounded quite strange to myself. " Well, 
 I have turned Stebnitzius out of the house." 
 
 My wife turned white. 
 
 " What do you mean ? " she said, almost inaudibly, 
 and without moving. 
 
 " I struck him, and hunted him away almost like a 
 dog ; you know why."
 
 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 45 
 
 She was silent. Her face was still pale, and her 
 eyelids quivered. 
 
 "You have betrayed me and deceived me, you dis- 
 honourable woman !" I cried, with increasing passion. 
 I saw you both in the park. I saw you in each 
 other's embrace. My gun was loaded, and — I did 
 not kill you." 
 
 "Ah, had you only done so!" she moaned, "had 
 you only done so ! " 
 
 I let go of her hand ; it gave me no pleasure to 
 inflict physical pain upon her. 
 
 " Listen to me," I said, looking at her with hatred. 
 " I do not know what I shall do with you, whether I 
 shall turn you out of the house or not. I cannot 
 
 make up my mind. If it were not for Kolja . 
 
 The sight of you is odious, insupportable to me. I 
 thought you were the best woman on God's earth ; 
 now I know you to be the worst. I do not even 
 wish to know if you have betrayed me to the fullest 
 extent, or whether you only wished to do so. The 
 thought and the deed are equally dishonourable and 
 disgusting. Go, you liar, your presence is hateful to 
 me ! " 
 
 She rose and passed me with bowed head, and left 
 the room. 
 
 I own at that moment I hoped she would either 
 drown or poison herself. 
 
 Ghastly thoughts passed through my mind.
 
 46 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 
 
 Five years have passed since then. 
 
 You stayed with us, and you noticed nothing. I 
 forgave my wife, not from want of character, but 
 because I considered it necessary and honourable 
 not to rob Kolja of his mother. 
 
 For the child had no share in her guilt. Why 
 should he share my grief 1 My heart is broken ; 
 but we only know it, my wife and I. My son knows 
 nothing : he will walk in the right path of life in 
 happy confidence. Should I have done better to kill 
 my wife and to add a fresh sin to the one of which 
 she was guilty ? You understand why I did not kill 
 her ; you understand that it would have given me no 
 relief to have done so. On the contrary, that moment 
 would have become an eternity of remorse had I 
 committed this deed, whereas it has remained but a 
 moment covered over with the consoling hand of 
 time. My wife has repented of her sin, has suffered 
 much. 
 
 The Greeks say that not even the gods can alter 
 the past. My past was irrevocable, but I should not 
 have changed it by a deed of murder. The offended 
 husband was able to forgive, because he was also a 
 loving father. And have I the right to kill her be- 
 cause she wounded and betrayed me "^ Did she 
 thereby forfeit her right to live .-' Was I her Creator 1 
 Can only that thing live which has not sinned against 
 myself.
 
 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 47 
 
 I did not kill her ; I forgave her. Had I killed 
 her, I should have committed a contemptible crime ; 
 I should have destroyed my child's life, and should 
 have inflicted an indelible stain on my character, and 
 have made a martyr of my wife. Now, as it is, I am 
 at peace.
 
 Whose was the Blame ? 
 
 BY 
 
 MRS. JAMES GREGOR 
 
 49 E
 
 Whose was the Blame ? 
 
 CHAPTER I 
 
 TWO ladies were seated in the arbour of a beau- 
 tiful large garden, laid out in the old-fashioned 
 style. 
 
 They had just come to the end of a book they 
 were reading aloud. It now lay before them on the 
 table — a mere unpretentious little pamphlet in a yel- 
 low cover. Nevertheless, it had not missed its aim, 
 for the naturally calm, strong face of the younger 
 woman, with its lofty brow and clear blue eyes, bore 
 the traces of a powerful emotion, which seemed to 
 have called up afresh an old pain that had long since 
 been conquered and buried. She looked like one 
 who, having long since ceased to struggle, is on the 
 point of throwing off the self-imposed fetters which, 
 as the years have passed on, have bound themselves 
 more and more closely around a soul by nature so 
 free, so bright, and so full of hope, striving to crush 
 out all the vitality within. 
 
 51
 
 52 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 
 
 She rose up and looked into the gentle, kindly face 
 of the older woman, whose eyes were full of an in- 
 quiring interest, and she said, in a low and trembling 
 voice, — 
 
 " I cannot speak of it, sister, but I will write of it 
 for you and all those who may care to read, for all 
 who are inclined, as you are, to accept the magnani- 
 mous dicta of the Prince. I will give you the answer 
 — the answer of a woman — to the words of the 
 Prince : ' Thou shalt do no murder.' 
 
 And now that we are reconciled, and that we have 
 lived together three years, you may find in this 
 answer a solution of much that was hard to under- 
 stand in my past — that past during which you too, 
 sister, looked upon me with scorn, and condemned 
 me as others did. Methinks he has given but a poor 
 solution if he alludes to the physical death. He has 
 only looked into the heart of man through the green 
 spectacles of hope."
 
 CHAPTER II 
 
 YOU left home early, and therefore you know 
 little of the years of my girlhood. I saw 
 you last when I was nineteen years old. 
 
 I was a child, full of hope, courage, and love of life, 
 putting forth claims to which I felt myself entitled — 
 claims for an existence of inward happiness and 
 satisfaction, of striving and reward — and all around 
 this was shed the halo of endless love in the com- 
 panionship of a husband, better, greater, nobler, than 
 myself — and for that very reason dearer to my heart. 
 I never laid any importance on mere outward cir- 
 cumstances. You know what my choice was, and 
 you also know that I would cheerfully have shared a 
 garret with the man I loved. 
 
 Yes, with the man one loved ; but we will come to 
 this later. 
 
 I knew that my parents were very wealthy. I 
 had been brought up carefully and lovingly ; I had 
 learned willingly, and acquired a fair amount of 
 knowledge ; moreover, I looked out with clear- 
 
 53
 
 54 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 
 
 seeing eyes on all around me. But, alas ! I imbibed 
 the evil as well as the good. 
 
 For I was still very young when I began to 
 recognise much that was very unlovely, and I per- 
 ceived that the impression that life is beautiful, so 
 gladly accepted by the youthful mind, was not one 
 that could be permanent. 
 
 I often felt that I could see right into the heart of 
 people, and while they met me with friendly words, 
 I could see the bad, false, deceitful spirit that was 
 lurking behind. 
 
 You know I was often blamed when young for 
 being so sparing of words, so morose, and so shy of 
 people, and how often I had to bear the comments 
 of the following nature : " Don't look so gloomy, and 
 don't talk such stupid, earnest stuff, or you will never 
 gain any firm footing in your social circle." 
 
 I often felt terribly oppressed by the conventional 
 folly, the lying and false words which were spoken, 
 and bound to be spoken — so much so, that I was on 
 the point of becoming pessimistic and hypochondria- 
 cal — that was because I was so absolutely lonely. 
 
 I do not know if you have ever had this feeling of 
 loneliness : it is like a boundless, barren desert. To 
 know that there is not one person in the whole 
 world, among the countless numbers it contains, who 
 understands you, who makes your interest his, whose 
 heart beats in warm and tender sympathy with yours.
 
 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 55 
 
 But this is love. I recognised that it was the love 
 I sought. I sought it even as a child, though I did 
 not then recognise the object of my search. The 
 meaning only dawned upon me later, when I first 
 felt this terrible loneliness. 
 
 It was the spring of the year — the trees, the plants 
 the bushes, were so young, so beautiful, so full of 
 life and scent. 
 
 It was Sunday afternoon, and the Promenade was 
 crowded with noisy, merry people, I was walking 
 alone, as I had wished to do, because I felt the need 
 of thinking over many things oppressing my heart, 
 and of much that was new to me — at least, in the 
 form in which it now presented itself. I felt that 
 there was no joy in it, for I knew, as soon as I had 
 thought the matter out, I should have to bear yet 
 another lost ideal to the grave, and lay it to rest in 
 the quiet burial-ground of my heart. Of late they 
 had died in rapid succession, the bright, kindly 
 children of my heart. This mortality began when I 
 was yet but a child ; but up to now, for each death 
 there had been a new birth. 
 
 As I was walking along, I saw in my mind those 
 little graves, and bethought me of the many tears 
 that had been shed over them. I suddenly felt as if 
 everything about me was sinking away from me, the 
 beautiful spring, the merry people — nothing before, 
 nothing behind, a feeling of endless nothingness.
 
 56 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 
 
 " Anker warf, wo kein Hauch nehr weht, 
 Und der Marksteim der Schopfung steht."* 
 
 And yet they were still there, the trees, the people 
 the carriages with their ceaseless roll — yes, alas! they 
 were there 
 
 But what did it all concern me ? I was alone, 
 quite alone. There was no fellow-creature who 
 would have understood me in a few words, who 
 would have taken me in his arms, and have said, in 
 quieting and consoling tones, " Be still : I think, I 
 feel, I suffer as you do. I know it all — we are one in 
 heart ; come to me. You will here find consolation 
 and counsel when you are lonely." 
 
 Lonely, alas ! I had never felt so lonely. I should 
 never have had the feeling if I had known of one 
 such person in the world ; and though we had been 
 separated by seas and mountains, it would have 
 mattered little — our souls would have been as one. 
 
 But I knew of none. And yet, at this very hour, 
 whilst I was burying an old ideal, I was giving birth 
 to the greatest and most beautiful of all. So great, 
 so glorious an ideal, that it seemed to comprise in 
 itself all the others, which I had cherished and 
 fostered, over which I had mourned, and which were 
 nothing compared with this. They might all now 
 perish without causing me lasting grief, if only this 
 
 * Schiller.
 
 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 57 
 
 one remained untouched and unchanged in its spot- 
 less beauty and grandeur. 
 
 I now realized what love is : the cessation of lone- 
 liness and of selfishness. 
 
 When I went home, I felt a new being ; I now 
 knew what I ought to do and to seek in this world. 
 
 But I changed outwardly at this period also. All 
 my feelings were clear and beautiful ; never had I 
 been so happy or so free. 
 
 Yes, life was beautiful — I knew it and felt it. 
 How could it be otherwise, since Nature had given 
 me a sensitive soul, and with it the possibility of 
 reaching the high ideal within } I no longer saw in 
 those about me so much that was ugly, superficial, 
 and wrong. Everything seemed reversed, and more 
 than once I said to myself, " There is some hidden 
 meaning behind it all." 
 
 And I longed to find the meaning, and sought it 
 as one might grains of gold. My acquaintances 
 began to find me amusing, talkative, witty. They said 
 I was in love, that was what they called it, and I said 
 the same, although I knew well enough it was not 
 the case. 
 
 What was it? I was auite clear about the matter, 
 though not always; for instance, at first, as long as I 
 was still seeking. But I had not to seek long ; I soon 
 discovered that I had made a mistake. 
 
 In society (where each man throws his best cloak
 
 58 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 
 
 around him, not only the physical but the moral cloak) 
 I received attentions from different men. They knew 
 how to be sympathetic ; and, as from a personal 
 point of view I was a desirable match (for the 
 exterior is always more important than the interior 
 to the majority of people), many a one patched up 
 his cloak, had it cut and trimmed with poetry. I was 
 taken in by this sort of thing, and this was called 
 being in love. But soon I began to spy a hole in 
 the society cloak, a damaged place or seam where it 
 had sprung open, and I looked through at the naked, 
 empty soul which was often so smooth, so polished, 
 and inane (though always very brilliant from its 
 outer wrap), so that I had no curiosity to fathom any 
 deeper. 
 
 The preliminary glance had sufficed, for just as 
 the illusions I had cherished died gradually away 
 before the realities of life, so in exact proportion did 
 the ideal within me gain fresh life and strength every 
 day. 
 
 This great ideal of love filled my whole soul, and 
 was the motor of all. It was kept white and pure, 
 unsoiled and fair, its polished surface unsullied by a 
 breath. If this had happened, it would have been 
 my ruin, for I could not have borne it. This ideal 
 was the strength and object of my life, and the 
 physical side of me would have received no other 
 sustenance.
 
 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 59 
 
 Later — ah, later, it was so ! Fate had ordained it 
 thus. 
 
 I did not know that one could be a corpse and 
 yet live ; it was only as a married woman that I 
 made this experience.
 
 CHAPTER III 
 
 ONE day I made the acquaintance of a man 
 who seemed to me to be quite different from 
 any one who had yet crossed my path. 
 
 His ideas were bold, grand, and far-reaching. He 
 had already made some mark in the world, in spite 
 of his youth, without, however, boasting about it. 
 
 At least, it seemed to me that where he did not 
 hide the consciousness of his merit, he merely showed 
 a justifiable pride. He was loved, esteemed, held in 
 high consideration all round ; he was, moreover, an 
 amusing companion, and a thorough man of the 
 world. Whenever he was of the party, there was 
 laughter, merriment, and witty conversation. 
 
 He attracted me as he did all women ; at least, in 
 those days it appeared to me that all were in love 
 with him. 
 
 I first met him at a ball (unfortunately, later on, 
 it was only at these festivities that I had any 
 opportunity of meeting him) ; but when I thought 
 
 over the ball at night alone in my room, it appeared 
 
 60
 
 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 6i 
 
 to me an event which was destined to have a great 
 influence over my life. 
 
 I never went to dances merely to amuse myself — 
 dancing in itself gave me but slight pleasure : I went 
 to see and to observe. It was only later, when I was 
 a married woman, that I danced for the mere pleasure 
 of it, and I attended balls with that object, also to 
 forget and to seek distraction. 
 
 At this time, however, I had no wish to forget. 
 
 During the weeks which followed that eventful 
 ball, I could not banish this man from my thoughts. 
 I was constantly repeating over to myself the conver- 
 sations we had together. Considering the occasion, 
 we had talked a good deal, and the subject matter 
 had been fairly serious. He appeared also to be 
 seeking, and from the many conversations I had 
 with him later on, I gathered that he was un- 
 happy. 
 
 How did I come to that conclusion .-' Ah ! how, 
 indeed .'' The more I saw of him, the more intimately 
 I conversed with him, the more I felt the impulse to 
 help him. But, although, in spite of careful exami- 
 nations, I could detect no flaw in the costly, genial 
 society mantle he wore, nevertheless, I was a little 
 troubled, and I felt a shrinking against which I 
 struggled in vain, 
 
 I had a secret, silent struggle with myself in those 
 days. I tried to avoid my new friend. I purposely
 
 62 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 
 
 avoided one or two social festivities where I could be 
 sure of meeting him. 
 
 It was as if my guardian angel had whispered to 
 me, " Take care — he is too strong for thee." 
 
 And that was really the case. The gentle warning 
 voice was drowned by the burst of joy in my heart — 
 so joyless and loveless up to the present time. 
 
 " It is all real," my heart whispered joyously, "all 
 this understanding of me, this fine feeling, this no- 
 bility of disposition, and, above all, my love for him 
 is real — the love of soul for soul, the kindly reception 
 of a lonely soul by another, that both may lead, in 
 communion with each other, a beautiful, pure, and 
 holy life." When I was more than usually pene- 
 trated by the conviction of some special failing of 
 my own, I felt that his love was much too grand a 
 gift from nature, and the thought came upon me 
 with terror, that perhaps I might be a stumbling- 
 block to his genius. 
 
 But then I thought : " No ; he will raise me to his 
 level. My soul will grow when brought under the 
 influence of his, and the tired wings will be strength- 
 ened afresh, and bear me aloft into better, higher 
 spheres." Alas ! these were idle dreams. 
 
 " He loves you, child. Do you realize this .'' 
 
 " What his love is .'' " Ah, me ! the mockery of it 
 all. 
 
 I must really laugh outright while I write this ;
 
 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 63 
 
 but the laughter sounds as though something had 
 broken within me, or as though the broken shreds 
 were rattling in the icy wind. 
 
 Yes, indeed, something is broken ; once I thought 
 all were broken. But a prince was to come — a prince 
 good and kind, who should awaken what was slum- 
 bering within me, to all appearance dead
 
 CHAPTER IV 
 
 r 
 
 1DID not at that time know the nature of his love 
 for me. Although I had observed much, I did 
 not then suspect the extent of the boundless hypo- 
 crisy which men allow themselves with impunity to 
 exercise on women. I did not then know that men 
 in a sense killed their wives before marriage — before 
 even knowing them. Tolstoi has found the true ex- 
 pression of this in his " Kreutzer Sonata." I knew 
 little of this ; I had a presentiment of it, but not that 
 it was so general. I imagined it to exist in indivi- 
 dual cases, and was to be excused, if not sanctified, 
 by nature, love, and passion — the grievous shock to 
 one's nature on discovering that the true marriage 
 was an impossibility. I would have excused a false 
 step under such circumstances. I would even have 
 forgiven it in the man I idolized, the god of my pure 
 ideal. 
 
 But my case was not such a one. The whole thing 
 was sordid, low, and animal. He was like the hero 
 of the " Kreutzer Sonata " — not much worse, but cer-
 
 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 65 
 
 tainly no better tlian one taken from the common 
 herd. 
 
 I had never known the " common herd," but I felt 
 that his genius ought to have raised him. It will 
 perhaps be said that my error lay in seeking so 
 god-like a man. 
 
 But was I really seeking such a one .' I have 
 spent the latter part of my life in thinking that 
 question out. 
 
 There was a time — the most terrible time of my 
 life — nay, not of my life, for I was not living then, I 
 was merely vegetating — when I believed that I was 
 seeking a god, but there was no god. There existed 
 only common, low, selfish human creatures, and I be- 
 lieved that I shared those attributes with them, and, 
 what was worse than all, I saw that the man whom 
 I believed to be fashioned of finer clay was also as 
 they were. And I said to myself, " I have no right 
 to complain ; I am as mad as Don Quixote, who 
 took a peasant for a knight and windmills for giants." 
 All human beings are egoists, every one. It is not 
 only impossible to find one who will sacrifice his soul \ 
 for the well-being of another, but there is not one I 
 who will give up his physical comfort and his 
 material well-being for his fellow-man, . --> 
 
 First comes self, and others do not come into con- 
 sideration at all if they are so foolish as not to look 
 after themselves. " They are all lonely, as lonely as 
 
 F
 
 66 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 
 
 I am," I said to myself, " but they do not analyze the 
 amount of suffering they have to bear — they are 
 happy. Why am I not happy ? " 
 
 Nobody seemed to think it would be different ; 
 nobody seemed to think that I must be eventually 
 happy after marriage. Yes, after marriage ! after I 
 had made a compact with that man — not an indis- 
 soluble alliance of soul, but a mere physical union. 
 
 Oh, God ! oh, great bountiful Nature, how is such 
 a thing possible ? 
 
 How is it that the fairest, and purest, and holiest 
 laws can be dragged in the mire ? 
 
 The deadliest sins are those against Nature, and a 
 marriage without love — without unselfish love, with- 
 out the spiritual union of one human being with 
 another— this is a sin against Nature. What could 
 be more horrible than to allow such a relationship 
 to hold good when one has recognised it to be 
 unnatural .-• 
 
 One's whole life becomes nothing but one long 
 falsehood. The woman who goes on living such a 
 life with full consciousness of the fact, must feel a 
 criminal, but, unlike him, she undergoes no degrada- 
 tion in the eyes of the world. On the contrary, 
 people call her a good woman, an excellent wife. 
 Even those who know the true circumstances of the 
 case will say she is truly faithful and good, for al- 
 though she does not love her husband, she continues
 
 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 67 
 
 to look after him, to make his home comfortable, and 
 to receive him with a joyful, happy face. Well, per- 
 haps it may be a martyrdom, but, I fear, a martyrdom 
 without a crown. A useless — nay, even a criminal 
 martyrdom. How many thousands of people there 
 are who, living in full knowledge of life, cling in a 
 cowardly, slavish spirit to these barbarous customs ! 
 For, who made these customs .'' Not divine, reason- 
 able Nature ; there is no such thing in her wise 
 provision. 
 
 It is human beings who made these laws, weak, 
 narrow-minded creatures, who are afraid of them- 
 selves and of the animal nature which they cannot 
 control. To that end Wisdom and Experience pro- 
 ceed to fence the animal in. But, ah, me ! the 
 mockery of it. The animal springs over the hedge 
 when he is inclined. That does not affect morals in 
 society, as long as it happens secretly, not openly, 
 before the eyes of the world. No, it must be sur- 
 rounded with lies and deceit ; the fence, though use- 
 less, must be left intact. The human being who 
 struggles against the animal nature, and fights it 
 down, but whose soul cannot be kept back by any 
 limit of man's making, who says, " I cannot keep the 
 law. Oh that the human will that made it would 
 restore my liberty — would restore our liberty, for we 
 both suffer to become free individual human beings." 
 How does it fare with such a one?
 
 68 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 
 
 There is a separation, certainly — but it is difficult, if 
 not impossible, allowed by law — with the mutual con- 
 sent of the married couple, but stigmatized by the 
 world. The woman is put outside the pale and pointed 
 at, there is a stain on her honour; it is almost accounted 
 as a crime that she is separated from her husband. 
 She can no longer associate with her fellow-creatures 
 as before : there is perpetual whispering and gossip 
 about her. It is very rare that another good, honest 
 fellow, who took pleasure in her society before, comes 
 near her when he hears the words, ** separated from 
 her husband." Tolstoi looks upon the dissolution of 
 marriage, even when it is sanctioned by law in the 
 form of divorce, as absolutely criminal ; he maintains 
 that only once in life should a person enter into so 
 close a relationship with another — never again, even 
 though the first contract be not marriage in the e\-es 
 of the world. But I should like to know whether 
 this stern judge of human feelings has ever tried to 
 understand a woman's attitude in these matters. 
 Does he really think that a woman's whole life must 
 be fettered because, while young, innocent, and in- 
 experienced, she entered upon marriage ^ Must she 
 always discover her error when it is too late to 
 
 '■ remedy it .'' It is worse than hell ! At least, so long 
 as men have not reformed according to Tolstoi's 
 models. But, alas ! the oppressed sex must wait 
 
 , some time yet for the change. Ah, these men ! — is it
 
 WHOSE IV AS THE BLAME 69 
 
 not absurd that they should write books on the sub- 
 ject, showing how very good and noble and merciful 
 they are when it occurs to them to say, " Thou shalt 
 do no murder." Ask yourselves if this is true. " If 
 only you had done it," says the poor unhappy wife of 
 Galitzen's hero. Does not a man really feel this ? 
 Does he not know the meaning of that heartbreaking 
 cry, " If only you had done it." - — 
 
 No, we women must explain it to you first ; then 
 perhaps you may understand it — perhaps not. You 
 may possibly shake your heads, and say with a deli- 
 cate, superior smile, "over-excitement of a fanciful 
 woman." 
 
 But I know only too well that it is not so. I have 
 felt it in my inmost soul. What the wife meant was 
 this : " Oh, that you had taken all that remained of 
 my real self as it was when I first saw you, loved 
 you, and married you — to my destruction. You 
 have long since taken all that was good and beautiful 
 in me : why should you disdain what remains ? Now 
 I know your former life, I know what it was worth, 
 and what you were pleased to call your love for me. 
 I gave to you a love which was pure, beautiful and 
 undivided, an all-embracing, all-sanctifying love, 
 which you degraded and polluted and trampled in 
 the dust. There were hours when you dragged me 
 down to the level of your animal nature, and when I 
 loathed you. Every time it seemed to me more
 
 70 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 
 
 dreary and comfortless, until the life had completely 
 gone from me. Can it be that I still live, or that 
 there can be anything in me worth killing ? If there 
 be anything, I cannot see why you should be deprived 
 of this pleasure. It cannot be your conscience which 
 holds you back, since it did not prevent you from 
 slaying what was best within me." 
 
 That was the meaning of her words — that the 
 meaning of her sad eyes when she rose and went to 
 the door with bowed head.
 
 CHAPTER V 
 
 WHEN I recognised that the influence of the 
 man was too strong for me to resist, and 
 that therefore I was helplessly in his power, from 
 the passionate love I bore him, I did not know that 
 it was his cleverness and his experience that had 
 gained the power over my mind ; I did not know 
 that it was an act of violence, of imprisonment, to 
 which I was consenting, because I was blinded by 
 my folly. 
 
 Yes, he was clever, and his mantle was magnifi- 
 cent ; there was not the smallest hole or the tiniest 
 rent to be discovered in any part of it, and it was 
 draped so skilfully. From time to time artificially 
 damaged places were displayed — faults that were 
 quite apparent ; but even the damaged spot seemed 
 to have a costly foundation underneath. 
 
 " He is quite open about his faults," I said to my- 
 self; " and though I admit them to be faults, they are 
 quite to be excused," and I got even to love them so 
 that I could scarcely have done without them. 
 
 Then came the day when he asked me to be his 
 
 71
 
 72 WHOSE WAS THE BEAME 
 
 wife, and I consented. It was the moment for which 
 I had longed day and night ; but now that it had 
 come, I felt as if no impression had been made upon 
 me. I went joyfully to the fight, in spite of the 
 warning voice of that unconscious, unawakened 
 element within me. I had a struggle with my people, 
 who were, strongly opposed to my marriage with a 
 poor man who was my social inferior. 
 
 But at that time I fought for my ideal. 
 
 We did not see much of each other just then. This 
 was a misfortune, for had we had more opportunity 
 of meeting each other before marriage, perchance 
 the moment would have come, ere it was too late, 
 when the magnificent drapery might have become 
 displaced, and one glance might have sufificed. 
 
 It was only when the family opposition ceased, and 
 my father, who saw the matter with clearer eyes than 
 I, had died, that we had ample opportunity for 
 
 meetmg. 
 
 Then came a time when the faintest suspicion 
 began to dawn upon me as to what it might look 
 like under the mantle. 
 
 I know that one night, a deadly anxiety came over 
 me, lest it should all be over — all a mere dream of 
 the past. When he came to visit me on the following 
 day, I showed my confidence by trying to explain 
 to him the state of my feelings. He did not under- 
 stand me, and was offended, affecting a certain
 
 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 73 
 
 coldness in his manner. With much anxiety I sought 
 to appease him, and he once more assumed the 
 manner of a tender lover. Yes, he was tender, but 
 utterly lacking in understanding, and I felt that our 
 souls were quite apart. 
 
 I was as lonely as before — yes, even more so, for 
 I had lost my own individuality. I felt during that 
 time as if I were somebody else, and as if I knew 
 nothing of my former self, of the hopes I had 
 cherished, or of the yearnings I had gone through. 
 
 I tried to persuade myself that I was immeasur- 
 ably happy. 
 
 I silenced the still, small voice within me, because 
 I said it belied the truth. I even called it my fiend, 
 partly because it was so painful to hear, and because 
 it spoke the truth. 
 
 One is apt to call truth a fiend, because it so often 
 tears the bandage ruthlessly from one's eyes — the 
 bandage which is so pleasant, because it prevents us 
 seeing what is unlovely. 
 
 One thing I could not deny, and it certainly caused 
 me alarm, and that was, that I wearied in his society — 
 I, who never felt the sensation of ciinui when alone. 
 
 Dimetri says, on one occasion, in contrast to Tol- 
 stoi, " We did not weary of each other." 
 
 "We." No, he did not weary; but what about 
 Nadine, the poor princess ? I am firmly persuaded 
 that at the time xwy fiance did not notice it, because
 
 74 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 
 
 he was under the spell of love, and with such love as 
 his, weariness and irritation do not come into con- 
 sideration, because it is not conceived possible that 
 they can have anything to do with it. 
 
 It must not be supposed that I imagine now, or that 
 I imagined then, that I was all " soul." I am only too 
 conscious of the fact of how closely body and spirit 
 are connected, and that we can only live by and 
 through each other, I never sought a purely 
 spiritual love, or one that did not require the pre- 
 sence of the lover ; but the aesthetic feeling must 
 sanctify all, the carnal love must spring from the 
 spiritual. The former should only arise when the 
 latter has been perfected. 
 
 To a pure-minded maiden, the presence of a lover 
 is above all things to be desired. She longs for the 
 warm, fervent look of love. (I discovered sometimes, 
 with an inward shudder, that there was in his look 
 desire, rather than love.) 
 
 She longs for his kiss, for the pressure of his hand. 
 It is true that this is physical. What is this com- 
 pared with the sensations of a man .-' 
 
 When a girl is wearied in the presence of the 
 beloved one, that is truly a sorry matter. But I 
 would pay no heed to the inward voice — it only 
 prevailed at times, and whispered, " If he were not 
 there, if you did not know him."
 
 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 75 
 
 Then I bethought me of the magnificent mantle in 
 which there was no rent, or of the damaged spots 
 which only served to enhance the grandeur of the 
 rest. 
 
 Yes, he was a splendid creature : it would be folly 
 not to love him with my whole heart, and to sacrifice 
 willingly all that I had hitherto known, loved, and 
 possessed. 
 
 Alas ! he demanded the sacrifice. But I did not 
 suspect that I must give up my ideal, that I was 
 expected to kill the child of my heart. Had I known 
 this, I would have killed the rest which was worth- 
 less ; but the knowledge only came by degrees. 
 There is a strange quality in human beings which 
 enables them to bear with calm fortitude any pain 
 that is inflicted gradually, and for any length of time ; 
 but if it fell upon them with one blow, they would be 
 powerless to endure it ; they seem to have fallen into 
 a lethargic sleep, as if the dull throbs of the padded 
 hammer which fate lets fall on the petty everyday 
 life deadened all the better, nobler thoughts and 
 resolutions within them. 
 
 Many there are who never awaken from this sleep 
 and these, after all, are the happiest. I mean in the 
 common acceptation of the term. Thank God, I 
 now recognise that in spite of all there is a great and 
 lasting happiness which rises triumphantly above all 
 misery. Thank Heaven I have passed the stage of
 
 76 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 
 
 doubting the fact, and I shall cherish eternal and 
 unalterable gratitude towards the man who taught 
 me this, who proved it by the mere possibility of his 
 existence. Those are the most to be pitied who 
 awake from the sleep from time to time. Here I 
 am reminded of the parson's wife in Kieland's story, 
 who, having woke up suddenly one night, saw the 
 whole of her past life lighted up by a sudden flash. 
 She only said, " How sad, how very sad it all is ! " 
 She is now an old woman, who for a quarter of 
 a century has lived a contented and regular life- 
 having merged herself, her true individuality. And 
 suddenly her former self appears before her, and 
 says : " What have you done to me ? When I was 
 young, I was full of life ; and now .? " Then that 
 former self seemed to revive and assert itself in all 
 the strength it had possessed before fate had lulled 
 it to sleep. The old woman regained for a few 
 moments the feelings of thirty years ago, for those 
 years that have been slumbered away do not count. 
 But she soon sees her illusion, and that the time has 
 really gone for ever. " Why do you weep .? " says her 
 husband. " You can surely have no cause." And yet 
 she had true cause for sorrow, for she was bemoaning 
 a dead thing. At that moment she was burying her 
 real self, which had only awakened from sleep to die 
 of terror. 
 
 Kieland shows here the true knowledge of a 
 
 woman's heart.
 
 CHAPTER VI 
 
 E were married, and I gave myself up to the 
 lethargic state without a struggle ; and, 
 although I was never entirely overcome by it, there 
 was real danger during the first part of my married 
 life of my succumbing entirely to that deadly sleep. 
 
 I had hurried on the marriage, because I dreaded 
 the warning voice within me, and I thought it was 
 the best means of reducing it to silence. 
 
 The ceremony was a beautiful and a solemn one, 
 but when we stepped up to the altar through the long 
 rows of relations and friends, it was as if a voice 
 whispered to nie, " This is all a theatrical show ! " 
 
 And when I stood before the venerable parson, who 
 I was told by the others gave a most edifying dis- 
 course, the same voice was still ringing in my ears, 
 and I could think of nothing else ; and yet I was not 
 frivolous by nature — the padded ham.mer was begin- 
 ning to do its work. 
 
 Thus we began life together ; there was a terrible 
 weight on my mind and a dull pain at my heart, but 
 
 77
 
 78 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 
 
 I took it for anxiety about what was before me — the 
 great change of my existence. 
 
 I have never been of an anxious or timid nature — 
 fear of any kind up to this time was an entirely un- 
 known feeling to me. I looked to my husband as my 
 guide, my friend and protector, who should help me 
 out of this sadness, out of the maze of my own vague 
 thoughts, which were my worst enemies. 
 
 But, alas ! the mantle had slipped, and I saw a 
 hideous, bare bit of selfishness through the rent which I 
 had thought to find a foundation of generosity. No- 
 thing but selfishness, and the selfishness assumed such 
 dimensions that it blinded his eyes, and prevented 
 him from seeing the misery of his wife. 
 
 He made one or two attempts to cheer me with 
 laughter, senseless jokes and explanations which 
 showed no comprehension of the situation, and then 
 he gave it up. The relationship soon resolved itself 
 into this : I ought to be cheerful — it was my duty. I 
 ought to adore him, and when he had time he would be 
 graciously pleased occasionally to accept the adora- 
 tion. 
 
 He seemed to think everything must be right, 
 because it was his wish that it should be so, and 
 my duty to make it, 
 
 I made another attempt to speak to him, and to 
 explain what my real meaning had been. I began 
 timidly and hesitatingly, for I felt uncertain of
 
 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 79 
 
 myself, and inclined to think the whole thing was 
 fancy. 
 
 I wanted to tell him what my ideal of love had 
 been : the sharing of life, the cessation of loneness, 
 the universal and perfect understanding between us. 
 
 He did not even let me finish, but his look betokened 
 vexation : " This is all nonsense." He sent for a bottle 
 of champagne, and tried to persuade me to drink it. 
 He said I was not cheerful enough. We were on our 
 wedding journey, and he wanted to get all the plea- 
 sure he could out of it. 
 
 The mantle was shifted more and more, and was 
 often blown about by the wind of selfishness. 
 
 This momentary glance caused me such alarm that 
 I hastily strove to forget what I had seen, and turned 
 my attention in another direction. 
 
 The fair and beautiful ideal within me was fast 
 fading away, and the mist which surrounded it was 
 growing more and more dense. I no longer wished 
 to see it ; I sought to put the whole thing out of my 
 mind. I succeeded so completely after a while that 
 I did not even feel a void in the place it had once 
 occupied, though everything seemed a cold mockery. 
 
 I returned home, sick in body and mind. 
 
 " As I said farewell, as I said farewell, 
 My heart was heavy as lead ; 
 When I came back, when I came back, 
 All joy, all love was sped."
 
 So WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 
 
 Yes, I was ill indeed, and gradually became worse. 
 I lay for months in my mother's house in a state of 
 torpor, taking no interest in anything. I only real- 
 ized later on, when it was all over, how absolutely 
 indifferent I had been to all that was passing around 
 me. I believe that no possible event could have 
 roused me from the state I was in. If my doctor had 
 suddenly appeared before me, and had announced 
 that I should die in the morning, I should have 
 accepted the information with as much indifference 
 as the ordering of a new prescription. 
 
 As my physical strength returned, I began to feel a 
 little more of what was going on around me. I began 
 to take a little interest in everyday matters, although 
 my inner self had not yet awakened to life. 
 
 I believed my ideal was dead once and for all. 
 
 Nevertheless, after a while I made one or. two 
 efforts to follow what a sense of duty seemed to 
 indicate as right. Whilst I was undergoing a cure in 
 a foreign place, separated from my husband for some 
 time, I strove afresh to cover with the gorgeous 
 mantle the cold, selfish form of its owner. 
 
 I knew it would be no use, and yet I deceived my- 
 self for a while by trying to set up afresh the idol in 
 my heart ; but, alas ! I had seen only too well that the 
 feet were only of clay. 
 
 As I felt myself gaining strength, I longed for an 
 object on which to expend the newly found energy ;
 
 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 
 
 and during the few weeks of separation from my 
 husband, I succeeded in loving, and was happy in the 
 thought that I had perhaps found something better 
 than that which I had formerly sought. I even fell 
 to laughing over my former ideal conception. 
 
 My husband had tried to make me understand that 
 my former chaste and beautiful love was mere folly. 
 
 I tried during these {Q\y weeks to banish the re- 
 membrance of the first part of my married life : I 
 strove to forget how little consideration these lords of 
 creation think necessary to show towards their wives, 
 and the shamelessness with which the chaste feelines 
 of those wives are trampled upon. 
 
 I wished to give up all the ideas I had hitherto 
 held on this subject as folly and illusion, and to adopt 
 those of my husband as the only true and reasonable 
 ones. 
 
 I strove to do this in all honesty, but I failed. I 
 succeeded in developing a spurious sort of affection, 
 and so thoroughly did I deceive myself for the 
 moment, that I did not at first see that the whole 
 thing was a counterfeit. 
 
 With this poor mistake and love in my heart, with 
 a fund of honest resolutions, but bereft of all ideas 
 and all poetical feeling, I returned at the end of my 
 cure to my new home. 
 
 This was certainly not the realization of the dream 
 I had once cherished — far from it. It was a sober 
 
 G
 
 82 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 
 
 and miserable awakening from my dream ; but I was 
 so changed myself that I was not conscious of this. 
 
 Nevertheless, there was an indescribable something 
 which I could not throw off and which lay with a heavy 
 weight on my soul. It was unbearable, but indefin- 
 able, and I had no wish to analyze it even to myself. 
 
 I fought courageously with myself: this I can truly 
 say. If the physical and mental energy I spent over 
 the struggle had been used in the furthering of a good 
 cause, they would not have been exhausted. 
 
 When the time was over, and the strength and 
 energy which had all been directed to myself were 
 spent, then I recognised what power had lain in me, 
 and how grand it would have been to have spent them, 
 not on a useless struggle against myself, but in joining 
 my forces with a true, strong, noble man, would have 
 led me with his loving understanding in the right 
 path ; but it was not so, alas ! 
 
 I almost succeeded in absorbing myself in the 
 everyday cares of life, asking for nothing and desiring 
 nothing more, striving to be to my husband all that 
 is most desirable for egoists — a good housewife, one 
 who is merely there to make a pleasant life for him ; 
 that is, to look after his material wants. As for 
 mental needs, a woman must not trouble about that : 
 she is too limited even to understand them. 
 
 While men press onwards to some high and -lofty 
 goal, while they are stimulated on all sides, while, in
 
 IV HOSE WAS THE BLAME 83 
 
 one word they really live, a woman is fully occupied 
 in creating a pleasant atmosphere for the man when 
 he returns home. Nor docs he trouble to inquire 
 whether the petty, oft-recurring worries of the daily 
 home life have left her any leisure to refresh her tired 
 spirit with mental stimulant. 
 
 At the risk of incurring his highest displeasure, the 
 wife must keep up a friendly countenance and assume 
 a pleasant smile when her gracious lord returns ; 
 she must be witty and amusing, so that he may find 
 recreation at home to compensate for any worries 
 which may have occurred in the fulfilment of his daily 
 task. They are even considered the best of their 
 kind who yearn for this domestic refreshment. Many 
 have not even time to look at their wives and give 
 them an opportunity of displaying their wit and 
 cheerfulness ; they hurry immediately to clubs or 
 some other place of amusement, to seek " distraction " 
 as they call it. If they consider it necessary at all to 
 offer an excuse, they do so by pleading the inability 
 of their wives to entertain them in a sufficiently 
 bright and pleasing manner. Poor wives ! Nobody 
 seems to consider how they have been worried during 
 their day's work, or the longing they have for mental 
 stimulant ; but such a craving in a woman is simply 
 ridiculous. There are some women whom nature 
 has endowed with so contented a temperament that 
 they seem to be quite happy in the present condition
 
 84 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 
 
 of things. I have heard their liusbands converse 
 somewhat in the following strain : — 
 
 " When I have been actively employed in my 
 business all day (the business of this man was of a 
 varied and stimulating nature, not unoften inter- 
 rupted by visits from merry friends, or chess matches 
 in some restaurant or other), I demand on my return 
 a merry, friendly wife, and a comfortable house. I 
 could not endure a serious woman who would worry 
 me with earnest questions. I see quite enough of the 
 serious side of life. I want light entertainment, and 
 it is the vocation of a woman to provide me with 
 that." 
 
 Yes, that is their vocation — according to the idea 
 of most men, especially German men. Men only 
 really represent human beings or those worthy of 
 consideration. 
 
 Women are, according to their social position, the 
 servants, the toys, or the instruments of pleasure for 
 these same men. 
 
 In rare cases of happy marriage, when the men are 
 of finer nature, their wives are their consolation, their 
 friends, a source of joy that makes them forget the 
 cares of life. But they are always there in their 
 relations to men, always there to make life easier, 
 more comfortable and pleasant. They are created 
 for men, and women must be satisfied with this idea, 
 and be perfectly content and happy.
 
 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 85 
 
 If they succeed in satisfying one of the lords of 
 creation, their ambition ought to be reahzed. 
 
 A man never inquires as to how this is brought 
 about. He rarely dreams of considering the in- 
 dividuality of his wife : he is far too high above her. 
 He makes his friends and companions among his 
 own sex : no woman could occupy that capacity. 
 
 "Why should she trouble herself about the serious 
 side of life.''" thinks the man. "Her one object should 
 be to amuse herself and vie." 
 
 What are the amusements which are considered fit 
 and proper for women ? There are women who have 
 never desired anything better. For such they are 
 sufficient (though one knows not whether with 
 different education and other surroundings they 
 might not have been capable of higher enjoyments). 
 For others these pleasures act as a kind of deadening 
 of their powers, and when they awake from their 
 lethargy, they look upon them with disgust. 
 
 But they must be cheery at all hours of the day 
 and night, bearing in mind that the sole object for 
 which they have been created is to serve man in some 
 way or other. 
 
 In no scale of creation does the male claim such 
 mastery of the female as among human beings. The 
 female serves, of course, to propagate her species ; but 
 when she has done her duty by giving birth to her 
 young, she has a separate and individual existence as
 
 86 WHOSE IV AS THE BLAME 
 
 marked as that of the male ; she is by no means his 
 inferior ; she is often endowed with keener intelli- 
 gence, for in the struggle for existence and the 
 maintenance of her species by protection of her 
 progeny, she has often developed higher instincts 
 than the male. 
 
 Amongst women the mental faculties are not 
 originally weaker than among men — they have 
 deteriorated for want of development. 
 
 The superior physical strength of man has been 
 used to oppress woman ; she has been relegated to 
 lower spheres of work. Men make the laws, and 
 exclude women from all the advantages which the 
 spirit of progress is bringing to satisfy the growing 
 needs of the human mind. 
 
 For centuries, by means of this brute strength, men 
 have thwarted the mental development of women — 
 and that is why her sex has remained behind : she 
 has only been able to eat of the crumbs that fall 
 from the rich man's table. And what gigantic 
 strength must lie in woman, if, in spite of all the 
 obstacles surrounding her, she yet succeeds in making 
 a way for herself through the paths of learning, and 
 accomplishes such feats as set men agaping. 
 
 But this is a rare occurrence. The really intellectual 
 women who have courted and gained renown are very 
 few and far between. From this men have sought 
 to prove that women in general are far less gifted 
 than men.
 
 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 87 
 
 Yes, great women are rare ! But have you realized 
 that they serve to prove to you, if only by one 
 individual case, how great and overwhelming must 
 be their power if they succeed in scaling the thorny 
 wall — the bulwark of hindrances — which their in- 
 tellectual superiors have put in their way ? Have you 
 considered this ? 
 
 The majority of men never think at all of this. 
 Why should they ? Is it not far easier to go on in 
 the time-honoured customs, to live cheerfully with 
 one's wife, to have her ever at hand to minister to his 
 comfort ? And so it saves much trouble to adopt the 
 theory of the intellectual weakness of women. Any- 
 thing that goes beyond the limit they have set is a 
 horror to them ; they even look upon it as a crime 
 if the woman claim an individual existence at all. 
 
 Thus the struggle towards higher life is made 
 impossible by petty everyday duties, by vexation at 
 every turn, which produce the same effects as the 
 constant pin-pricks — they wear away the power of 
 concentration, and eventually kill the finer feelings 
 of the soul. 
 
 The mind gradually loses all vitality, youth, and 
 freshness, and becomes incapable of looking at life 
 as a whole. It is as if a layer of thin, fine dust had 
 gradually, almost imperceptibly, floated down and 
 shrouded all the fresh young feelings of the heart. 
 
 The husband notices nothing. He only perceives
 
 SS WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 
 
 that the wife is losing her charms— that she is grow- 
 ing tired, old, and unlovely — and is indifferent even 
 towards her lord and master. He had not contem- 
 plated that when he honoured her by marrying her. 
 
 Nor she, indeed, either. All is so different from 
 what she once imagined. She had dreamed of the 
 community of life, of work, and the perfect union of 
 two human beings with equal claims and rights. Is 
 her conduct so monstrous and so horrible if the 
 thought come to her that she is no longer bound, 
 because the life she is forced to lead has no moral 
 claim upon her, because she did not know— nay, she 
 could not know— what that life could be when she 
 took that marriage vow ? True, the idea of secretly 
 breaking her plighted vows may be to her more 
 repellent than the prospect of continuing her present 
 hateful existence, and affecting love she does not feel. 
 But is it wrong to loosen such a tie ? The law says 
 No ; but public opinion— that unstable voice (which 
 we all most fear) — says assuredly, Yes. 
 
 In a marriage blessed with offspring the matter 
 decides itself. For a woman who has given birth 
 to children there is a great and sacred duty in bring- 
 ing them up, and this duty is so beautiful and so 
 elevatine that it enables her to bear much that would 
 be otherwise unendurable.
 
 CHAPTER VII 
 
 A WOMAN has naturally a wonderful power 
 of endurance, and she needs but a tiny ray 
 of happiness to enable her to overcome the greatest 
 difficulties — indeed, to make these difficulties appear 
 as trifles which cannot hurt her soul. Children can 
 give such true and real happiness. 
 
 I never had children, nor have I known the calm- 
 ness and bliss which the society of these dear innocent 
 creatures brings with it. 
 
 I fell ill about this time, and was worse than I had 
 ever been. I had to lie in a reclining position for 
 some years of my life. 
 
 I was obliged to give up my household duties, and 
 to relinquish the supervision of the house. And yet 
 my husband always turned to me when anything 
 went wrong. The servants, as is the custom of ill- 
 bred people, were rude and disrespectful — seeing that 
 I was powerless, and could not deal with them. 
 
 I was very ill, and the doctor said I was not to 
 excite myself — an order I would willingly have 
 obeyed if possible. 
 
 My husband came into the sick room from time
 
 90 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 
 
 to time, in order to fulfil the duty of inquiring after 
 my health ; but before I could answer these inquiries 
 he proceeded to reproach me with one thing and 
 another, and then ensued violent scenes. 
 
 I was terribly irritable at times. I had few visitors: 
 I had come as a total stranger to the town, and had 
 soon been confined to my room, so that my circle of 
 acquaintances had scarcely been formed. My dear 
 mother was, unfortunately, too far away ; so that I 
 seldom talked to any one except to my husband and 
 the servants. It was a doleful time. 
 
 These are all trifles, I admit — nothing but trifles 
 which it might have been seemly to pass over in 
 silence, only my whole life was made up of such 
 trifles. 
 
 I know that it is not pleasant reading ; one feels 
 the dull, heavy prose of everyday life, which means 
 to most of us untold annoyance. And this is a poor 
 substitute for the thrilling excitement of a tragic fate 
 which appeals to our pity and admiration. But, alas ! 
 I cannot offer this, and I crave pardon if the recital 
 of my minor woes is wearisome. 
 
 Yes ! it was hard to lie there day after day and 
 year after year without being able to foresee any 
 change in the condition of things ; it was hard to 
 have nobody near with whom to exchange a friendly 
 greeting, and to be hourly in dread of some insolent 
 speech from the mouths of my inferiors, or of the un-
 
 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME gi 
 
 feeling behaviour of him who ought to have been my 
 best protector and friend. My strength was ebbing, 
 and I felt, as it were, on the edge of a volcano, for I 
 never knew what the next moment might bring forth, 
 and whether some time or other words would be 
 spoken which would compel me to leave the house. 
 
 I scarcely knew whether or not I provoked my 
 husband to these dreadful utterances. If any one 
 had dared in former times to address one such word 
 to me, I should have looked upon it as a deadly 
 offence. 
 
 And now I must needs hear them from the mouth 
 of one from whom 1 ought to have heard nothing but 
 vi'ords of love, who ought to have sheltered me from 
 the unkind attacks of others. Yes, they came in quick 
 succession, and they entered into my soul like so 
 many poisoned arrows, and the poison entered into 
 my whole being, and destroyed all that had still a 
 remnant of vitality within me. 
 
 My courage was shattered. Now and again I made 
 a feeble effort — a fresh start, as it were — but I soon 
 broke down, as if the very sap of life were destroyed. 
 All was dead and barren — and my faith gone. 
 
 Ah ! if he had only not killed the ideal of my life ! 
 If he had not dragged it in the dust and trampled 
 upon it ! 
 
 I do not know how I lived through that time ; but 
 I survived — physically, at least.
 
 92 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 
 
 As my physical strength returned, I began to seek 
 refuge in books. I tried to construct a system of 
 philosophy on the ruins of my past life. I read and 
 pondered, and tried to banish all thought of self. But 
 this I could not do, and at the bottom of my heart I 
 never really wished to do it — the consoling words of 
 the old classical writers could afford me no protection 
 against myself But as the interest and understand- 
 ing of my old teachers came back, I began to feel 
 fresh life within me. The pure and euphonious lan- 
 guage acted upon me as a mild and soothing, yet 
 potent, charm, and the power of divine perfection 
 made its influence felt upon me as of yore. But the 
 music of those voices was interrupted by the dull, sad 
 echoing of my own lonely, passionless heart. 
 
 " All is vanity and lies — even those lofty ideas ; 
 poetry is but a puppet, gorgeously dressed, but stuffed 
 with straw. 
 
 I was no longer capable of feeling or understanding. 
 I flung away the books I had loved so dearly, and 
 rushed out into Nature's wild and free expanse. 
 
 Could she save me, and give me back what I had 
 lost 1 
 
 But Nature said : " Thou hast sinned against me. 
 All other sins can be expiated and forgiven, but not 
 so with those committed against me." 
 
 She was a cruel mother to me, this same Nature 
 whom I had loved from my childhood upwards. She
 
 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 93 
 
 drove me to this sin, and I could not escape it, be- 
 cause it was now veiled under the name of Duty. It 
 one only recognised what is Duty (that divine 
 daughter of the gods). She is good, and holy, and 
 pure. Thrice happy he who always knows where to 
 seek her, and from whose paths he never goes astray. 
 But eternally cursed is he who does not recognise 
 her, and who sins against thee, great holy Mother 
 Nature. 
 
 For true duty and obedience to nature ought never 
 to clash. 
 
 I dreamed a dream, a passing dream, 
 
 The vision fled too fleetly. 
 And cruel Life will punish me 
 
 For dreaming all too sweetly. 
 
 Dream, thou liest on my heart, 
 To earth my thoughts depressing ; 
 
 My earlier aspirations all 
 With thy dead weight oppressing. 
 
 In that brief dream no grain of truth. 
 All lies, all blear illusion ! 
 
 1 dreamed in loving arms to find 
 The key to Life's confusion. 
 
 Afar, methought a glimmering light 
 
 Of bliss for me was shining ; 
 But all I found was cruel Life 
 
 New wounds with old combining.
 
 94 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 
 
 When Nature first my being wrought, 
 
 And manifold contrived me, 
 Of hope, through love, to reach to bliss, 
 
 She had not quite deprived me. 
 
 A cruel mother thou to me 
 
 Hast been, O Nature, surely ; 
 Do not thine other children rest 
 
 Upon thy breast securely ? 
 
 Thou gav'st a heart with richest love 
 
 Filled full to overflowing ; 
 That heart condemn'st to loneliness, 
 
 No kindred heart bestowing. 
 
 Ah, loneliness within man's soul ; 
 
 Grim word, our joy's undoing ! 
 Alone amid the press of men, 
 
 Or lonely past reviewing ! 
 
 I'm thus from real life exiled, 
 
 Condemned to lonely dreaming. 
 Ah, must I, Life, in truth unknown. 
 
 Content me with Life's seeming ! 
 
 Ye Powers of Nature, hear my cry ! 
 
 Of those by you created. 
 Give me but one to be mine own. 
 
 Let this lone heart be mated ! 
 
 — E. Tribe. 
 
 Yes, Nature, thy child wails and calls to Heaven, 
 but Nature pays no heed, for she is a stern, inexor- 
 able judge. Is he my true husband, this man with 
 whom I live, but whom I do not love .'' Have I 
 realized that Nature has so constituted human beings 
 that they choose each other in marriage ?
 
 WHOSE IV AS THE BLAME 95 
 
 And I pretend to love, pretend it to the whole 
 world, because men are mad enough to force this lie 
 upon me as a duty — force me to turn my beautiful 
 righteous life into one vast lie. 
 
 Life is only given once to each person to obey the 
 holy laws of duty and nature. 
 
 But did not Nature bestow love upon me, that 
 sacred burden which makes us all forget ourselves, 
 and brave every sacrifice? Did she not instil into me 
 the longing for a union with another person, and 
 prompt me with despair at the absolute loneliness of 
 the soul — which impels it to go forth to seek a fellow- 
 soul .'' That was tlie initial error. If I had not recog- 
 nised this so clearly, if I had acted unconsciously, as 
 so many have done, then I might be forgiven ; but as 
 it was, I sinned against the sacred claims of nature 
 and morality. 
 
 Not that miscalled morality invented by an erring 
 and easily deceived humanity, but a heavenly mor- 
 ality which Nature has placed in the pure instinct or 
 conscience of man, which continues to flourish if not 
 stifled by custom and education, and which rises up 
 above the abuses of human laws. 
 
 I knew even then that it was the weight of guilt 
 which was pressing so heavily upon me, and hin- 
 dered every attempt of the soul to soar to higher 
 things, and hence sprang up the doubt in my mind 
 as to whether the demands of morality could be
 
 96 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 
 
 obeyed, or whether the ideal I had felt, and known, 
 and loved, could ever be attained. But now I know 
 it can exist, and he who taught me this was and is 
 my guardian angel. The thought of him makes me 
 better, and recalls me to duty, right, and life ; it bids 
 me act, and dream no longer. I thank thee from the 
 bottom of my heart. Thou hast ceased to live, but 
 thou livest in my heart, and in the hearts of all who 
 have felt thy influence.
 
 CHAPTER VIII 
 
 I SAW him frequently and for long together 
 before I made his acquaintance. I was struck 
 each time with the remarkable head and the whole 
 personality of the man. His slightest action fore- 
 tokened individuality and character. I could in no 
 way explain why he attracted me so greatly. I 
 realized that he differed in every way from the 
 people with whom I was brought into contact, but 
 I could not account for the peculiar and personal 
 sympathy with which he inspired me. At that time 
 my critical faculties were much too keen, and my 
 state of mind too indifferent, to lay much value on 
 any unconscious feeling of sympathy. 
 
 After an unexpected meeting with him, I could 
 not prevent my thoughts from dwelling on this event. 
 I felt in a measure compelled to notice him, though 
 I tried to persuade myself the only difference be- 
 tween him and other men was the cut of his mantle. 
 ' So I tried to forget him, and for a time I succeeded. 
 Then one day I made his acquaintance. It was on 
 the occasion of a charitable entertainment, a truly 
 
 97 H
 
 98 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 
 
 magnificent display, in which beauty, generosity, 
 humour and wit vied with one another to render 
 the whole undertaking a brilHant success. 
 
 All these qualities were on the surface, and hid 
 the ugly and selfish, envious and wicked feelings 
 which only inexperienced and ill-bred people allowed 
 to peep through when a fold of the mantle became 
 displaced. Of such people it was said, They are not 
 properly in society — they are diamonds, it is true, 
 but rough and unpolished ones. Diamonds they are 
 not ; they are merely burnt cinders. Few know 
 this, and those who do, conceal their knowledge. 
 Men are very cunning : with one hand they wash 
 the other snowy white. 
 
 I met my new acquaintance at this entertainment. 
 I was standing in the bow of the window, partly 
 hidden by the crowd. I saw them all, and I saw 
 myself also and my mantle of deceit. I was seized 
 with horror at myself. How willingly would I have 
 thrown this selfsame mantle aside ! but I could not, 
 for so much that was unlovely would have been 
 brought to light. " It would be more honest," 
 whispered my conscience ; and just at that moment 
 he stood before me. 
 
 He gazed at me earnestly with his dark grey eyes, 
 as he introduced himself to me, in a low, distinct, and 
 somewhat foreign accent. 
 
 After making a few remarks on the society, the
 
 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 99 
 
 acting, and the dancing, he asked me if I would be 
 so kind as to make him acquainted with some of the 
 ladies. " I should feel under such an obligation," he 
 added. " It is at best difficult for foreigners to feel 
 at home." The words were said in the gentlest of 
 intonations, and his eyes beamed with kindliness. I 
 noticed that he had many friends and acquaintances, 
 and had therefore no need of my good offices ; but 
 he had instinctively felt my loneliness, and had come 
 to me asking a favour to conceal his kind intentions. 
 I noticed soon that it was not only the outward 
 loneliness he had seen, but that he had read into my 
 inmost soul, and had seen what had so far been in- 
 visible to every other human being — namely, that I 
 was standing absolutely alone. It was a similar 
 feeling in him which made him understand my 
 condition of mind. 
 
 He fetched chairs, and we sat close together in the 
 bow window. First we spoke of indifferent things, as 
 is customary between people who have only just be- 
 come acquainted. It was astonishing how his mere 
 presence calmed me. I never felt the same with any 
 other person. My eyes were fascinated with the 
 peculiar shape of his head and the loftiness of his 
 forehead. I noticed the predominance of the reason- 
 ing and benevolent faculties over the sensuous. I 
 noticed the clear-cut profile, the slightly aquiline 
 nose, the beautiful mouth, with small refined lips, and
 
 loo WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 
 
 the somewhat decided chin. It was an essentially 
 clever face. 
 
 " Have you ever studied phrenology ? " The 
 question had only presented itself to my thoughts, 
 but the outward expression was quite involuntary. 
 He turned his pale, thoughtful face towards me ; 
 it was lighted up by a bright and kindly smile. 
 " Yes," he answered quietly. And now, almost 
 unconsciously, we dropped into a conversation, 
 which, considering how little we knew of one 
 another, led far into the region of sentiment and 
 introspection. 
 
 For once I completely forgot I was talking to a 
 man, and a man who was a complete stranger to me. 
 I had dropped my usual attitude of observation, and 
 my habit of looking for the holes in the society cloak. 
 I had forgotten to hide my own feelings, and to draw 
 the cloak about me which served to conceal them. 
 
 It seemed like speaking to myself, like meditating 
 in one's own soul, and as if new means and ways 
 were occurring to me of understanding myself and 
 others. At moments I fancied some one was taking 
 me by the hand, and drawing me gently away from 
 the false path into which my vanity and selfishness 
 had led me, showing with gentle and kindly voice how 
 to retrace my steps and begin a fresh trial. I forgot 
 everything else about me — every outside impression 
 seemed to have faded away, my eyes were closed to
 
 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME lor 
 
 the outer world, and I saw nothing but the clear grey 
 eyes, which seemed to be looking into my very soul. 
 I scarcely noticed that I was speaking myself, and 
 indeed that any conversation was being held at all. 
 I seemed to be gazing at the great problem of life, 
 which had hitherto seemed insoluble, in quite a new 
 light. 
 
 There was something so soothing and consoling in 
 his manner that there seemed fresh hope of my life 
 proving more satisfactory, if built afresh on the 
 foundations of the new thoughts that gradually filled 
 my mind. 
 
 A loud jarring laugh close to my ears awoke me 
 from my dream. I knew the tone and the voice 
 only too well. Suddenly the bright ball-room, with 
 its crowd of merry, moving people, appeared before 
 me, and just before me stood my husband, with his 
 
 usual self-conscious smile. R rose from his 
 
 chair to greet him. My husband returned his greet- 
 ing in a somewhat negligent fashion peculiar to 
 himself, which jarred upon me because of its 
 familiarity. 
 
 " By Jove ! what a serious conversation you have 
 been having ! My wife has evidently wandered once 
 again into the regions of philosophy. Pray accept 
 my thanks for the patience you have displayed. 
 Come, it is time to go home," he added, turning to 
 me ; " the carriage is there. And you," he said,
 
 I02 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 
 
 playfully tapping R on the shoulder, " you must 
 
 make up for lost time by having a good vigorous 
 dance with the pretty girls." 
 
 I felt the colour rush into my cheeks ; I only 
 
 dared to cast a passing glance at R as I bowed 
 
 slightly to him. He seemed to me to be changed, 
 confused in his manner, and as if he had not clearly 
 heard what was said. He spoke suddenly, as if the 
 German tongue gave him great difficulty. He then 
 bowed to me in the most cordial way, and took leave 
 of my husband. 
 
 I left the room on my husband's arm, who was 
 stopped and surrounded by his acquaintances on his 
 way out. I was accosted in the hall by a friendly old 
 uncle of mine. 
 
 " You look as serious as if the evening's amuse- 
 ment had bored you terribly," he said, taking my 
 chin in his hand and looking down into my face. 
 
 I felt the observing look of my husband behind 
 his glasses, and the mocking shrug of his shoulders. 
 " You must put that down to philosophy, uncle," he 
 said. 
 
 " Philosophy ! What a strange woman to go to a 
 ball to talk philosopliy." 
 
 "Yes, and to bore other people with it too." 
 
 " Ah, if they choose to submit to that sort of thing, 
 that is their own affair," said my uncle, holding up 
 his forefinger, and then he disappeared.
 
 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 103 
 
 We went out into the cold, frosty night, and our 
 steps resounded on the pavement of the quiet street. 
 Neither of us spoke a word while he handed me into 
 the carriage. 
 
 My husband looked gloomy and bored ; he sat 
 there thinking over his own affairs as usual, humming 
 an opera air. I leant back in my corner, with a- 
 feeling as if the moon and stars were shining for me 
 alone, and something which I had long thought was 
 beginning to stir within me, to throw off its dead 
 lethargic slumber, and to rise to new life. I realized 
 this, and lost in these dreams, followed with my eyes 
 a constellation which shone out and disappeared again 
 at every turn the carriage took. 
 
 When we arrived home, my husband opened the 
 door with his latchkey, and wished me good-night. 
 
 " Are you not coming in too .'' " I asked, in as- 
 tonishment. 
 
 " No ; I am going back to the ball, to have a glass 
 of wine with a few of my friends. Your society 
 wearies me. You have certainly done a good day's 
 work in boring one man pretty thoroughly by the 
 nonsense you talked all the evening. It's more than 
 I can stand — my manners won't bear the strain. 
 Poor fellow ! I pity him," and laughing loudly at 
 his own wit, he went his way. 
 
 The heavy iron door closed upon him with a loud, 
 creaking sound.
 
 104 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 
 
 I stood there without moving, and listening to the 
 sound of his footsteps as they died away in the night. 
 
 Bored — -that was the only idea that penetrated my 
 brain. I do not know how long I stood in the dark 
 hall after all was quiet outside. Tears streamed 
 down from closed eyes, and ran down my cheeks. 
 Suddenly I saw two grey eyes looking into mine, full 
 of kindness and sympathy, and I stretched out my 
 arms to the empty air. " I am grateful when I think 
 you are in the world," I said. " Beside a life such as 
 yours everything seems small and indifferent, and 
 everything seems easy to bear." 
 
 And now I suddenly realized what had made him 
 so different from other people — why everything else 
 had escaped my memory when I was with him ; yes, 
 even the consciousness of his presence. 
 
 It was because there was no gilding or sham about 
 him — none of the fine, noble qualities with which other 
 men live to adorn themselves ; he was a simple, true 
 man, with no wish to " assume the virtues though he 
 had them not." He was by nature modest and quiet, 
 nor was he bent upon producing any particularly 
 favourable opinion. He was observing and full of 
 understanding — without exercising any harsh judg- 
 ment, and without being at all conscious of his own 
 worth. 
 
 To him it was a natural thing to do his duty. He 
 recognised his own fault?, and felt his human weak-
 
 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 105 
 
 ness ; he knew what it had cost him to become master 
 of himself, and to attain to the power of self-control 
 he had now acquired. 
 
 A man without a mantle to conceal his real self. 
 What a phenomenon ! Everything about him was 
 real, even to the courtly, polished, society manner 
 which was so attractive. 
 
 The consideration he naturally showed for all those 
 about him, the charitable opinion he formed of 
 them, as well as the respectful attitude he adopted 
 towards them, were not merely the natural outcome 
 of his good bringing up, but rather due to his sym- 
 pathy and understanding for those around him. 
 
 The knowledge and comprehension of this man's 
 character were as a revelation, nay, as a redemption 
 from the living grave and. eternal damnation. I went 
 slowly upstairs in the dark, and undressed as if it 
 were a dream. I was dead tired — more tired than I 
 had ever felt before, for I had gone through more 
 in those two hours than in the whole of my former 
 existence. 
 
 The next morning when I awoke in my bed, the 
 whole thing seemed a sort of dream. Beside me lay 
 the man to whom I belonged, and to whom I must 
 belong all my life, because I had erred at the out- 
 set. 
 
 I bent over him, and looked him in the face. How 
 different, how absolutely different from the man
 
 io6 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 
 
 whose acquaintance I had made the night before ! 
 He was the exact opposite in every way. " I will 
 bring- no accusation against him," I thought; "he is 
 quite satisfied with himself, and in his special way he 
 has done good work. The fault lay in my choosing 
 him." 
 
 So I lay there and looked upon him with no feeling 
 of hatred in my heart. Nay, for the first time for a 
 long while I even felt a little sympathy for him, for I 
 no longer suffered from the stab which he had given 
 my heart, and which, as I thought, had killed my 
 ideal, since I had felt that the ideal was yet capable 
 of life, as if it had found the great Redeemer for 
 whom it had waited since ^the lonely hour of its 
 birth. 
 
 The Redeemer had appeared, and was greater than 
 my wildest dreams had imagined. 
 
 And I fell to thinking that my husband had ex- 
 pected something different from his married life than 
 what I had been able to give him, and was certainly 
 not happy. 
 
 How did he come to choose me for his wife ? Alas ? 
 at this moment, with the gentle, kindly voice of that 
 other man in my ears, I sought what nevertheless I 
 had already recognised, namely — I was a rich heiress, 
 and he had considered me a desirable match. 
 
 Ah, yes ! It all came back to me, and I rose with
 
 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 107 
 
 a deep sigh : he had done me so grievous a wrong 
 that he could never make amends. 
 
 I felt all at once as if I were stifled, or as if I could 
 not endure the atmosphere of the house one moment 
 longer. I must have air, and at any price I wished 
 to take a long walk, to refresh myself and collect my 
 forces ; for it seemed there lay before me a task which 
 would demand all my strength. 
 
 It was one of those cold, wintry days on which one 
 seems to feel better and freer than usual, for it is as if 
 the clear, cold wintry air acted as a purifying spirit 
 upon the mind. One has the feeling that in leaving 
 the dull, over-heated rooms, you leave behind the 
 heaviness that weighs down the mind and hinders 
 the power of a quiet and just train of thought. 
 
 My life seemed to have acquired a new strength, 
 and a spring of youthful courage had sprung up 
 within me, demanding some object on which to 
 expend its strength. 
 
 Ah ! and I was so young still ! I returned to the 
 house to fetch my skates. I thought the physical 
 exercise would be good for me, and I walked quickly 
 over the firm path of snow glittering in the rays of 
 the cold winter sun. 
 
 My glance fell on the white branches of the trees, 
 bathed in a soft rosy light, which took the tenderest 
 and strangest forms against the blue background of 
 the sky. I drank in the poetical beauty of the day —
 
 io8 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 
 
 the glorious view of the country, broken by hills and 
 clumps of trees, and enclosed in the distance by the 
 towers and roofs of a far-off village. The black 
 raven hopped over the rosy snow, and flew away 
 croaking at my approach. I loved to see the great 
 wide expanse of country buried in the snow, and to 
 revel in the quiet nature from which all traces of 
 human life are banished from the nonce. 
 
 Life looks so beautiful from afar off. How peace- 
 ful and idyllic is that snowy village sparkling in the 
 sun, with the picturesque outlines of its roofs and the 
 gently curling smoke of the chimneys ! 
 
 But when you come close, what is to be seen .'' — 
 dirt, misery, hunger and cold. Is it not so with 
 everything? 
 
 Was it so with the man, the remembrance of whom 
 was still so clear in my mind .-* 
 
 Alas ! hideous Doubt — my deadliest foe, that had 
 once striven to dispel the most cherished and 
 treasured sensations of my childhood, and which, by 
 the experience of the last years, had acquired such a 
 terrible mastery over me ! And now it sprang up 
 afresh, with its cautious, feeling fingers, seeking to 
 tear down the beautiful new vision in my soul, 
 before fate with its rough grasp should dash it down 
 as a false mirror, 
 
 I resisted, and strove to protect my new treasure ; 
 but Doubt laughed at me, and said — " Fool ! have you
 
 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 109 
 
 not been sufficiently wounded by the sharp pieces 
 these broken mirrors leave behind, and which have 
 pierced your very soul ? Must you now put up another 
 — larger, more beautiful, more deceiving than ever? 
 When Fate breaks it up, the pieces will hurt — they 
 will tear your flesh and wound you to death, and 
 you will sink back into the daily, barren, vegetating 
 existence without hope of salvation — worse than 
 hell itself." 
 
 Hell, hell ! the word dinned itself into my ears, 
 and yet I continued to resist the weary Doubt which 
 sought to remove the image from me, before it could 
 be dashed to pieces and pierce my heart. 
 
 Then came another voice, which called itself Duty, 
 Custom, Right : " Yes, you must tear this image from 
 your heart, from the place your husband alone should 
 occupy." 
 
 "Yes, yes," I murmured, with gnawing anxiety at 
 my heart — " I will strive indeed." 
 
 I felt as if some one held me at the throat. I stood 
 still and looked out into the distance, and above me 
 was the pure air. I stretched out my arm, and said, — 
 " Help me. Nature, ah, help me. Thou art holy, 
 great, perfect. Thou hast nothing to do with the 
 petty idea of human beings ; they stretch out bold 
 hands to thee, and strive to drag thee down into these 
 petty, distorted paths. But they take thy sacred 
 name in vain, and thou lookest down on them, and
 
 no WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 
 
 laughest at the folly of thine own children. Help me, 
 Nature, and teach me to obey thy laws, and keep me 
 from turning against thee. Oh that I had ever 
 obeyed thee ! but, alas ! I did not do so ; for the 
 false morality which has been learnt as a child, and 
 which has been handed down from generation to 
 generation, is too deeply engraven on the mind — 
 namely, the morality which condemns as sin what is 
 good and holy." 
 
 Thou hast even bid us- love one another, because 
 thou hast said that through love alone one becomes 
 great and noble. But fidelity without love is mon- 
 strous and against nature. 
 
 One would almost think that I was advocatinsr 
 what the so-called realists call " free love" — a feeling 
 which, by the bye, is no longer free. This school 
 of thought goes against nature, out of which they 
 have made a hideous caricature. 
 
 Nature is Divine and spotless, and she abhors the 
 chaining of two together who cannot love one an- 
 other. 
 
 I know a man whose mere existence gives me a 
 higher and wider conception of human greatness, one 
 who can serve as a moral support — against my cares, 
 against the weakness of my life — the mere thought 
 of whom made me better, and drew me back to what 
 was right. Let me not lose hold of him, but let me 
 thank him with all my heart for his coming, and love
 
 WHOSE IVAS THE BLAME in 
 
 him without the power of my being. But morality- 
 insists on the destruction of a love like this. It must 
 be vanished from the heart, and with it must go the 
 best and loftiest human feelings — all that makes life 
 worth living. And this because at a time when 
 consciousness and sense of responsibility were un- 
 developed a thoughtless, youthful promise gave body 
 and soul in lifelong pledge. The soul has long since 
 broken its bonds, and escaped. The material union, 
 though disowned with abhorrence by the soul, re- 
 mains as before, and morality calls this faithfulness. 
 Is it not a sin and a shame ? I did not see this all 
 so clearly on that wintry morning, but I felt some 
 consolation come into my soul from breathing in the 
 great, pure air of nature, and my conscience, which 
 had gone astray in the maze of modern morality, was 
 somewhat quieted and strengthened.
 
 CHAPTER IX 
 
 AFTER a (ew steps, I turned sharply round the 
 corner ; a dazzHng sheet of ice lay in front 
 of me, well swept and fenced in, provided with skates 
 and ready helpers for all the pleasures of skating. 
 
 An ice carnival was to be held that afternoon. At 
 such a comparatively early hour the place was almost 
 empty of visitors. I only discovered at the extreme 
 end of the pond a dark, slender form gliding about 
 on the ice in graceful circles and figures. 
 
 Now he turned round and began to skate back in 
 a beautiful regular motion. A strange anxiety crept 
 into my heart. I knew who he was, although it was 
 too far off to identify him. For a moment the idea 
 occurred to me to turn back before he should have 
 recognised me, and yet that seemed a physical im- 
 possibility ; it was as if my feet hung as lead, and 
 as if I must stand here to the end of my life. 
 
 He came nearer and nearer without appearing to 
 notice that there was any living creature near except 
 the man in attendance. I never saw any one go over 
 the ice in such a manner. The movements were so
 
 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME ri3 
 
 wide and free, the lines so pure, there was nothing 
 that betrayed any striving after effect. 
 
 He recalled to my memory an eagle I had once 
 seen in the Alpine heights as it sank slowly down 
 with outspread wings and scarcely perceptible move- 
 ment. 
 
 I was still standing on the edge of a pond only 
 fifty steps away. " Shall I put on your skates, miss ? " 
 said a rough nasal voice, whilst a dirty hand was 
 thrust out towards me. 
 
 I started, and looked into the man's red face ; his 
 fingers had already taken possession of my skates, 
 and he was hastening along in the firm belief that I 
 was following him down to the edge. I believe, had 
 I not thus been compelled, I should not have moved 
 from the spot. I began to skate with a beating 
 heart, as if I were committing some horrible crime. 
 My first attempt was poor and tottering, this being 
 the natural consequence of my long illness. I felt 
 very insecure, and suddenly the ice seemed to be 
 giving way under my feet ; in a sudden fit of physical 
 weakness I looked round me for a resting-place. 
 
 He was skating at some distance, but just now he 
 appeared to have noticed his fellow-skater, and to 
 feel by instinct that she needed help. 
 
 With the swiftness of an arrow he came to me. 
 My look was rivetted upon him, and I noticed he 
 maintained the regularity of his movements in spite 
 
 I
 
 114 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 
 
 of their swiftness ; I did not notice the ice beneath 
 me was bending and cracking. 
 
 " Come away from that spot," he cried, whilst con- 
 tinuing to skate ; "it is not safe." 
 
 I made an awkward movement, and with a loud 
 burst the ice gave way under me. He was beside 
 me in a moment with outstretched arms. I felt the 
 strength with which he dragged me out ; my move- 
 ment had been a stumbling and involuntary one, and 
 to right myself I was forced to cling to him. He 
 dragged me backwards with both hands, and landed 
 me safely on the firm part of the ice. 
 
 When I was once in safety, on seeing who I was, 
 he raised his hat with courteous greeting, and said, 
 " I must apologise for my method of proceeding. I 
 am afraid I have frightened you, but the spot was 
 dangerous," 
 
 He held out his hand, and asked me how I was 
 after last evening, and then offered me his help in 
 skating. 
 
 " But you are so skilful and I so awkward, I should 
 only hinder you, I am sure," I answered, and wished 
 to stop. 
 
 " Not at all. I could help you until you have got 
 into practice again. One always feels stiff and 
 strange at first, don't you think .? " 
 
 I looked at his graceful, agile form, and wondered 
 how he could talk about being stiff. He laughed,
 
 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 115 
 
 as if he read my thoughts. " There is so much ice 
 
 at R that I have had frequent opportunity from 
 
 a child," he said, and we glided off together. 
 
 " Have you skated much } " 
 
 " I ? Oh, no. The doctor forbade it." 
 
 " Have you been ill ? " 
 
 " Not exactly ill, but I coughed a good deal ; the 
 ■coughing has returned for the last few months." 
 
 "Then you ought not to skate." 
 
 " Oh, no," he laughed. The laugh sounded harsh and 
 bitter, and was followed by a fit of coughing. " Oh, 
 no, I have no time to be ill. I have to harden my- 
 self to all outside influences, or else I should not be 
 able to do anything." 
 
 "And what do you think of doing?" I was 
 almost frightened at my own question. I might 
 appear indiscreet, considering the shortness of our 
 acquaintanceship ; but it was almost an involuntary 
 question, inspired by the intense interest I felt in this 
 man's idea of " doing." 
 
 " Do you mean during life ? " he said, looking at 
 me earnestly — " my duty .'' " 
 
 I said nothing. The word duty had sounded 
 strange to me coming from his lips, because (unlike 
 myself) he seemed to know where that duty lay, and 
 he had succeeded in giving an expressive tone to a 
 word which is so often abused by most people. The 
 words seemed to sum up the whole man. Yes, to
 
 Ii6 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 
 
 mean anything, the word must be used in that way. 
 Oh, that his life might be spared to do that duty \ 
 My glance fell on the tall and almost alarmingly 
 slight figure. I noticed that he stooped somewhat, 
 and that his face was thin and pale ; his large, clear 
 eyes had a far-off, dreamy look. We glided on to- 
 gether. He led me admirably, and sustained me 
 with his strong protecting hand. 
 
 If only this hand could have led me through life, 
 I would never have grown tired of it. I would have 
 grasped it as the hand of a true comrade. I would 
 have shared joy and sorrow with him, and have 
 helped him with sympathy and understanding to 
 accomplish his life's duty. 
 
 We spoke but little : all my thoughts seemed con- 
 centrated in the sensation that I was not alone, that 
 I had a protector, helper, and trusty friend by my 
 side. 
 
 It was a delightful feeling of security, as if no per- 
 son in the world could do me any harm. I did not 
 stop to reflect that it was a transient thing. I lived 
 in the present, and for the moment the past died out 
 of memory. 
 
 I knew now that there was no illusion. The image 
 would never be dashed in pieces ; it would last till 
 death, and could never be effaced, even though the 
 man himself should be no longer in this life. Doubt 
 had lost its power, and made no attempt to regain it.
 
 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 117 
 
 During the next few weeks we did not happen to 
 meet. I went away some time to stay with my 
 mother, who, not feeling well, desired to have me 
 with her. It was well for me that I should thus be 
 able to face things clearly and pull myself together. 
 I passed a summary judgment on myself, and 
 analyzed all my feelings and sensations, so that I 
 might know exactly what I might allow myself to 
 do. I recognised, indeed, that I must tear this image 
 out, even though I tore my heart out with it, unless 
 I could honestly say that the intercourse with him 
 made me better, nobler, purer, in thought, feeling, 
 and deed. I owed this to my own self-respect, but 
 I found nothing in the love but was healthy and 
 helpful. Since the day I made his acquaintance, and 
 even during the weeks I had not seen him, I felt 
 fresher and more energetic in all my undertakings ; 
 it seemed to me as if new life were pulsating through 
 my veins ; I seemed to be freed from some oppress- 
 ing weight. I went more joyfully about my daily 
 work, and got through it with a greater ease and 
 skill. I did it without reluctance, for it seemed as 
 if the little threads of everyday life were all woven 
 into one great whole, or as if they were fragments 
 that I had to reconstruct into a holy temple — the 
 
 Temple of Duty. When I thought of R , it 
 
 was only because I had chosen him as an example, 
 and wished to be worthy of him. Example — yes,
 
 ii8 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 
 
 he was so indeed, and will ever be as long as I am 
 able to think. I can never hear that gentle, clear 
 voice again, nor will those serious eyes rest upon 
 me again. But he will remain as a standard to me 
 whenever life presents any element of doubt as to 
 what is good and right. I shall then try to imagine 
 what judgment he would have passed. For during 
 the few months of our acquaintance, and on the few 
 occasions we were alone, we had discussed many 
 subjects, the treatment of which came back to me 
 in after days.
 
 CHAPTER X 
 
 BUT I must tell you the facts in their natural 
 order, somewhat after the manner of Prince 
 Dimetri. But mine is not so easy to tell as that of 
 the Prince from the arrival of Stebnitzius to the 
 moment when he was actually driven away, and the 
 Princess was only outwardly allowed to retain the 
 position of wife. My story is not so simple. It re- 
 lates to thoughts rather than deeds — indeed, it is 
 only concerned with the region of thought ; but are 
 not thoughts as evil as deeds .'* 
 
 Yes, but no inquiry is made into the nature of 
 thoughts, whether one is made purer by love, whether 
 a great, clever man can help one to attain by love 
 what would have been impossible without. 
 
 The judgment is passed on the following ground : 
 you have loved another man in place of your hus- 
 band ; this constitutes sin. Must one throw aside 
 all that is great and good in one ? must one steel 
 one's heart against every ennobling tendency, and to 
 give way to selfishness and to the lower passions, and 
 even love them if they happen to be the self-same 
 
 passions of a husband chosen in blind ignorance ? 
 
 119
 
 I20 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 
 
 Why are great and noble men given to us ? Do 
 they only exist for themselves, only as ornaments to 
 the human race ? Shall we close our ears to their 
 words, which penetrate to our understanding and 
 force their way to our hearts, and shut out from our 
 eyes this pure and unselfish act ? Are we to turn 
 from them as if they were evil, simply because we 
 have erred in the choice of a husband, and because 
 our love for the other might degenerate into for- 
 bidden passion ? Shall we have no profit out of 
 what is good, and shall we, from moral reasons, 
 turn from what is true morality, and turn to what is 
 distinctly immoral ? that is, the common life with a 
 man whom we do not love, and who lets us sink 
 deeper and deeper, until, according to Tolstoi's theo- 
 ries, we are ruined body and soul ? 
 
 Is not this unnatural and almost idiotic ? I have 
 never been able to understand it, nor do I think I 
 ever shall ; and therefore, on moral grounds, I have 
 taken the liberty of setting aside the so-called moral- 
 ity of society.
 
 CHAPTER XI 
 
 AFTER R 's return from B , I often met 
 him out in society or at concerts. Though we 
 had little opportunity of being alone and holding quiet 
 conversation, I was never with him without feeling 
 that I had become more intimately acquainted with 
 him. One scene in the theatre will never be effaced 
 from my memory. He was sitting in front of me, so 
 that I could catch his profile, and the study of his 
 thoughtful head was more interesting to me than the 
 acting on the stage. During the next interval he 
 came into our box. He greeted me courteously, and 
 shook hands with my husband, with whom he entered 
 into conversation. The two men discussed matters 
 
 of ordinary town talk. R strove now and again 
 
 to draw me into the conversation, and asked my 
 opinion on one point or another. But my husband 
 monopolized the conversation, and would not allow 
 
 me to utter a word, nor had R a much better 
 
 chance. He was very witty in his own special line, 
 
 and always knew the latest things out. R stood 
 
 before him, looking at him in the quiet way which
 
 122 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 
 
 was peculiar to him. When suddenly my husband 
 button-holed him, and whispered something into his 
 ear. 
 
 It must have been something highly diverting, but, 
 according to his views, quite unfit for my ears, for, 
 after having said it, he tried to compose his face, 
 and to resist the temptation of roaring with laugh- 
 ter. A sudden flush showed on the pale face of his 
 listener, betokening shame and anger. He looked 
 hastily at me, to see whether I had understood any- 
 thing. 
 
 I had heard nothing, but I glanced inquiringly at 
 him. He turned quickly away with a strange look, 
 half of scorn, half of anger ; he then took a hasty 
 leave, and went out. 
 
 My husband looked after him, somewhat taken 
 aback; but with a cynical smile he said, — 
 
 "What a bore that man is! He is as innocent as 
 a nun, in spite of all his experience of life. No 
 German behaves in that fashion. He really is slow." 
 
 Then followed a long, unconcealed yawn. I felt I 
 was being mastered by my anger. 
 
 " If more men were possessed of a tenth part of 
 his dignity and goodness, society would certainly 
 profit by the change," I said, in a low voice. 
 
 He cast a hasty side glance upon me, and said, 
 with a low, mocking laugh, — 
 
 "Ah! the wind blows in that direction. So we
 
 WHOSE IV AS THE BLAME 123 
 
 have lost our heart to that dull spectre, have we ? 
 Well, by all means, as far as I am concerned, I am 
 not jealous of a monk." 
 
 I remained seated a ^qw moments longer, then 
 such a horror came upon me that I stood up with- 
 out saying a word, and went home in the middle of 
 an act. 
 
 It was one of those moments in life in which the 
 piteousness and misery of my lot was so forcibly 
 borne in upon me. I could not help contrasting these 
 two men. 
 
 When my husband returned home late — I had 
 retired earlier — there was a renewal of one of those 
 dreadful scenes in which he mocked at me in a wild 
 and violent manner, whilst I, in sharp and unsparing 
 language, gave him my opinion of what lay under 
 his beautifying cloak. 
 
 It was one of those terrible nights when the ground 
 seemed to give way under my feet. Passions like 
 hot lava streams that have burst their bonds rushed 
 in upon me and choked my very existence. 
 
 But this mood passed over as so many like moods 
 had done before, leaving me in a state of dull apathy. 
 Cowardice once more asserted its sway ; there was 
 the old fear of coming to a decision my life was as 
 empty and cheerless as the barren, scorched fields 
 over which the burning lava has passed. 
 
 I went out the next day oppressed by this feeling,
 
 124 WHOSE WAS THE BLAAIE 
 
 thinking of nothing, and sensible of nothing, with no 
 remembrance of all that had passed during the last 
 few weeks, my courage damped, and all sense of duty- 
 crushed within me. 
 
 Turning round the street corner, I suddenly stood 
 
 before R . He bowed courteously, and stood aside 
 
 to let me pass. Whilst hurrying on, I had the feeling 
 of being dragged back by an invisible hand, as if I 
 had something to say to him, something for which I 
 ought to ask forgiveness. 
 
 I turned round, and noticed that he was standing 
 still looking after me, and we walked slowly along 
 towards one another until we stood face to face. He 
 bowed again, with a questioning look upon his face. 
 
 " I must apologise," I said, trying to look past him 
 up the street, which at that moment was almost 
 empty, " for the offence I fear my husband gave you 
 last night." 
 
 " Offence to me ? Oh, no ; I only feared " — he spoke 
 with diffidence, as if he dreaded lest his words should 
 produce involuntarily a wrong effect upon me — " I 
 only feared lest the words should have affected you 
 painfully if you had understood." 
 
 He looked very grave, and I felt that his clear eyes 
 rested upon me with almost anxious solicitude ; it 
 was as if he were trying to look into my soul. I felt 
 the deep interest he took in me, and the feeling 
 brought with it great anxiety and deep joy. He
 
 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 125 
 
 seemed to tremble at the thought of discovering it 
 himself, a feeling of which his conscience could not 
 approve. Never had a stranger made so delicate 
 and tactful an attempt to express a friendly sympathy 
 without words. 
 
 I had been wounded in my inmost soul, cast down 
 and helpless. I had gone out in a state of complete 
 indifference towards the world, and this because I 
 thought everybody was in the same attitude towards 
 me. It was a hideously selfish state, I knew ; but I 
 felt like one who is about to rid himself of this life 
 because there is no more joy to be found in it. This 
 is selfishness, but it is the selfishness of despair ; and 
 despair, which is a kind of delirium, is in some man- 
 ner to be excused. 
 
 Now, for the first time in my life, I had met a 
 fellow-creature who took interest in me, and strove 
 to find out what I thought on certain points — seeking 
 to know whether I took a wise interest in life, and 
 whether mine was a pure, unpolished nature. That 
 is what he wished to know. 
 
 We stood opposite to one another, each observing 
 the other. Then I said, " Though I have not grasped 
 your full meaning, I thank you with all my heart." 
 
 When I had uttered these words, I was overcome 
 with anxiety that I should have spoken too strongly, 
 but he understood my meaning perfectly. 
 
 And yet perhaps he did not fully understand my
 
 126 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 
 
 gratitude, because he could not see my inward lone- 
 liness and sadness. 
 
 He stretched a hand out, and I placed mine in it 
 without a word. There was a smile on his lips as 
 he bowed and took his leave. 
 
 Goldne Sonne, leih mir deine schonsten Strahlen. 
 Lege sie zum Dank aufs Jovis Thron, 
 Denn ich bin arm und stumm. 
 
 So strong was the feeling within me that I was 
 able to receive my husband with friendliness and 
 kindness, and so considerate was I to him that he 
 gave me casually to understand how much he con- 
 gratulated himself on having set me right the evening 
 before. 
 
 "You are really becoming quite reasonable," he 
 said ; " and it is high time, too." 
 
 Even these remarks had no effect upon me. It 
 only aroused in me pity for the man who could make 
 them, but there was no pain in the thought that 
 the man, although he was my husband, had never 
 striven with care and love to possess my soul as well 
 as .my body ; there was not even a regret, because 
 I knew now that there was another who loved my 
 soul and understood it. 
 
 Therein lies the wrong. It is wrong, sinful ; nay, 
 it even amounts to adultery when one has said " I 
 will," though the word may be as fatal as a life-long 
 prison — one is sold, body and soul. Yes ; for one
 
 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 127 
 
 has no further right to dispose of one's soul. If one 
 does it, it is a punishable offence, and nothing can 
 excuse it. Is that the meaning of it, or not? 
 
 Nor is it even to be excused when the husband 
 scorns the possession of his wife's soul, nor cares to 
 effect an exchange which he ought to do ; or if he 
 forgets its very existence, and casts it on one side 
 as a useless appendage to the body which he does 
 possess. 
 
 Is this soul nevertheless condemned to cleave for 
 ever to his, to wait and hunger for the crumbs which 
 fall from the lord's table — as a sparing nourishment 
 for the devouring hunger for understanding and love ? 
 
 " Blessed are they that hunger and thirst after 
 righteousness." 
 
 Are they blessed or cursed .-' There comes a point 
 when both these consequences are true. There is a 
 state when a father, condemned to starve to death in 
 a prison, is capable of devouring his own children, and 
 just in the same way the soul consumes its own ideals 
 when it is in such a state of hunger ; for in the delirium 
 and despair the ideal of fidelity can perish. 
 
 I knew that I was not living up to my ideal of 
 fidelity when I wished to give my soul to another 
 lest it should perish of hunger ; for I was now hard 
 on myself, and did not shirk the agony of analyzing 
 every thought to its source. 
 
 But the mind was pure. I wished to save the
 
 128 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 
 
 better part of me. I wanted to escape from the cloud 
 of dry, poisonous dust which seemed to be slowly 
 sifting down on to my life. 
 
 Protect me, oh good and true fellow-man. Take 
 me in your arms as a friend ; take me to your heart. 
 " Thou shalt not quench the smoking flax." This is 
 what I thought, and I acted accordingly. He became 
 my spiritual support, and an indispensable factor in 
 my life.
 
 CHAPTER XII 
 
 I OFTEN saw him and talked to him. For the 
 most part we met in society, where, however, 
 we had few opportunities of quiet conversation with- 
 out being noticed. Nor was this necessary. Often 
 when I was discouraged and sad, one look from those 
 bright, earnest eyes — a gentle, friendly smile, a warm 
 pressure of his hand when we met, to soothe me — 
 that was quite sufficient to give me a sense of security 
 and protection. I never lost the feeling that in every 
 instance where I might meet him I could always turn 
 to him. When I went with my husband to an " at 
 
 home," I had the feeling that I belonged to R- , 
 
 not to my lawful spouse, who, by the bye, from the 
 time we entered the room together, took absolutely 
 no notice of me whatever. 
 
 If confidence and indifference are one, my husband 
 could certainly lay claim to the former quality. 
 
 He never sought to separate us, or to come between 
 
 us, or watch when he saw R come to me and 
 
 greet me, which he did in a simple, quiet, and almost 
 reserved manner. 
 
 Our intercourse in society consisted chiefly in a 
 
 129 K
 
 130 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 
 
 consciousness of each other's presence. When one 
 or other of us made a remark, an understanding look 
 passed between us. We did not definitely seek ex- 
 pression of the good understanding between us : it 
 expressed itself naturally, almost unconsciously. 
 Each instinctively tried to read the countenance of 
 the other, and each found it an easy task. 
 
 I remember one evening there had been a specially 
 merry party assembled together. We had played at 
 forfeits and other games, and' had amused ourselves 
 just like children. There had been much laughter of 
 a simple, childish nature. I have always cared for 
 those games which seem to have no special object, 
 but are entirely without malice or arriere-pensee. 
 
 He also had been one of the party ; but his quiet, 
 reserved manner never left him, though he always 
 managed to introduce something without making 
 himself the centre of attraction. It was his excessive 
 modesty which prevented him from bringing forward 
 his own personality, or from using any opportunity of 
 becoming a favourite of society. He took the esteem 
 of his elders and the boundless admiration of the 
 younger people in his usual quiet way, without losing 
 his friendly, modest bearing, or without presuming in 
 any way on the feelings he inspired. Indeed, I think 
 he was conscious of something more than a general 
 kindly disposition towards himself, which he did his 
 best to maintain.
 
 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 131 
 
 Such people require time before they can be known. 
 It is not given to every one to see and feel the plea- 
 sant and beneficent influence of such a calm, quiet 
 nature, which is sometimes put down as tiresome and 
 unsympathetic, because one fails to recognise how 
 much restlessness has to be fought down before that 
 quiet of mind can be attained which is a mirror re- 
 flecting in its smooth and polished surface the interest 
 and feelings of one's fellow-creatures, for which one 
 thus acquires sympathy and understanding. The 
 warm, pulsating life is held in check, and although 
 this nature has penetrated with kind and tender 
 feelings into the heart of things, yet its tactful mo- 
 desty will not allow it to take one step or to show 
 any more interest than is desired — it shrinks from 
 coming as a stranger or an outsider into a circle that 
 was already formed ; but if help is required, such 
 a nature is always ready to give it. 
 
 I have myself heard R spoken of as cold and 
 
 insensible — he whose quick, broad feelings served as a 
 guide to his clear understanding. His motto was 
 •" Tout comprendre c'est tout pardonner." 
 
 We came across each other several times during 
 the games that evening. Once as a punishment, 
 because we had forgotten to redeem our forfeits. He 
 gave me a side glance, and said, in his usual hearty, 
 warm manner, — 
 
 "To-day you are really merry, are you not? A
 
 132 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 
 
 human being has such an unconquerable, healthy- 
 capacity for being merry, and it is this that gives 
 the real beauty to life." 
 
 "Yes," I answered, "there must be an enormous 
 latent capacity for happiness in man. At the slightest 
 provocation an atom is set in motion, and can move 
 a hundredweight from the conscience as if it were 
 a feather. It is a pity that the effect is not felt long, 
 for the weight seems heavier than before ; yes, indeed, 
 one becomes perhaps conscious of it for the first 
 time. 
 
 "Ah!" he said pensively, "a great deal depends 
 on a man's will. The more I think, the more I learn 
 of life and begin to understand its significance, the 
 more I am conscious of the beauty of life. I have 
 arrived at the stage of contentment." 
 
 " But do you think that one's enjoyment is keener 
 through philosophy } " 
 
 " I do not call it philosophy, but thinking. When 
 you come to know clearly what existence is, you 
 come also to the enjoyment of it. How much is 
 unnoticed, unseen, unappreciated, of what Nature 
 offers us in so full and rich a measure, because we 
 hurry by with closed eyes, and because we think 
 those organs of sight are given to us for no other 
 purpose than to direct them to some forbidden, un- 
 attainable, and often imaginary good, without which 
 our deluded minds consider life not to be worth
 
 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 133 
 
 living. There are harmless, light, childlike, yet none 
 the less complete joys, and we should retain as long 
 as possible the faculty of appreciating these ; but this 
 faculty is destroyed by too much analysis. If we 
 came to philosophize, as you express it, on what we 
 are doing at this moment, there would be little to 
 take hold of ; indeed, our occupation might almost 
 seem to border on the ridiculous." 
 
 Reasonable people should have the faculty of so 
 controlling these reflections, and, indeed, their whole 
 intellect, that they should have the power of checking 
 its activity whenever it threatens to disturb their en- 
 joyment of simple, childlike, unintellectual pleasures. 
 
 " But now it is our turn." He stood up, and was 
 soon again laughing and joking among the merry 
 folk. 
 
 A few moments later he came back, heated and 
 breathless, to his place beside me. He coughed a 
 little, and looked paler than usual. I heard him pant 
 for breath, and when in the course of the game I had 
 to hold my hand in his, I noticed how feverish the 
 pulse was. 
 
 He noticed my anxious look, and smiled in an 
 absent manner. 
 
 " Are you ill ^ " I asked, in a low voice. 
 
 " No, not ill. I have had a cold for some time, but 
 am better now. This really means nothing." 
 
 He smiled again, but somewhat sadly this time.
 
 134 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 
 
 We could not speak to one another, because the 
 yame went on and we were separated. I followed 
 him with my eyes. When he sat down again at some 
 distance from me, I heard the dry, hollow cough 
 once again. I could not see him, and I was seized 
 with an indescribable anxiety which I could not ex- 
 plain. 
 
 He had never appeared robust, but as he had 
 always taken part in everything, and as I had heard 
 other men more than once extol his activity, his 
 power of work and his marvellous industry, I had 
 never thought that he could be ill, and he had dis- 
 puted the fact himself; nevertheless, there was a new 
 weight at my heart, and not even the new strength 
 which happiness had given me was sufficient to 
 remove it. 
 
 My name was called once, then a second time, and 
 a third time. I must have sat there buried in thought. 
 
 "Is anything the matter .'"' A loud, sharp voice 
 grated in my ears. My husband was looking in- 
 dignantly at me because of the disturbance to the 
 game. 
 
 His vanity and pride were evidently wounded 
 because his wife had been the object of laughter. 
 
 " No," I said, trying to smile too. 
 
 " Perhaps she is composing poetry," sniggled a 
 former school friend in a low voice. 
 
 Now the laughter was louder than ever. But I was
 
 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 135 
 
 not long the object of it, for R stood up at the 
 
 opposite side of the circle with a new magic trick of 
 the most comical kind. 
 
 My husband looked in that direction, and joined 
 in the laughter in a manner which was usual with 
 him — not a hearty laugh, but with open mouth, as if 
 swallowing the real laugh. But the attention was 
 withdrawn from me, and nobody remembered me or 
 my want of attention in the preceding game, in which 
 I had been obliged to take part. 
 
 " If you must assume a Medusa face that freezes 
 one's laughter, let us go home," hissed my husband 
 close to my ear, in a voice of suppressed rage. 
 
 I rose up, for I felt I must get away from him. I 
 could not endure my husband's reproaches ; it was 
 
 beyond my strength. I ran up to where R was 
 
 standing, and stepped close to his side, as if I wished 
 to see what he was doing. It was an involuntary 
 movement, and one seeking protection. 
 
 " Don't stand so near," shouted the others, "or else 
 there is little merit in finding out how it is done." 
 
 I was conscious of a hasty glance of love and 
 understanding. 
 
 " No," he said ; " now we are going to do something 
 else, but I shall want help. Would you stand here ? " 
 he added to me, passing me some of the cards and a 
 little box, which I had to show the company was 
 perfectly empty.
 
 136 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 
 
 I felt his kindly care of me ; I knew he had under- 
 stood, and that, to a certain extent, he had taken me 
 under his protection. He wanted to occupy me and 
 distract my thoughts. 
 
 " I am so sorry," he said, when we were able later 
 on to have a few moments' quiet talk — " I am so 
 sorry that our ' philosophy ' after all has disturbed 
 your pleasure in these innocent amusements. It was 
 my fault : pray forgive me." 
 
 " No, it was not the philosophy, but a new weight 
 which the natural capacity for happiness is not strong 
 enough to move." 
 
 His eyes rested questioningly upon me. I looked 
 into the beautiful spiritual face — every feature was so 
 well known to me, and each one told of greatness 
 and goodness ; he seemed so noble, so refined, so 
 different from other men. Nothing which suggested 
 low or common thoughts had ever entered there ; if 
 ever such thoughts had suggested themselves during 
 the years of his youth, they had been combated, torn 
 up by the roots, dashed from him. I knew the 
 gentle smile so well that played about the corners of 
 his lips ; it was half sad, and yet there was a new 
 faint suggestion of happiness in it because there was 
 here one full of sorrow and anxiety for the lonely 
 stranger whose home was so far away. 
 
 We were standing in 'the ante-room preparing to
 
 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 137 
 
 leave the party, and as my husband was busy discuss- 
 ing some new idea with one of his business friends, 
 he had not time to take much notice of me, so that 
 
 it was R who put my wraps about me and took 
 
 me to the carriage. 
 
 " Good-night." His warm hand rested for a moment 
 in mine, then my husband stepped in, and we drove 
 away. I began to think matters over in my mind, 
 and wondered why I had blushed and gone away 
 without begging him to see a doctor, to follow the 
 latter's prescriptions, and to spare himself as much as 
 possible by not over-exerting his powers in his studies 
 and learned pursuits. 
 
 And I had been silent, and blushed as if I were 
 ashamed, as if I had committed some evil deed. 
 
 " Why should not I help a fellow-creature, and 
 warn him .'' " 
 
 I recalled his smile, which had become changed 
 by the suggestion of happiness, and I felt that here, 
 sitting in the dark beside my silent and apparently 
 sleeping spouse, I blushed afresh. Yes, he had 
 been happy. Though for some time we had lived in 
 a whirl of society, and though we had seldom been 
 alone together, yet we had managed to know each 
 what the other was doing. It is true we did not 
 often speak, but a glance was often sufficient to 
 establish a perfect understanding between us. We 
 had never told each other by word or sign how much
 
 138 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 
 
 we were to one another ; but we both knew it — we 
 were bound to know it. We should not otherwise 
 have had such intuitive knowledge of each other. 
 Why, then, should I have blushed when I thought 
 of the difference in his smile .-' and why should I 
 blush because he felt this and it brought him happi- 
 ness ? How strange the human mind is, I thought ; 
 how it shrinks from the consciousness of what has 
 long existed ! 
 
 " I wonder why you have such a predilection for 
 pale, sick people," said my husband suddenly, in a 
 g'ggliiig) mocking tone. 
 
 I started out of my thoughts ; my heart beat, but 
 not from an evil conscience. I was only startled phy- 
 sically by the harsh tone in which the question had 
 been put ; a shock had come to me at the word 
 "sick." 
 
 " Whom do you mean } " 
 
 " Whom do I mean .'' Do ask a less foolish ques- 
 tion. Do you think I am blind .-' By the bye, he is 
 a very clever fellow," he added, in a half-gracious, 
 half-condescending tone ; " he expressed some very 
 good ideas just now. Well ! " he drawled out after a 
 while, though I had asked no questions, for I sud- 
 denly failed to understand what he was driving at. 
 
 He had always spoken of him in a slighting tone. 
 Whence this sudden praise ? 
 
 " What do you mean .'' " I asked, in my turn.
 
 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME I39 
 
 " Always that question, ' What do you mean ? ' By 
 the bye, I told him to come and visit me." 
 
 " And do you imagine he will respond to this 
 summons ? " 
 
 " Bah ! I am not always so uncivil as you choose 
 to think me. He said he would certainly not delay 
 to call as soon as he had your permission to do so. 
 " Ha ! you won't be long issuing the invitation, eh 1 " 
 
 A mocking giggle followed these words. I felt 
 that I grew alternately hot and cold, and betwixt 
 fear and joy I scarcely knew what to say. My hus- 
 band did not press for an answer, for the carriage had 
 just stopped before the house. He opened the door, 
 and, without shutting it behind him, went straight 
 to his own room, leaving me to find my way in the 
 dark. 
 
 What could be his intentions in asking R to 
 
 visit at our house ? Was he attracted by R 's 
 
 cool understanding and his learning, or did he wish 
 to see how I would receive the intimation ? Now the 
 question arose in my mind as to what was to be 
 done. 
 
 As I lay in the dark, during the quiet of the 
 night, I seemed to foresee clearly what must happen 
 
 if I requested R to call. I knew that till I put 
 
 the request personally he would not set foot in my 
 house. 
 
 Yes, I saw and recognised it all with infinite joy,
 
 140 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 
 
 and yet at the same time I felt in my heart as if the 
 whole of my past life were blotted out, and as if my 
 present life were filled with only one image. 
 
 Our intercourse for the future would be of a more 
 intimate and private nature. We would be able to 
 read together and talk over everything in a quiet and 
 undisturbed way. I knew it all, as if I were the 
 small piece of metal that has ventured into too close 
 proximity with the all-powerful magnet. I already 
 felt the magnetic power tearing at my heart, and I 
 resolved to proffer my request. 
 
 He had left the matter in my hands, with his usual 
 -delicacy and tact. There was a gentle note of 
 warning in this act of his. I ought to have lent a 
 listening ear — I could easily have made an excuse for 
 so doing. He would then have paid a visit to my 
 husband which I could have ignored. But I tried to 
 persuade myself that I must invite him, that it was a 
 mere question of politeness, of no more signification 
 than what I had often done before in inviting any 
 young man to call upon us. 
 
 I was in such a hurry about the matter that I rose 
 earlier than usual, wrote to him begging him to come 
 on the following evening, and I took the note to the 
 post myself 
 
 " Where have you been .'' " asked my husband, when 
 I came down to breakfast later on, 
 
 " I have been to post a letter."
 
 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 141 
 
 He asked no further questions, and it was only in 
 the evening that I remarked casually, looking up from 
 the newspaper, — 
 
 " I suppose you have no objection to R taking 
 
 tea with us to-morrow ? " 
 
 He sniggered ironically. 
 
 " It is really very amiable of you to do me the 
 favour." 
 
 Then he returned to his newspaper, and soon forgot 
 all around him, including his wife. 
 
 On the following morning I received a card from 
 
 R , regretting that a previous engagement would 
 
 prevent his coming that evening, and at the usual 
 calling hour, the following day, he appeared in person. 
 
 My husband was not at home, and I received him 
 alone. I felt quite a different relation towards him. 
 I could not speak openly nor look him in the face, 
 and it seemed quite impossible to treat him as I had 
 done for the past few months. 
 
 He also appeared stiffer, more formal and reserved, 
 than usual, though he was as courteous as ever. 
 
 He expressed his regret at having to refuse my 
 invitation, and said that he had come to express that 
 regret in person. 
 
 We both expressed our regret that my husband 
 was out, and then ensued a silence during which we 
 endeavoured to pick up the thread of the conver- 
 sation. Suddenly we looked one another in the face.
 
 142 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 
 
 We both looked uneasy and constrained because 
 we both knew we were lying and playing a part. 
 For the first time we stood in an equivocal and uncon- 
 ventional position to one another — we both had 
 tightly fastened up the mantle which we had never 
 feared to display openly up to the present time. 
 
 We looked at each other and blushed, but we did 
 not turn away our glances from each other ; our eyes 
 looked deep into each other's for some moments : he 
 saw to the depth of my soul, and I knew that he 
 would find but little there of any worth, but his was 
 as pure as a well of pure water. And yet I could not 
 bear his gaze, because it was full of endless love, 
 sympathy, and understanding. I have never let any- 
 body else thus read into my heart, because I knew 
 that nobody else could gaze so unselfishly and forget- 
 fully, and with so loving an understanding. Others 
 would not have so covered up my failings with the 
 mantle of charity from the outside world, or have 
 striven gently to improve them ; they would have 
 dragged them out laughing before the gaze of the 
 public, and have rejoiced to have found me no 
 better than they were themselves, and they would 
 thus have stifled and crushed those germs of good 
 which had not yet put forth, because there was no 
 good soil, instead of fostering and cherishing them as 
 he did until they had grown into tall, strong trees, 
 which in their turn would give shelter to others.
 
 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 143 
 
 He took my hand in his. 
 
 " I thank you from the bottom of my heart," he 
 said slowly, and his full, rich voice trembled a little. 
 The tone was still vibrating in my heart when the 
 door closed upon him. Tears welled up into my 
 eyes, and I threw myself on a couch, weeping bitterly. 
 
 Why had fate willed it thus .? We both realized 
 only too keenly its cruel, inexorable power — more 
 keenly than if we had made our full confession in 
 words. 
 
 At present we could give each other mutual sup- 
 port and deep consolation ; but how would it be 
 later? Ah! if he had gone away then and never 
 returned ! 
 
 My husband came home an hour later. I was 
 sitting before my writing table, trying to appear 
 interested over a book. 
 
 " Oppose not Fate's decree, 
 Nor seek thy lot to shun ; 
 Accepted in humihty, 
 
 'Twill lead you kindly on." 
 
 I opened at this passage by chance, and Goethe's 
 dear, well-known words were before me. 
 
 The card which R had sent in to announce his 
 
 visit was lying on the table. 
 
 My husband picked it up, and threw it down again. 
 
 " Well, your morning has been pleasantly filled up."
 
 144 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 
 
 I did not move. He walked up and down the 
 room once or twice. I thought he was still thinking 
 over the morning visit, and I trembled at what he 
 might be going to say. Then suddenly he began to 
 speak about the clothes which must be put in order 
 for a journey, and that very evening he went away 
 for an indefinite period. 
 
 During the time he was away I only saw R at 
 
 other people's houses. 
 
 When I met him, he always showed the same keen 
 consideration for my feelings; indeed, it seemed to me 
 as if he wished to give me more protection and 
 support than before, because I was alone. Among 
 the circle of people we frequented there were many 
 men with whom I greatly objected to dance, and 
 whose acquaintance was extremely unpleasant to me. 
 He knew how to keep these people away from me 
 with unusual tact, or if he could not do this, he 
 remained and took part in the conversation. If we 
 had an opportunity of speaking privately, our conver- 
 sation always turned on serious things. I do not think 
 he quite realized how each of his quiet words sank 
 into my heart, and what a balm to my wounded sensi- 
 bilities was his great, clear conception of life, which 
 seemed to give to my soul fresh and healthy power of 
 endurance. I reminded him of what he had once 
 said : " Life is beautiful, and I am content. Nature is 
 great, pure, and beautiful, and I have always been
 
 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 145 
 
 inclined to appreciation : it is this that makes my 
 happiness." 
 
 " But human beings destroy the good : that is what 
 is so painful," I answered. 
 
 " Do not believe that," he said. " They cannot do 
 so : it is only the outward effect. They cannot touch 
 the spotless nature of what is really true and great. 
 Are not you of the same opinion .-* " 
 
 He looked at me lovingly and kindly, and I felt 
 the comfort he had wished to give me, and I answered 
 by taking his hand gently in mine, to which he re- 
 sponded with a gentle pressure. 
 
 His pale face did not bear the print of happiness 
 upon it ; but then, he had not said he was happy ; 
 he had only said he was content, and he had never 
 looked discontented. He seemed to be able to bear 
 the greatest pain in the full consciousness of it, but 
 also with the deepest resignation which told of the 
 happiness of triumph. 
 
 Six weeks afterwards my husband returned sud- 
 denly one evening. Without having announced his 
 arrival by so much as a line, he entered my room. 
 
 " Good-evening," I said, in as friendly a tone as I 
 could muster. 
 
 "Good-evening," he answered, without even offering 
 me his hand. He began to give orders, and to complain 
 that this and that were not as it should be. Then he 
 took no further notice of me, and during supper he 
 
 L
 
 146 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 
 
 spoke little, but read through the letters and papers 
 which had come for him. 
 
 We had absolutely nothing to say to each other ; 
 we had not missed one another during our long 
 separation, and the meeting seemed all too soon. I 
 pictured to myself how different it would have been 
 
 if R had sat there in his place and returned to 
 
 his rightful position after an absence of six weeks. 
 Ah ! Heavens ! how different it all would have been! 
 
 I know the thought was a wrong one, but I admit 
 to having had it, and I do not wish to idealize or 
 suppress anything ; I would like to speak the whole 
 truth, just as Galitzin makes his hero say what he con- 
 ceived to be true from his point of view. I wish 
 to show simply the reverse of the medal. 
 
 About a week after my husband's return I re- 
 minded him that he had not yet returned R 's 
 
 call. 
 
 He turned his head half round, and I shall never 
 forget the lowering, suspicious look he cast on me. 
 
 "Did he help to pass away the time and console 
 the grass-widow ? " 
 
 His mocking language was sharper, more uncivil 
 than usual — indeed, it was almost diabolical. 
 
 " I have only seen him occasionally out in society," 
 I answered, as quietly as I could. I wished at all 
 costs to avert one of those shameful and degrading
 
 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 147 
 
 word skirmishes, lowering to both, and only empha- 
 sizing our hatred. Although R could neither 
 
 see nor hear what passed, his soul had become so 
 much one with my own that I should have felt that 
 I disgraced him if I had not acted in his absence 
 as I should have wished to do had he been present. 
 
 •' Ha, ha !" laughed my husband as he went out of 
 the room. I felt the blood rise in my cheeks ; I hid 
 my face in my hands, and wept bitterly. I was 
 seized with an indescribable longing to rush to the 
 man I loved, to tell him all that was in my heart, 
 and to seek protection — yes, to seek protection from, 
 my husband and myself. 
 
 If he had been present, I know that I would have 
 fallen into his arms, and entreated him to remaia 
 with me, and never to leave me. 
 
 But fortunately he was not there. 
 
 He was in the town, in his own home, and to have 
 sought him there would have needed a sharper 
 stimulant of despair. 
 
 But this moment of culpable weakness — for all 
 weakness is worthy of blame — passed over. 
 
 One learns with time to bear many things which 
 at first appeared absolutely beyond one's strength. 
 
 Ah, that slow, stifling torture, that mortal anguish 
 which yet does not kill — always another turn to the 
 rack, always a deeper humiliation in one's own eyes, 
 and hope and happiness ever on the wane, until the
 
 a48 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 
 
 light of life seems utterly extinguished, and there is 
 no prospect of freedom or change of any kind left. 
 
 Fate holds us with iron hands, and permits not a 
 :glance either side. 
 
 Ah, it is a living burial indeed ! 
 
 It came upon me thus one night as I lay alone, 
 looking with open eyes into the empty darkness. I 
 felt it all creeping upon me. I shuddered at the 
 dim consciousness of it within me as I felt its icy 
 ■cold power. 
 
 A terror of my own existence seized me, I stood, 
 ■as it were, outside of myself, and saw myself lying 
 there in the dark. It was as if I stood beside a 
 •corpse, but a corpse with life and breath in it. 
 Buried alive — buried alive ! All that makes life 
 ivorth living lost to me and to others ; nothing left 
 but a breathing corpse ! Terror was upon me during 
 that night. I felt it was a truth, and no folly or 
 liallucination — a real, living truth. 
 
 I struck a light, and, as I often did during sleep- 
 less nights, I read the clear, calm meditations of 
 Marcus Aurelius on the things of the world — that 
 •old sage whose eyes have so long since closed in 
 •death, and yet who will ever live. 
 
 By the help of that clear mind I succeeded in 
 forgetting myself — the spectre of my dead self passed 
 away, and I looked out at the world through the 
 wise old eyes of Marcus Aurelius.
 
 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME i49' 
 
 But the horrible feeling of being buried alive re- 
 turned later on, and I could not always allay it as 
 during that night. If I had lived alone, and had 
 never gone out among people, and had never seen 
 warm life pulsating around. But as it was I was shut 
 out from all ; my life was empty and barren — I had 
 neither goal nor purpose. I was a dead and useless 
 member of society, without being able to call the 
 man to my side who might have saved me — the only 
 one who could help me, who could drag me out from 
 under the ruins of my former self, which were cover- 
 ing me as a grave. 
 
 When I thought of him now, I always thought of 
 the mocking laughter of my husband. 
 
 There was a mixture of anxiety in the feeling, not 
 for him, but on my own account, which made me 
 pause when the thought passed through my mind, 
 prompted by the cry of despair during those 
 moments of abandonment, — 
 " Help me, dear friend." 
 My blood boiled when I thought of that laughter. 
 
 I did not dare mention R 's name, though day 
 
 after day passed without my seeing him. The social 
 entertainments were over. As the season came to an 
 end, I sought him in the theatre, at concerts, in the 
 streets. " I will rise now and go about the city, in 
 the streets and in the broad ways I will seek him 
 whom my soul loveth." I sought him, but I found
 
 J50 WHOSE TVAS THE BLAME 
 
 him not. I did not dare to ask for news of him from 
 others, for I noticed that though he had given no sort 
 of opportunities for so doing, society, thick-skinned 
 as it usually appears to be, had managed to display 
 marvellous fine sight in discovering a certain myste- 
 rious relationship between us. 
 
 My attention had been drawn to it when I found 
 myself the subject of half-derisive smiles and passing 
 remarks. 
 
 Some weeks after my husband's return I heard a 
 •quite unknown voice behind me at the theatre say in 
 French, — 
 
 " Do you know that R- is leaving ? " 
 
 " Leaving so suddenly } " answered another un- 
 known voice. 
 
 " Yes, in a few weeks. He is better. By the bye, I 
 saw him to-day ; he looks ill and much pulled down. 
 It was only an hour since he had received the news 
 from his Government, which seems to have excited 
 him afresh. The doctor had warned him against all 
 excitement, which he said was bad for him." 
 
 I felt as if I had been turned to stone. 
 
 I longed to look behind me, hut I could not move 
 my head. I longed — ah, what did I really long for.'' 
 1 could frame no definite wish. I remained motion- 
 less, without seeing or hearing. I got up at the end 
 of the piece, and walked slowly home. " 111," and 
 "going away" — those were, I think, the only two
 
 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 151 
 
 words in the dictionary of my brain, and I could 
 have used no others. I went straight to my room, 
 and lay down on my bed, where I remained motion- 
 less the whole night through with open eyes, thinking 
 of nothing. It was beyond my powers of thought to 
 conceive how it would fare with me when he was 
 gone away for ever. 
 
 Then came the dawn of day, and with it the cheery, 
 shining winter's sun, taking away the terrible spell 
 which had hung about me all night ; its bright rays 
 lit up the bare grey branches, which stretched out 
 their stiff arms as if pleading to be heard, but plead- 
 ing in vain. 
 
 Then came the other thoughts like a storm upon 
 me. " O God ! only not to have to think and 
 to endure! " 
 
 More comfortless than ever — now the hopeless 
 burial has come, the end of all ! 
 
 " But why now ^ No, I will seek him. I must see 
 him, even if it costs me my life ; for if death comes, 
 I am quite indifferent to it," I said to myself 
 
 I think I was very near to madness. My brain 
 was on fire, and my fingers trembled as I took my 
 hat to go out. Where was I going ^ To him — to 
 my sick friend, who would so soon be lost to me. 
 
 Then — slow, firm steps came up the stairs. I heard 
 the maid open the door of the reception-room, and 
 ask some one to sit down, as her mistress was at home.
 
 152 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 
 
 " I do not wish to intrude at so early an hour, but 
 tell Madame I have some communication to make 
 to her." 
 
 My heart stood still ; I could scarcely breathe. 
 The sound of his voice had stilled all the wild, ex- 
 cited', defiant feelings that had arisen in me. I was 
 perfectly calm ; it was as if a gentle hand touched 
 me. I felt that while near him I could do nothinsf 
 rash or foolish — in fact, that I could not have a weak, 
 much less a wicked moment. 
 
 I believe, in thinking the matter over since, that 
 this was the secret of my love for him, the reason 
 why I deferred to his judgment, because his influence 
 was in the direction of what was best and most ele- 
 vating, and repelled all that was weak and small. 
 
 I opened the door and went into the room, in- 
 wardly excited, but outwardly calm. He was stand- 
 ing at the furthest of the three windows. I caught 
 his profile in sharp outline. He did not appear to 
 have noticed my entrance into the room. His head 
 was slightly bent, and he was playing absently with 
 the tassels of the curtain. I stepped noiselessly on 
 the soft carpet until I came to where he was stand- 
 ing. I laid my hand upon his arm. 
 
 " Have you been ill, my friend .-' " 
 
 My voice trembled, but I was surprised myself at 
 the quiet intonation with which I said this, as if I 
 had stolen a tone from his own voice.
 
 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 153 
 
 He started slightly, and stretching out his hand, he 
 turned his pale, earnest face towards me. 
 
 The eyes seemed larger and more deeply set in the 
 pale, thin face — and their expression was so sad. 
 
 "Yes, I have been ill." 
 
 He must have read the shock and terror on my 
 face. I glanced involuntarily at the transparent 
 fingers, which I held in mine as if I could never 
 let them go again. 
 
 The old kindly smile played for a moment round 
 his mouth. 
 
 " But I am better now." 
 
 " You are going away 1 " 
 
 I think this was merely a cry clothed in these few 
 words. 
 
 He looked closely at me with the deep under- 
 standing which he only could feel. He led me to a 
 couch, took a chair, and sat right in front of me, 
 
 "Yes, I am going away, and my object in coming 
 
 here ," he stammered — there was a veiled sound 
 
 in his voice which is often the case with invalids. 
 " I felt I must tell you this in person." 
 
 " I knew of it," I said, feeling that my self-control 
 was beginning to give way. 
 
 " Then I have come too late after all ; I wanted you 
 to hear of it from me, but I could not come out sooner." 
 
 " R ! " I cried. Terror seized upon me, and I 
 
 fell on my knees before him.
 
 154 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 
 
 He raised up my head, and I looked into his pale, 
 suffering face. 
 
 A slight sigh escaped him, and he bent forward and 
 kissed me long and passionately. 
 
 Thou great Unknown, who dwellest in man and 
 hast given them the sole path by which human souls 
 can communicate, so that the terrible loneliness to 
 which the human soul is otherwise condemned is 
 taken away — Thou, who in moments such as these, 
 sacred and pure, hast shown them how to find this 
 way — Thou knowest that kiss was a sacred one 
 between two whose souls are pure — a kiss such as is 
 given only once in a life-time ; but many there are 
 who live without ever knowing such a moment. 
 
 He raised me up and stood before me, and his eyes 
 were filled with tears. 
 
 " Oh, R ! " I moaned ; " you have taken away 
 
 from me the burden and misery which hung over my 
 whole life, and threatened to drag me down ; but it 
 will crush me if you go. Life is too heavy for me : I 
 cannot bear it." 
 
 He drew my head to his breast, and drew his 
 hand lovingly over my hair. 
 
 " My child, it is not life that is weighing you down. 
 Nature's intentions towards us are great and good ; 
 but men and their lav/s have spoilt everything. Fate 
 is not so hard on all as she is on us ; but we must 
 bear it."
 
 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME iSS 
 
 I felt the beating of his heart and the vibration of 
 his voice. 
 
 I knew that we both realized the burden and the 
 responsibihty of the moment — recognised also as we 
 thus sat together how greatly we needed all our self- 
 control. It was because we really loved, and because 
 our feelings were pure, that, in spite of our human 
 passions, we preserved our dignity. We had suddenly 
 become so earnest and quiet. The torrent of feelings 
 had flowed back within bounds — the broad, deep 
 bounds of two human beings whose love is too strong 
 to commit the smallest outward offence against the 
 human law. 
 
 There remained only the great, calm, all-pervading 
 feeling that my soul and his were one. 
 
 " I will be with you, and will never abandon 
 you, even though distance separate us," he said 
 simply. 
 
 " I thank you." 
 
 I saw how pure and great his thoughts were, and 
 I wished to be like him, and to imitate his example. 
 It was, as it were, against my will that the words 
 burst forth : 
 
 " Stay with me." 
 
 His eyes began to flash, and his face gave signs of 
 an inward struggle ; and then he seemed to cast 
 some thought from his mind. His eyes looked 
 straight into mine.
 
 IS6 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 
 
 He murmured, in an almost inaudible tone, — 
 
 " Shall I teach thee what this Hfe in truth to be is found ? 
 It is renunciation, when its deepest depth we sound : 
 Seeing, knowing, comprehending, and with parting it is 
 bound." 
 
 I was sittinsf there rig^id and motionless, almost 
 stunned, when a horrible ring of laughter sounded in 
 my ears. It struck me like a sharp knife, which 
 pierced through my wounded and overflowing heart, 
 tearing up the sacred feeling I had buried there. 
 
 " Ha, ha, ha ! I call this a good joke. Why, the 
 fellow is really made of wood — stiff and conven- 
 tional to the last degree ; there's nothing natural 
 left in him. 
 
 " Ha, ha ! I do call that learning the moral cate- 
 chism by heart. There is a woman kneeling before 
 him, who seems to be, by the bye, somewhat im- 
 perfectly versed in that same catechism, who em- 
 braces him like a fury, and entreats him — ha, ha ! — 
 to allow her to remain with him. And this piece of 
 Anglican wood, this stiff wax figure, lets himself be 
 treated thus, quotes a poor rhyme, and exit. 
 
 "Ha, ha! Or was it only horror at the wife of 
 another man throwing herself at his head ? and yet 
 the opportunity was a good one. As representing the 
 audience, I don't know whether to applaud or hiss." 
 
 The laughter sounds grimly, — as the laughter of 
 fiends in hell, as if all the pure and elevated feelings
 
 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 157 
 
 were hacked to pieces, ground to dust, and scattered 
 to the winds. I felt as if I were stretched on the 
 rack. The wild anger of a husband would have 
 seemed as a relief from that devilish laughter. 
 
 He stood at the half-open door of his study, his 
 hands on his hips, with a wicked expression on his 
 mouth and in his eyes. Never had the abyss between 
 us been so yawning, so boundless, so utterly im- 
 passable. 
 
 How could I ever have loved two men so utterly 
 different ? 
 
 Yes, he laughed and mocked, and made me endure 
 the vulgarity of his whole mind. And yet I really 
 believe that he appeared to himself extraordinarily 
 grand and worldly-wise. 
 
 He knew the world, and knew also the wisest steps 
 to take. 
 
 He was living beyond the attribute of Prince 
 Galitzen — " Thou shalt do no murder." It had never 
 even entered his head to kill any one. 
 
 Who would commit such folly .-* He had not even 
 turned the lovers out, as Galitzen had done to his 
 rival, and the idea of repudiating his wife had like- 
 wise not occurred to him. There was no question of 
 forgiveness either. Mockery is the best and the 
 most convenient weapon. 
 
 Ha, ha ! he knew the silly woman with her fan- 
 tastic ideas of love — her ideal aesthetic love — on
 
 158 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 
 
 account of which he had always chaffed her, and 
 which was to his mind a very burdensome addition. 
 
 She had got herself into a nice position. This is 
 what this aesthetic love led to : the worship of a block 
 — an idol — a conventional dummy. Now he was 
 master of the situation, and wished to show that 
 people who are reasonable in their love, who under- 
 stand how to enjoy life, get much more out of it. 
 
 These are the terms in which he would have de- 
 scribed the situation ; this would have been the 
 caricature he would have drawn of the pure man if 
 he had had the representation of the matter. 
 
 You see, dear sister, it was this that urged me with 
 irresistible force to awaken what had so long been 
 buried in the past, because the appearance of my 
 husband as he stood laughing at the door was so 
 forcibly recalled to me by the passage we were 
 reading in which Prince Galitzen makes his hero 
 burst forth with the following words : " I did not 
 kill her," and then described how, having restored 
 the m.oral health of his wife, he then forgave her. 
 And what a hero he appeared to himself! "You 
 have acted like a good man," he says approvingly 
 to himself, and how good and noble he will appear 
 to his readers of both sexes, unless they have gone 
 through a similar experience in their own lives. 
 
 Yes, they must know that he wrote his own version 
 of the story. Whether it would have sounded just
 
 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 159 
 
 the same if the wife of that "good man " had written 
 her account, I cannot tell. I only know one side of 
 the description, nor even how far that is false or true. 
 In any case, I think that the feelings of this common 
 life together are expressed in a one-sided manner. 
 What to the husband may have sufficed with his 
 wide manifold interests and stirring outside life, in 
 whose past so many had had a share, were to her, 
 with her great, longing woman's heart, but crumbs 
 thrown out to appease her hunger. 
 
 And the description of the friends of his youth — 
 that is also one-sided. 
 
 We must hear what the wife has to say — whether 
 he was worthy of her love and yearning, whether he 
 was capable of being all to her that a warm, sensitive 
 heart yearns for, or whether it was all an error. 
 
 Whether it was right or wrong, I know not ; there- 
 fore I am unable to pronounce a decision. Society 
 says it was wrong ; but it lies so often, and why 
 should not it lie in the present case, when it has 
 Nature against it ? 
 
 Yes : " Thou shalt do no murder." 
 
 If my husband had written my story, how very 
 different it would have sounded ! What a sorry figure 
 I should have cut, as well as he for whom I should 
 have given up my excellent and renowned spouse, if, 
 fortunately, the man had not been too stiff, too con- 
 ventional, or too worldly-wise. But my husband has
 
 i6o WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 
 
 not considered it worth whife to write a story about 
 it, or even to make it a subject of reflection — it was 
 only a matter for sport. 
 
 From his own point of view he had done his duty. 
 He had shared everything with me, and had procured 
 rae every comfort, and allowed me full liberty. And 
 I, his wife, had been such a simpleton, that instead of 
 falling down and worshipping him, I had transferred 
 my affections to a conventional creature who, in spite 
 of all the overtures I made him, actually ran away. 
 It really was a subject for mirth. 
 
 Now, at least, the wife will become reasonable. 
 Yes, I did become reasonable, though he did not 
 only refrain from putting me to a physical death, and 
 did not even repudiate me, but only laughed at me. 
 
 It is not only the sorrow itself, but the conscious- 
 ness of it. Conscience is the blessing and the curse 
 of mankind. 
 
 " Blessed are the poor in spirit " are Christ's words, 
 and that is why His cup of sorrow was so bitter — 
 more than it could have been to any other — and He 
 must needs drink to the end, because His heart was 
 so great, His love so sacred, and His consciousness so 
 deep. That is why He has become the Consoler 
 and the Redeemer of mankind, and their pattern. If 
 only men would not make a God of Him, and thereby 
 take away from Him the merit of His redeeming 
 power !
 
 CHAPTER XIII 
 
 I NEVER saw my friend again. I spent the night 
 following on our parting, alone in my study, 
 pacing up and down the room. Terrible hours, in 
 which the thoughts rushed through my brain like a 
 storm of wind. I knew not whether to live or to die. 
 
 But as a star in the dark night, and trembling, 
 through the darkness came the thought : He knows 
 all, understands all, and will do what is best. 
 
 The next morning a letter was brought to me. "A 
 man-servant left it," said the maid. " I was told to 
 give it to Madame with my own hands." 
 
 " Beloved A , 
 
 " I am leaving to-day. It must be so — believe 
 me, it must be so. We could neither of us go through 
 a second parting like that of yesterday. You know 
 your duty, as do I. 
 
 " There remains but little time, but what there is 
 belongs to you. I will not boast of my strength, and 
 I do not know if there were more time I should do 
 over again what I have done. 
 
 i6i M
 
 i62 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 
 
 " I know not if my strength comes from weakness, 
 but I know I am doing what is right. 
 
 " I await your call, if necessity urge it. Be calm, 
 and do not become a prey to despair. You know 
 that you have a friend even beyond death. Death ! 
 ah, if it would only tarry, that I might watch over 
 your life ! 
 
 "Yours to the end, 
 
 ■'R ." 
 
 No more time. I seized at once the terrible mean- 
 ing of those words. My friend had no more time, 
 because death was about to show him the last step 
 of life. 
 
 During the terrible moments which followed, I was 
 haunted in all I did by the image of him which rose 
 in my mind. I seemed to see his pale lips move, 
 and to hear him murmur, " No more time." 
 
 How completely he had understood me, and our 
 relation to one another ! How pure, and great, and 
 good his thoughts had been ! " You know your 
 duty" — I kept these words before me constantly, and 
 determined to be worthy of his confidence in me. 
 
 I went through my household and wifely duties as 
 far as it laj' in my power. 
 
 My husband looked down upon me with a sarcas- 
 tic smile, and went about as usual, without thinking 
 about me one way or another, unless he needed my
 
 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 163 
 
 help. Indeed, things remained pretty much as they 
 did before, except that he occasionally burst out 
 laughing, with a hideous and wicked expression in 
 his face. 
 
 " I should scarcely have thought he would go off 
 in this manner, after you had prepared such a touch- 
 ing scene for him, and after you had confided to him 
 how badly I treated you. Ha, ha, ha ! " 
 
 He pretended to shake himself with mirth. 
 
 "You see how one can mistake the most noble 
 thoughts of one's friend." 
 
 I said nothing, and left the room, wondering to 
 myself that even this did not disturb my equanimity. 
 
 After receiving R 's letter, everything was per- 
 fectly indifferent to me. I felt dead to everything 
 else in the world and all human feeling in me seemed 
 to be stifled. 
 
 " I have no time " — those words seemed to swallow 
 up everything else. It even took away the deep 
 consolation of that other phrase, " I await your call." 
 
 The thought grew stronger within me, and the 
 terror increased, so that there was no room in life 
 for any other feeling. 
 
 Then I was fully prepared for the letter I received 
 some months later, which, though it brought no 
 further news, yet it took from me the last ray of 
 hope by the certainty of its contents, and threw me 
 on a bed of sickness.
 
 1 64 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 
 
 "When you receive these lines, I shall be far 
 away from you — I who, since I knew you, have been 
 near to you every hour, every moment of the day. 
 
 " We have enjoyed what has been given to few — we 
 have had a short span of life that has not been quite 
 lonely. We have been inseparable, though distance 
 has come between us. 
 
 " I am obliged to leave you alone, and that is why 
 it is so difficult to die — for me to whom, from a child, 
 dying seemed so easy. But you must remain and 
 finish your difficult task. It is the last counsel of a 
 friend that I enjoin upon you. Farewell, for I cannot 
 say 'auf weidersehn.' Would that it were possible ! 
 
 " Yours in death, as in life. 
 
 The page lies before me. How often it has lain 
 there, and how many tears have fallen upon it, as if 
 they were jealously striving to blot out the last 
 trembling lines — the last counsel of a friend ! 
 
 With it was sent a small sheet with a few words 
 
 written in bold, firm writing, very much like R 's 
 
 own handwriting, — 
 
 " My brother wrote these lines six hours before his 
 death, and entreated me to send them to you. He 
 wept as he wrote, and they were the first tears I had 
 ever seen him shed. He died as a hero, after much 
 suffering."
 
 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 165 
 
 I felt a wish to write to the brother for further 
 particulars, but I did not like to do so. 
 
 For a whole year I was so completely shattered, 
 mentally and physically, that there was no thought 
 of moving. Then I awoke gradually to the outward 
 life, but I was a changed person. 
 
 The physician said later on, " Her young and 
 strong constitution has saved her." I thought it 
 could only have been my evil genius. 
 
 For why should I live if he were dead .'' 
 
 Without a friend in the wide world— alone as 
 before. No ; for I had yet to seek what was to be 
 done. I had to realize my ideal. But now there 
 ■was nothing to do : the world was empty. 
 
 But I had something to accomplish — my duty ! 
 
 And each day this duty seemed to reveal itself 
 with greater clearness. It bid me rise from my sick 
 bed, leave my husband's roof, and seek my destiny 
 in the uncertain future. It was this unmistakable 
 conviction of duty which gave me the strength and 
 courage to bear the anger of my relatives, as also 
 the pain which I knew my action must inflict upon 
 them, and to tear myself of my own free will from 
 the circle of those who had once honoured and loved 
 me. 
 
 You know all this, dear sister. You know what 
 they said, because you were with them at the time. 
 Forgive me for opening anew the old wounds.
 
 i66 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 
 
 You and my mother sorrowed over me, and wept 
 for me. It broke my mother's heart, and caused you 
 to grow prematurely old. 
 
 Yes, you sorrowed and wept, but even you believed 
 what was said. Even you, my nearest relations — 
 who knew me, and in whose midst I was brought 
 up — you believed those things against me. You 
 listened with bleeding hearts, and faces burning with 
 shame, when my brother told you that I had brought 
 shame and disgrace upon our name and our family, 
 and that I had run away to commit common adultery. 
 
 You looked upon me as a low, fallen woman, and 
 grieved over me as such. My mother wrote me a 
 letter full of pity and love ; she was willing to take 
 me to her heart, and to raise me up, if only I would 
 come to her, and confess my shame, and repent. 
 
 It was a letter full of a mother's love, but there 
 was not one word which showed that she had not 
 also judged by appearances. 
 
 I took up the letter, and flung the fragments in the 
 ocean, and laughed as the waves engulfed them. 
 
 He was dead ! 
 
 Ah, truly this is a comical world ! 
 
 My heart was full of bitterness against you. I 
 never wrote one line of self-justification. 
 
 When there is no natural bridge of understanding 
 between two souls, no words can bring them into 
 closer communication.
 
 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME . 167 
 
 It was one early morning, after a sleepless night 
 of long-drawn-out sorrow, that I left my husband's 
 house. But the act was neither hasty nor premedi- 
 tated. 
 
 During the long months of convalescence spent on 
 my couch the true recognition of what my duty was 
 had flashed upon me : it was the sacred duty I owed 
 to my higher and better self. 
 
 At first I had had difficulty in discovering wherein 
 lay my duty. 
 
 The image of R was ever before my mind. 
 
 His eyes looked me through and through with ques- 
 tioning gaze, and there had been for some time no 
 answer. 
 
 He had recognised his duty, and had done it to 
 the last. He had wisely left it to me to find out 
 where mine lay, knowing well that there is no more 
 hopeless condition than that which makes us turn to 
 others that they may decide what our duty is. We 
 are poor soulless creatures in very truth if we lose 
 our own individuality. 
 
 At a time when the very pinions of my soul had 
 lost their power, I had been revived by a spark of 
 his fire — he had restored my strength until it had 
 slowly developed, during my long illness, without my 
 being conscious, even at a time when physically I 
 was near death. 
 
 The greatest service which one human being can
 
 i68 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 
 
 render another is to lead him gently back to the path 
 of his own individuality — a path he must tread alone ; 
 nor should the adviser strive to lead him aside from 
 that path by any by-ways suggested by his own in- 
 clination. A strong individual nature will resist the 
 attempt, but a weak one will be killed like a plant 
 whose roots have been torn up. 
 
 It was only after his death that I fully appreciated 
 the greatness and unselfishness of R 's conduct to- 
 wards me. He had stood high above the judgment 
 of the world and its conventional standpoint of right 
 and wrong. 
 
 He had gone away knowing that I alone could 
 strike the balance between me and the world. 
 
 He had sacrificed, without a moment's hesitation, 
 his own happiness, and though he knew how short a 
 span of life yet remained, he never strove to influence 
 my train of thought. He was dead. The light of 
 his life was extinguished. Nevertheless, a spark of 
 his fire lived in me, and leaped into a flame which 
 consumed with its scorching breath what was false 
 and untenable — all that had lowered and hampered 
 the development of life. 
 
 And when the purifying flame had done its work, 
 there came to me an answer to my question, and it 
 ran thus : My duty is to live in such a way that I 
 can respect myself. 
 
 And when I had fully realized that the answer was
 
 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 169 
 
 a true one, I left my husband's house never to re- 
 turn, 
 
 I brought neither shame nor disgrace upon you by 
 leaving, but I should have brought them upon myself 
 if I had remained. 
 
 " Farewell ! I am leaving you never to return. I 
 am parting from you without any hatred in my heart. 
 It was neither your fault nor mine that our hopes 
 were dashed to the ground, and that in me the sense 
 of right was well-nigh deadened. 
 
 "The fault lies in the hard, inflexible creed of those 
 who call themselves the world, and in those laws that 
 boldly take upon themselves to bind together with- 
 out power of separation, two souls who have never 
 really known or fully loved one another ; and as if 
 mocking at Nature, who has created these two for 
 the sole purpose of developing, during their short 
 span of life, each single individual existence — these 
 very laws forge chains which irrevocably bind these 
 souls together until they return to the chaos from 
 which Nature took them." 
 
 This was the letter I left when parting from the 
 man from whom I had hoped for so much happiness, 
 and for so complete an embodiment of my ideals. 
 
 Had my husband understood my words } 
 
 I heard his answer from my relations, who cast me 
 out from their midst. 
 
 No one at home knew that R was dead ; no
 
 170 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 
 
 one ever knew the cause of my illness. If I had said, 
 " He is dead ; I am going out alone into the world to 
 what I believe to be right for me," should I have been 
 understood ? Would Society have believed me, even 
 though my evidence had been supported by proof? 
 No ; for Society has neither head nor heart, nor any 
 aspiration after individuality. 
 
 People would simply have shaken their heads, and 
 said I was mad. It was well for me that I strove no 
 longer to please them, and no longer asked for their 
 consent to the course of life I had chosen to adopt. 
 
 But how much vitality and happiness are wasted 
 for those who are trained and directed to dance to 
 the capricious music of public opinion before they are 
 able to resist the influence of their bringing up, and 
 before they succeed in restoring the dignity of their 
 own individuality. 
 
 " Ich lernte diese Welt verachten 
 Nun bin ich erst sie zu erobern werth." 
 
 {Goethe's " Fai/st," second part.) 
 
 I have realized the truth of Goethe's words in my 
 own life. As the ship sailed over the waves of the 
 ocean, bearing me to the land of my friend, and to 
 the uncertain future awaiting me there, I felt a return 
 of physical and mental power, under the influence of 
 the conviction that I was doing what was right. My 
 feelings towards the world and life and my fellow 
 creatures seemed to lose some of their bitterness.
 
 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 171 
 
 The fa.rther I got away from them, and the surer I 
 felt of never returning to the former state of things, 
 the less scorn I felt ; the old world in which I lived 
 had become too indifferent to admit the possibility 
 of hatred. 
 
 What they might be thinking or saying of me at 
 home caused me as little anxiety and fear as the 
 storms which made the ship's timbers creak, bringing 
 the passengers to their knees in prayer and tears, and 
 distorting the face of the sailors with terror. The 
 struggle of the elements had no effect upon me — a 
 more terrible storm raged in my heart. Neverthe- 
 less, I had gone forth as a triumphant conqueror. 
 
 But I wished nevertheless to go on living, and I 
 found this out by the joy I experienced when our 
 battered ship landed on the shore of the new country. 
 
 A totally new existence lay before me. I did not 
 start on my new life with the feeling of loneliness 
 
 that had overpowered me before I knew R , or at 
 
 the moment of that first anguish when I realized that 
 I should never again hear the voice of my friend. 
 I began full of courage and hope and belief in my- 
 self ; 1 was inspired by a glorious feeling of freedom. 
 I had cast from me the very cause of my loneliness, 
 for only he can be lonely who feels that he does not 
 belong to those around him, though he wishes to do 
 so. 
 
 I felt myself a part of nature and the world, but
 
 172 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 
 
 an individual part, and not one who wished to merge 
 herself in another. 
 
 Love and gratitude often took me to liis grave, 
 which was marked by a tombstone bearing nothing 
 but his name. I always brought away from the spot 
 a renewal of courage and belief in humanity. The 
 
 mere human personality of R has, in the course 
 
 of years, died out of my memory ; he lives only as 
 the principle of what is good, noble, and true in man 
 — as the embodiment of that principle without a 
 shadow of deceit. 
 
 My new life, looked at from an unprejudiced point 
 of view, has taught me much, and brought me pure 
 and great joy. 
 
 I have learnt to love the world again, because I 
 have met many people whose good strong natures 
 have not come to grief on the jagged rocks and 
 pointed cliffs of conventionalism. I believe that I 
 have helped a few in the dangers which threatened 
 their life-ship, when guided only by their own in- 
 experienced hand. I have loved many a one with 
 warm affection just at a time when they were loneliest 
 — that is, when most surrounded by the world. 
 
 I have sympathized in the joy and sorrow of many 
 a young life, and out of the mire of vulgarity I have 
 often found the golden grain of noble aspiration. 
 
 I have never heard what the world thought of me, 
 or what people said about me — it would have been
 
 WHOSE WAS THE BLAME 173 
 
 an empty noise, a senseless clatter in my ears. I have 
 been free and happy, and have showed a clear, open 
 face to the world, in spite of calumny and scorn, 
 because I did my duty in helping and loving and in 
 showing understanding and sympathy for all the 
 lonely groping souls with whom I was brought into 
 contact. 
 
 " Therefore these three abide, hope, love, and 
 charity ; but the greatest of all is charity." 
 
 These words now stand on his tombstone under his 
 name, in unskilful lettering from an inexperienced 
 hand. 
 
 I myself traced them out the night before T left 
 his native country — -that country in which I had 
 found so many noble people, and which brought so 
 much deep joy into my life. 
 
 When we first met again, sister, you were surprised 
 to find me so calm and so full of the interest of life. 
 
 You thought to find an unhappy, crushed creature, 
 disillusioned and persecuted, whom you would take to 
 your heart ; but I came to you free and content. 
 
 When we learn to despise what the world says of 
 us, and to follow what we ourselves recognise to be 
 the right path, then only are we free. 
 
 We may be Don Quixotes, but that matters but 
 little if only we have this belief in a better future 
 and better social dispensations. 
 
 The grass of time has long since grown over the 
 
 N
 
 174 WHOSE IVAS THE BLAME 
 
 memory of all I experienced from him, and I should 
 not even have spoken of it to you, dear sister, if what 
 had so long slumbered had not been awakened by the 
 one-sided writing we have just read ; and though the 
 words were written in my heart's blood, I felt as if, at 
 all costs, I must attempt a defence — a plea for my 
 oppressed and trampled-down sex.
 
 
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