“That is merely because I don’t know how you have deserved them of me. Is it perhaps because I don’t know how to pay my shoemaker, or how to meet a whole bunch of bills that have come in the last fortnight? Oh, what a fool I have been! Instead of leading this dog’s life with you, I might to-day attend the Academy of War and lead a decent existence.”
“Hold your tongue, you vulgar brute; you have no right to insult me! Leave my room, or I shall leave the house!”
“Instantly, and with the greatest pleasure, my gracious lady! Pleasant dreams to you!”
So saying, Leimann violently slammed the door behind him so that the windows shook, and then went to his own bedroom.
But his wife buried her face in the sofa cushions and sobbingly sought relief in tears. That gave a vent to her feelings of hatred and rage against her heartless husband. Her whole soul rebelled against this brutal man whom she had married because he had sworn on his knees to her that he could not live without her. And now he roughly stamped into the ground the affection which she once had borne him. He desecrated all those recollections which are so dear to a woman’s heart, and which at critical points in her life are meant to be a stay and a comfort, and to make the burden of misfortune lighter to her.
And if, a short time before, when she had hastily parted from Borgert, she had felt something like remorse,—something of shame in having abused the confidence placed in her by her husband,—she now regarded herself as a victim, and her fault only in the light of a just revenge for his heartless conduct.
For at no time is the heart of woman more susceptible to temptation than at the moment when she feels herself betrayed and outraged in her best feelings.
Chapter VI
A SENSATIONAL EVENT STIRS THE GARRISON
It was plain daylight when the last guests left the Casino. Without exception, liberal indulgence in champagne and brandy had done its work, and the motley crowd that left the building thus “early” was in a decidedly boisterous mood, and the limits of decency and good manners had been passed by them hours before.