seen her, or she had not existed at all. This impertinence went so far,
that at last Count Ville-Handry, one day, almost beside himself with
anger, seized one of his neighbors by the collar of his coat, shook him
violently, and shouted out to him,--

"Do you see the countess, my wife, sir? How shall I chastise you to cure
you of your near-sightedness?"

Foreseeing a duel, the impertinent man made his excuses; and his
experience put the rest of them on their guard. But their opinions
remained unchanged; open war only changed into secret opposition, that
was all.

Fate, however, always more kind than man, held a reward in store for
Count Ville-Handry, which amply repaid him for his heroism in marrying
a poor girl. An uncle of his wife's, a banker at Dresden, died, and
left his "beloved niece Pauline" half a million dollars. This immensely
wealthy man, who had never assisted his sister in her troubles, and who
would have disinherited the daughter of a soldier of fortune, had been
flattered by the idea of writing in his last will the name of his niece,
the "high and mighty Countess Ville-Handry."

This unexpected piece of good-fortune ought to have delighted the
young wife. She might now have had her vengeance on all her miserable
slanderers, and enjoyed a boundless popularity. But far from it. She had
never appeared more sad than on the day when the great news reached her.

For on that very day she for the first time cursed her marriage. A
voice within her warned her that she ought never to have yielded to the
entreaties and the orders of her mother. An excellent daughter, as she