“‘Nothing at all,’ I said, ... in an off-hand way; but really, next to nothing.  I am a barber, your honor, and Heaven be praised!  I have custom enough to keep me busy from morning till night.  There are three of us in the shop, and what with shaving and combing and hair-cutting, not one of the three has the time to stop and scratch his head, and I least of all.  Many of my customers are so kind as to prefer my services to those of my two young men; perhaps because I amuse them with my little jokes.  And, what with lathering and shaving this face and that, and combing the hair on so many heads—­how does your honor expect me to pay attention to other people’s affairs?  And the morning that I read about it in the paper, why, I stood there with my mouth wide open, and I said, ‘Well, that was the way it was bound to end!’”

“Why did you say, ’That was the way it was bound to end’?”

“Why—­because it had ended that way!  You see—­on the instant, I called to mind the ugly face of the husband.  Every time I saw him pass up or down the street—­one of those impressions that no one can account for—­I used to think, ‘That fellow has the face of a convict!’ But of course that proves nothing.  There are plenty who have the bad luck to be uglier than mortal sin, but very worthy people all the same.  But in this case I didn’t think that I was mistaken.”

“But you were friends.  He used to come very often and sit down at the entrance to your barber shop.”

“Very often?  Only once in a while, your honor!  ’By your leave, neighbor,’ he would say.  He always called me ‘neighbor’; that was his name for everyone.  And I would say, ‘Why, certainly.’  The chair stood there, empty.  Your honor understands that I could hardly be so uncivil as to say to him, ‘No, you can’t sit down.’  A barber shop is a public place, like a cafe or a beer saloon.  At all events, one may sit down without paying for it, and no need to have a shave or hair-cut, either!  ‘By your leave, neighbor,’ and there he would sit, in silence, smoking and scowling, with his eyes half shut.  He would loaf there for half an hour, an hour, sometimes longer.  He annoyed me, I don’t deny it, from the very start.  There was a good deal of talk.”

“What sort of talk?”

“A good deal of talk.  Your honor knows, better than I, how evil-minded people are.  I make it a practice not to believe a syllable of what I am told about anyone, good or evil; that is the way to keep out of trouble.”

“Come, come, what sort of talk?  Keep to the point.”

“What sort of talk?  Why, one day they would say this, and the next day they would say that, and by harping on it long enough, they made themselves believe that the wife—­Well, your honor knows that a pretty wife is a chastisement of God.  And after all, there are some things that you can’t help seeing unless you won’t see!”

“Then it was he, the husband—­”

“I know nothing about it, your honor, nothing at all!  But it is quite true that every time he came and sat down by my doorway or inside the shop, I used to say to myself, ’If that man can’t see, he certainly must be blind! and if he won’t see, he certainly must be—­Your honor knows what I mean.  There was certainly no getting out of that—­out of that—­Perhaps your honor can help me to the right word?”