Yet it was noted that in proportion as he waxed wealthy and fortunate, he grew pale, thin, and anxious.  As his wife’s popularity increased, he became fretful and impatient.  The most uxorious of husbands, he was absurdly jealous.  If he did not interfere with his wife’s social liberty, it was because it was maliciously whispered that his first and only attempt was met by an outburst from Mrs. Brown that terrified him into silence.  Much of this kind of gossip came from those of her own sex whom she had supplanted in the chivalrous attentions of Wingdam, which, like most popular chivalry, was devoted to an admiration of power, whether of masculine force or feminine beauty.  It should be remembered, too, in her extenuation that since her arrival, she had been the unconscious priestess of a mythological worship, perhaps not more ennobling to her womanhood than that which distinguished an older Greek democracy.  I think that Brown was dimly conscious of this.  But his only confidant was Jack Hamlin, whose INFELIX reputation naturally precluded any open intimacy with the family, and whose visits were infrequent.

It was midsummer, and a moonlit night; and Mrs. Brown, very rosy, large-eyed, and pretty, sat upon the piazza, enjoying the fresh incense of the mountain breeze, and, it is to be feared, another incense which was not so fresh, nor quite as innocent.  Beside her sat Colonel Starbottle and Judge Boompointer, and a later addition to her court in the shape of a foreign tourist.  She was in good spirits.

“What do you see down the road?” inquired the gallant Colonel, who had been conscious, for the last few minutes, that Mrs. Brown’s attention was diverted.

“Dust,” said Mrs. Brown, with a sigh.  “Only Sister Anne’s ’flock of sheep.’”

The Colonel, whose literary recollections did not extend farther back than last week’s paper, took a more practical view.  “It ain’t sheep,” he continued; “it’s a horseman.  Judge, ain’t that Jack Hamlin’s gray?”

But the Judge didn’t know; and as Mrs. Brown suggested the air was growing too cold for further investigations, they retired to the parlor.

Mr. Brown was in the stable, where he generally retired after dinner.  Perhaps it was to show his contempt for his wife’s companions; perhaps, like other weak natures, he found pleasure in the exercise of absolute power over inferior animals.  He had a certain gratification in the training of a chestnut mare, whom he could beat or caress as pleased him, which he couldn’t do with Mrs. Brown.  It was here that he recognized a certain gray horse which had just come in, and, looking a little farther on, found his rider.  Brown’s greeting was cordial and hearty, Mr. Hamlin’s somewhat restrained.  But at Brown’s urgent request, he followed him up the back stairs to a narrow corridor, and thence to a small room looking out upon the stable yard.  It was plainly furnished with a bed, a table, a few chairs, and a rack for guns and whips.