They rarely or never spoke.  Beyond a grave inclination of the head, or a look whose profound misery he only understood, she gave him no recognition.  The world held her name above reproach, and considered that she had done very well to herself.

Ten years passed away, but the changes they brought were such as the world regards as natural and inevitable.  Christine’s mother died and her father married again; and Christine had a son and a daughter.  Franz watched anxiously to see if this new love would break up the icy coldness of her manners.  Sometimes he was conscious of feeling angrily jealous of the children, but he always crushed down the wretched passion.  “If Christine loved a flower, would I not love it also?” he asked himself; “and these little ones, what have they done?” So at last he got to separate them entirely from every one but Christine, and to regard them as part and portion of his love.

But at the end of ten years a change came, neither natural nor expected.  Franz was walking moodily about his library one night, when Louis came to tell him of it, Louis was no longer young, and was married now, for he had found out that the beaten track is the safest.

“Franz,” he said, “have you heard about Clarke?  His affairs are frightfully wrong, and he shot himself an hour ago.”

“And Christine?  Does she know?  Who has gone to her?”

“My wife is with her.  Clarke shot himself in his own room.  Christine was the first to reach him.  He left a letter saying he was absolutely ruined.”

“Where will Christine and the children go?”

“I suppose to her father’s.  Not a pleasant place for her now.  Christine’s step-mother dislikes both her and the children.”

Franz said no more, and Louis went away with a feeling of disappointment.  “I thought he would have done something for her,” he said to his wife.  “Poor Christine will be very poor and dependent.”

Ten days after he came home with a different story.  “There never was a woman as lucky about money as Cousin Christine,” he said.  “Hardy & Hall sent her notice to-day that the property at Ryebeach settled on her before her marriage by Mr. Clarke was now at her disposal.  It seems the old gentleman anticipated the result of his wild speculations, and in order to provide for his wife, quietly bought and placed in Hardy’s charge two beautifully furnished cottages.  There is something like an accumulation of sixteen thousand dollars of rentage; and as one is luckily empty, Christine and the children are going there at once.  I always thought the property was Hardy’s own before.  Very thoughtful in Clarke.”

“It is not Clarke one bit.  I don’t believe he ever did it.  It is some arrangement of Franz Mueller’s.”

“For goodness’ sake don’t hint such a thing, Lizzie!  Christine would not go, and we should have her here very soon.  Besides, I don’t believe it.  Franz took the news very coolly, and he has kept out of my way since.”