We married; my mother went wild, and my father went wild, and my friend went wild — the friend who took to talking to my father and my mother, and whispering about you to everyone; he took to telling of what you had taken in payment! So I went to him and gave him his fill of blows and contempt, and came back to you weary, pain and the struggle of doubt storming in my glances. You lowered your gaze, clasped your hands in despair, and said:

"Let me go... I do not want this torment for you! I do not want you to hear whispering and talk every day, and to live humbled, carrying my sin on your shoulder when no part of the sin is yours." You spoke like a homeless child trying to find some corner apart, wide enough for her and her sorrows... I went mad with tenderness for you, and ran to you and pressed you to me, to shield you from every harm — you, who never harmed anyone but yourself...

You looked at me long, then hid your tired head against my breast and wept, whispering: "I will be the best of wives to you, and I will make you the happiest of husbands"...

And so you were, and so you made me. People fled my company because I had married you, and people fled you because in their eyes you were a devil overflowing with evil, scattering it over their good earth... They did not know that you had created of me a man, a person, a being... You taught me to pay no heed to obstacles or hardships; you showed me that people's envy is weakness and their persecution ignorance... You taught me true faith in all that is true and noble and beautiful... You wiped sickness from my face and weariness from my body. I loved my mother and my father because they gave me being; I for-gave them their hatred of you and their loathing of you, and so rose above them in reason and right-ness... Lord, how beautiful you were! Ah, how sweet you were!!

I remember the day you learned that motherhood was drawing near you — the day you filled the house with joy and flowers, and our little table with cheer and food! I too was coming home to you with news of a promotion and a small gift... And when I came in, you read in my face the gladness and the glad tidings, and your eyes lit up, and I asked you: "Do you not see news in my face?" And you said: "Yes — and you, do you not see news in mine?" So you gave me your good news and I gave you mine, and we fell to dancing like two children whose hands had filled with dolls and with hope. And I said to you, reeling like a drunkard with joy: You are the world! You are life! And here is the world in my arms!

And you set about drawing up plans, preparing names, sewing

garments — all of it for a child you were making ready for me! And all I knew afterward was your being suddenly in the hos-pital, ill, hanging between death and life, after the unborn child was lost from you. I did not leave you for a moment, and did not sleep until the shadow of danger had gone from you; and when you came home wilted and frail, I hovered over you in anxious tenderness, watching your gaiety melt swiftly away from you... And it would seem to me that you were hiding from me some great secret that weighed upon your breast; I did not ask you about it, for I knew you hid only what you preferred to hide — so I kept silent!... And the days passed, and a year passed