So there's the end of the business, or rather one hopes so.

I used to hope that Clarice would wake up some morning into a real woman and find herself--isn't that the phrase?
I hope the reverse now; that she and her husband will philander along to the close of the chapter.

But I prefer your word,--to the close of the "comedy," say.

It implies something artificial.

Mallinson and Clarice give me that impression,--as of Watteau figures mincing a gavotte, and made more unreal by the juxtaposition of a man.