He had anticipated sullen temper, renewed quarrels, and then perhaps a separation, but he was startled to find her actually gone.

The servant gave him the cold farewell letter, written without tears, without sorrow.

He tore it into shreds and flung it from him.
"The last act in the farce," he said, bitterly.

"If I had not been mad, I should have foreseen this." The silent, deserted rooms did not remind him of the loving young wife parted from him forever.

He was too angry, too annoyed, for any gentle thoughts to influence him.