“The pursuit of happiness is a constitutional privilege, even for women. At least one has the right to choose the particular form of misery one prefers. Now Fate,” she said, “I am tired. Take you the reins and guide. What I am to meet, I must meet, and no shrinking or hesitating will avail against the inevitable.” And so she too, went away, never to return. CHAPTER V. THE END OF THE DREAM. “O shaven priest that pratest of souls, Knowest thou not that men are moles That blindly grope and burrow? The field that is grey shall be green again; But whether with grass or whether with grain, He knoweth who turns the furrow.” Miss Cartice Hill had been Mrs. Louis Doring six months,--a little portion of time, yet long enough to destroy all her illusions, and arouse her from her trance. The man she had idealized and loved for four years was a different person from him who was now her husband. Day by day the awakening had been going on, until his character stood revealed before her in repellent nudity, with all its pitiable defects unconcealed, and the worst of it was that he was not ashamed. A brilliant rascal usually has some qualities that command respect, however abominable his knavish ones, but Doring’s defects were the contemptible frailties of a fool. His wife had expected intellectual companionship, but she found his even-featured face a mask over dull nothingness, a shield for the emptiness of his mind. When the full force of this discovery came upon her it covered her with humiliation and destroyed her self-confidence and self-respect, nor did these qualities ever return to her in their former strength in all the future years. To have made so fatal a blunder shook her faith in her own wisdom forever. How was it that she had been blind and now saw? Who had woven the spell which had glorified its object from afar? She had been her own enchanter, though she knew it not. In him she had seen only that which was within herself, until forced to see him as he really was. Two days after their marriage her husband said to her, “Cartice, do you have any money?” “Yes,” she answered, pleasantly. “How much?” “I don’t know. See,” and she handed him her purse. He took it and counted fifty dollars. “Is that all?” he asked, in a disappointed voice. “As you had only yourself to support you should have saved money.” “I did save some,” she said, turning pale. “Where is it?” She told him. “I guess we shall have to use it right now,” he said. “Some business ventures of mine have not begun to pay yet, so it’s a good thing we have this ready money.”