“Yes; she _is_ beautiful,” Rue answered, in a very low tone—“more beautiful than ever. And such a perfect lady, too—so charming and so graceful, one can’t help loving her. I don’t wonder at you men, Will, when even we women feel it.” They drove on for another minute or two, each musing silently. Then Will spoke again. “Do you think,” he inquired, in a very anxious voice, “she’s . . . she’s happy with her husband?” “No!” Rue answered, decisively. It was the short, sharp, extremely explosive “No” that closes a subject. “I thought not, myself,” Will went on, with still greater constraint. “I was afraid she wasn’t. But . . . I thought . . . I might be prejudiced.” Rue lifted her eyes, and met his, by the gloom of the gas-lamps. “She’s very unhappy with him,” she burst out all at once with a woman’s instinct. “She does not love him, and has never loved him. How could she—that block of ice—that lump of marble. She tries to do everything that’s right and good towards him, because he’s her husband, and she ought to behave so to him. She’s a good woman, I’m sure—a pure, good woman; her soul’s in her art, and she tries not to think too much of her unhappiness. But she loves somebody else best—and she knows she loves him. I saw it in her eyes, and I couldn’t be deceived about it.” “You think so?” Will cried, eagerly. Her words were balm to him. Rue drew a deep sigh. “I don’t _think_ it; I know it,” she answered, sadly. “O Rue, how good you are,” Will murmured, with a feeling very much like remorse. “What other woman on earth but yourself would tell me so?” Rue sighed a second time. “I saw it in her eyes,” she went on, looking hard at him still, “when first she noticed you; I saw it still more when that dreadful man Lindner came up into the box, and she waited trembling, to see what was going to happen. I watched her face; it was full of terror. But it wasn’t the loving terror of a woman who thinks the husband she adores is just about to be attacked; it was the mere physical terror of a shrinking soul at the sight of a crime, a quarrel, a scuffle. You saved that man’s life, Will; whether you know it or not, you saved it; for the other was a quarrelsome, revengeful fellow, who came there fully prepared, as Florian told us, to stab his rival. You saved his life; and when I looked at yourself, and Linnet standing by, I thought at the time what a bad turn you had done——” “For _her_?” Will suggested, in a very low tone. “Oh no,” Rue answered aloud; “not for her alone, but for you as well—for you and her—for both of you.” CHAPTER XXXII WEDDED FELICITY