"It means the end of whatever affection he has for his wife. Of course he never had much. A man of his sort doesn't." She looked at him with curiosity in her face. "What difference does her performing make in his affection for her?" "Can't you see that he didn't fall in love with _her_? He fell in love with her performance." Mrs. Tate put one finger to her lips and hesitated for a moment. Then she said slowly:-- "How ridiculous you are, Percy! As if any one ever heard of such a thing!" XVI On the way home in the hansom that he had called, Jules scarcely spoke. Blanche kept glancing at him covertly; she had never before seen that look in his face, and it alarmed her; he seemed to be trying to keep back the anger that showed itself in his half-closed eyes and his firm-set chin. When they reached the lodgings, Blanche found Madeleine sound asleep by the fireplace, and without waking her, she started to go into the next room to see if Jeanne were comfortable. When she reached the door, Jules said in a low voice:-- "Wait here a minute. I have something to say to you." At the sound of the words, Madeleine's eyes opened slowly, and she blinked at Jules, who was glancing angrily at her. "This is a pretty way you take care of Jeanne. She might have had a dozen convulsions without your knowing anything about them." In spite of Jules' command, the reference to the convulsions, which had nearly cost Jeanne her life a few weeks after birth, sent Blanche agitatedly into the nursery. Madeleine lumbered behind her, and both were relieved to find the child sleeping contentedly in her cradle, her cheeks flushed, and her chubby hands clenched at her breast. Blanche would have liked to pass several moments there in rapt adoration, but Jules appeared at the door and made a sign to her to come to him. "Madeleine will look out for her," he said, pointing to the cradle. "Go to bed, Madeleine." Blanche tiptoed out of the room, removed her wraps, and, with the overcoat Jules had thrown on the couch, hung them in the little closet beside the big mirror. Jules, who had taken a seat in front of the fire-place, watched her impatiently, and then motioned her to sit in the chair opposite him. "Now perhaps you'll be kind enough to tell me what all this means. I knew that Englishwoman would be up to some mischief. What does it mean?" he said sternly. Blanche looked timidly into his face; the expression of anger that she had noticed on their way home was still there. She did not know what to say, and tears of misery filled her eyes and rolled slowly down her cheeks. Then weakened by her previous outburst, she covered her face with her hands, and began to sob, giving expression to all the torture that had come from the horror of her performance, from her incessant terror of being killed and separated from Jeanne. Jules was at first touched, and then alarmed, by the unexpected display of grief.