"I have an offer. The one that--that I told you of. It is an excellent opening--so Morani says. The company goes abroad--next week. And I know the part." "And you wish to go?" His voice hurt her with its absence of color. She lifted her hands and let them fall in her lap. Her gaze left the electric light, where the moth was still revolving in its little orbit. "It is not choice," she replied; "it is necessity. What else is there to do--except starve? Can we go on living like this day after day, you killing yourself with work, I a drag? It is better that I should go--better for us both." He hesitated a moment as if in thought, and when he spoke it was with judicial calm. "And would you have gone--a year ago?" She was silent so long that he would have repeated the question, but at his first word the answer came with a wave of self-abasement. "I--I suppose not." And that was all. During the next few days the subject of Mariana's decision was not mentioned. Both felt a constraint in alluding to it, and yet both felt the inevitableness of the final hour. Anthony's pride had long since sealed his lips over the expressions of an unwished-for affection, and Mariana had grown chary of words. But both went quietly along their daily lives, Anthony working at his desk while Mariana gathered together her shabby garments and made ready for the moment which by word and look they both ignored. Then at last, when the night before her going came, Mariana spoke. They had just risen from the supper-table and the slipshod maid of work had carried off the unemptied tray. Mariana had eaten nothing. Her face was flushed, and she was moving excitedly about the room. "I go to-morrow," she began, feverishly. Algarcife looked up from a book through which he was searching for a date. "So you have decided?" His lips twitched slightly and the veins upon his forehead contracted. Mariana shook out a night-gown which she had taken from a drawer, folded it carefully, and laid it in the trunk. "There is nothing else to do," she replied, mechanically, as if she were fencing with fate from a corner into which she had been driven. Algarcife closed the book and rose to his feet. He pressed his hand upon his eyes to screen them from the glare of light. Then he moistened his lips before speaking. "Do you realize what it means?" he asked. Mariana lowered her head into the trunk and her voice sounded from among the clothes. "There is nothing else to do," she repeated, as mechanically as before. "I hope that it will be for your happiness," said Algarcife, and turned away. Then he went towards her in sudden determination. "Is there anything that I can help you about?" Mariana stood up and shook her head. "I think not," she answered. "Signor Morani calls for me to-morrow at six." Algarcife sat down, but the old sensation of dizziness came upon him and he closed his eyes. "Have you a headache?" asked Mariana. "The tea was very bad. Shall I make you a cup?"