Why did he let himself go in this lamentable fashion before his wife? His was not the kind of trouble which could be comforted by the coddling of a wife; pride--shame--should make him hide it in his heart. “Rubbish!” All the time he was brushing his teeth, the word throbbed in his temples and played havoc amongst his noblest thoughts. After all, what did his last book matter? He forgot his father’s phrase--or at any rate he forgot it was his father’s. For the first time in his life awful questionings beset him. He, who up to that time had never met with anything but approval and smiles, felt rising within him a doubt as to the sincerity of those smiles, as to the value of that approval, as to the value of his works, as to the reality of his thought, as to the genuineness of his life. He returned to the bedroom, absent-mindedly holding his tooth-glass in one hand and his tooth-brush in the other; he placed the glass, which was half full of rose-coloured water, on the chest of drawers, and put the brush in the glass; then he sat down at a little satin-wood escritoire, where Marguerite did her writing. He seized his wife’s pen-holder and, taking a sheet of paper, which was tinted mauve and delicately perfumed, began: “MY DEAR FATHER, “I found your note awaiting me on my return home this evening. Your errand shall be punctually performed to-morrow morning. I hope to be able to manage the matter to your satisfaction, and by so doing to give you a proof of my devoted attachment.” For Julius was one of those noble natures whose true greatness flowers amid the thorns of humiliation. Then, leaning back in his chair, he remained a few moments, pen in hand, trying to turn his sentence: “It is a matter of grief to me that you, of all people in the world, should be the one to suspect my disinterestedness, which ...” No! Perhaps: “Do you think that literary honesty is less dear to me than ...” The sentence wouldn’t come. Julius, who was in his night things, felt that he was catching cold; he crumpled up the paper, took up his tooth-glass and went back with it to his dressing-room, at the same time throwing the crumpled letter into the slop-pail. Just as he was getting into bed, he touched his wife upon the shoulder: “And what do _you_ think of my book?” he asked. Marguerite half opened a glazed and lifeless eye. Julius was obliged to repeat his question. Turning partly round, Marguerite looked at him. His eyebrows raised under a network of wrinkles, his lips contracted, Julius was a pitiable object. “What’s the matter, dear? Do you really think your last book isn’t as good as the others?” That was no sort of answer. Marguerite was eluding the point. “I think the others are no better than this. So there!” “Oh, well then!...” And Marguerite, losing heart in the face of these monstrosities, and feeling that all her tender arguments were wasted, turned round towards the dark and once more slept. II