When she came to him that evening, he saw at once that the poor thing
was ignorant as yet of her misfortune. But the next day, she arrived,
panting, convulsed, pale as death. She threw herself into his arms, and
hid her face on his breast.
'You know?' she gasped between her sobs.
The news had spread. Disgrace and ruin were inevitable, irremediable.
There followed days of hideous torture, during which Maria, left alone
after the precipitate flight of the gamester, abandoned by the few
friends she possessed, persecuted by the innumerable creditors of her
husband, bewildered by the legal formalities of the seizure of their
effects, by bailiffs, money-lenders and rogues of all sorts, gave
evidences of a courage that was nothing less than heroic, but failed to
avert the utter ruin that overwhelmed the family.
From her lover she would receive no assistance of any kind; she told him
nothing of the martyrdom she was enduring even when he reproached her
for the brevity of her visits. She never complained; for him she always
managed to call up a less mournful smile; still obeyed the dictates of
her lover's capricious passion, and lavished upon her ruthless destroyer
all the treasures of her fond heart.
Her presentiments had not deceived her. Everything was falling in ruins
around her. Punishment had overtaken her without a moment's warning.
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