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But what of that? Surely women in society can talk to whom they

please. And then, jealousy means lowering both myself and her,"

he told himself as he went into her boudoir; but this dictum,

which had always had such weight with him before, had now no

weight and no meaning at all. And from the bedroom door he turned

back again; but as he entered the dark drawing-room some inner

voice told him that it was not so, and that if others noticed it

that showed that there was something. And he said to himself

again in the dining-room, "Yes, I must decide and put a stop to

it, and express my view of it...." And again at the turn in the

drawing-room he asked himself, "Decide how?" And again he asked

himself, "What had occurred?" and answered, "Nothing," and

recollected that jealousy was a feeling insulting to his wife;

but again in the drawing-room he was convinced that something had

happened. His thoughts, like his body, went round a complete

circle, without coming upon anything new.