THE LADY IN FETTERS
Perhaps I expected something from it—but, however it may be, I became weak and wicked before him, as a humble slave."
And then she calmly began to tell in detail how her husband had treated her. She spoke as if it were of some one other than herself who had endured all his cruelty and mockery.
Kragaef listened with pity and indignation, but her voice sounded so unmoved, and there was so much evil contagion in her words, that he suddenly began to feel within himself a wild desire to throw her on to the ground and beat her as her husband had done. The longer she talked and the more she described in detail how her husband had treated her, the stronger became his feeling and the greater his desire. At first it seemed to him that his anger at the shameless frankness with which she told of her sufferings, with her quiet, almost innocent cynicism, aroused this wild desire in him. But soon he understood that there was a much deeper reason for this wicked feeling.
Was it not, in truth, the soul of the dead husband becoming incarnate in himself, the monstrous spirit of an evil, weak torturer? He was terrified at first, but soon this momentary pang of terror died away in his
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