They got up and put on their coats, sipping their coffee standing. The painter was silent and preoccupied. There was a gloom over him. He could not bear this marriage, and yet it seemed to him to be better than many other things that might have happened....

I am surely in the toils. Last night the Count asked me in the suavest tones to write three letters, one saying that my work here was nearly done and that I should start for home within a few days, another that I was starting on the next morning from the time of the letter....