He could not feel safe and at ease with his temple of peace built close to a slumbering volcano, which was liable at any moment to blaze forth and bury its fair proportions in lava and ashes.
Irene did not comprehend her husband's state of mind.

She felt painfully the change in his manner, but failed in reaching the true cause.

Sometimes she attributed his coldness to resentment; sometimes to defect of love; and sometimes to a settled determination on his part to inflict punishment.

Sometimes she spent hours alone, weeping over these sad ruins of her peace, and sometimes, in a spirit of revolt, she laid down for herself a line of conduct intended to react against her husband.

But something in his calm, kind, self-reliant manner, when she looked into his face, broke down her purpose.