Chapter IX: Part III: I (3)

In the afternoon she was brought to her home on the Boulevard des Adieux, and her daughter-in-law took her place at her bedside. The next day Blanche Vernier came down with the children, of whom she had offered to take charge. The case was diagnosed as congestion of the lungs, which grew no worse until the fifth day. Immediately upon her arrival at Grenoble, Elizabeth had begged Philippe Lagier to wire to Albert's address in Paris. As there was no answer, she sent repeated telegrams, all of which were returned to her marked "Absent." When the invalid was questioned she could give no exact information. As her son left her, he had spoken of a rapid journey to Piedmont, returning to Paris over the Simplon.

"I shall write to you during the trip," he had added.

A post card came, which bore the name of an unknown village in Italy. On a detailed map they found that it was in the neighborhood of Ivrée. In accordance with his usual plan, the traveler was journeying through out of the way places to gain information for his book. Another telegram, directed there as a last resort, did not reach him. At last he wrote from Aosta, and his letter stated that he would spend a week there. Informed directly, he wired that he would leave with all possible haste. It was the eighth day and his mother had passed away the night before. They did not tell him so, but he could draw that conclusion from the telegram.

She would no doubt have recovered from an illness whose symptoms had not at first given rise to much alarm, had it not been for her age, and more especially for that gradual weakening, which in time, results from financial worries, sorrows and mental strain. After the death of her husband, she had known the worry of financial straits, the necessity for work, and all the demands of the noblest maternal ambition. This son, the thought of whom had comforted her broken life, for whose development she had paved the way, whose success she had followed with so much joy and confidence, had now in turn, made her suffer, by renouncing the duty she considered most sacred, the devotion which in the innate consciousness of one of her race, seemed to her to be most important; that of continuing, of upholding the tradition of the family. She had bitterly reproached herself for the excess of delicacy which had prevented her from acting as peace-maker between Albert and Elizabeth, in whom she often told herself, she should have been able earlier to realize the virtue which had lain dormant until it was gradually brought out by a crisis. This separation had slowly undermined and weakened her. She exhausted herself in prayer, and in her faith in the expediency of sacrifice, as of a burnt offering to obtain from God the return of him, whom she called in secret her prodigal son. With what haste she had gone to Saint Martin, after her son's last visit, to cheer up Elizabeth's languishing hopes. On the way she had faced the fatigue which weakened her limbs, often stopping to take breath, sustained by the idea that she was bringing a little comfort to the deserted woman. For a moment she believed that Albert had gone before her. He had come, but had not remained. Then she had that vision of unusual exaltation; that perhaps her death might bring about what her life had been unable to accomplish.

If not at once, at least after the second day she understood, alone, that it was the end, and prepared herself for it. The illness hovered over her without crushing her, at last took hold of her, but without that violence which suppresses thought and destroys the intellectual faculties, in that last struggle that frees an inert body. She departed, with her brain intact and her heart full. Her calmness was surprising, almost terrifying to those about her. She asked for religious help and received it with a piety, which was like the natural breath of her soul.

"Jean," she said several times.

It was the name of her husband, whom no one had heard her mention for a long time. She was reserved about her most intimate emotions. This name, so peacefully invoked, revealed the endurance of a deathless love which eternity would satisfy--or again she would ask:

"Is he coming?"

By this she meant her son. And it was only this question which she asked so often that had the power to dim her clear eyes, to still her features, already motionless and almost fixed with a serenity which anticipated death. She began on the third day, despite the reassuring prognosis, to show some evidence of what was so soon to occur. With great composure she told Fanchette, who protested against it, where to find the sheets and her bridal dress. She asked for a humble funeral, without flowers or wreaths. She saw Philippe and Marie Louise, tried to smile at them and begged that they should not be brought again.

Elizabeth, assisted with the best of good-will by Mme. Molay-Norrois, possessing that almost supernatural strength of woman at the bedside of invalids--watched over and took care of her day and night. When she came near her, she felt a sort of fear in seeing her so peaceful and almost relaxed. Once, being unable to hear the advice her mother-in-law was quietly giving her, she burst into sobs.

"Do not leave me, Mother," she entreated. "What shall I do without you--you are still Albert."

"I shall not leave you," said the dying woman with conviction.

And, with infinite tenderness, she added faintly:

"My daughter.--I had formerly regretted having had no daughter. One is always in a hurry to pity oneself!"

Then she seemed to gather a little strength, sufficient to inquire:

"Elizabeth, he will come back some day, I am certain of it. When he does, will you promise me that you will forgive him, forgive him without any restriction?"

How could Elizabeth refuse?

"I promise you," she said solemnly.

"That is right," answered Mme. Derize, "if he were there, I should have tried to join your hands. It is not time yet."

On the fifth day she appeared to be resigned to the fact that her son would not return. It was her last hope. She wished to see Philippe Lagier, who came every day to inquire about her. Their interviews, entirely alone, were of short duration; talking was already too much for her. She charged him to tell his friend of Elizabeth's devotion and of the change which had taken place in her. Was he not called to that mission and how could she, in the purity of her heart, suspect the humiliation he had known, which quite recently, he had believed to be incompatible with his engagement? Finally with great effort and frequent pauses, she expressed this singular confidence, which revealed to what degree she had thought of all the possibilities of reconciliation.

"On Albert's last visit, so few days ago, I knew that he was not happy. I was expecting that. Happiness cannot endure, except in truth. Then I thought that I would go to Paris, that I would go to see her."

"To see her?" repeated Philippe, who could not believe his ears.

"Yes, her. I have thought a great deal about it. Albert could not have broken so many ties for a miserable love. I knew him to be incapable of wickedness, although he is passionate and proud. Now this plan can no longer be realized...."

"When you are better."

"I shall never be better. Come closer. I want you to hear what I should have said to her, to her alone. Of his own accord, Albert will not leave her. I feel it: he has replaced the duty he has renounced with another, the chains of which he has tightened for himself. It is well said that one can never escape from his duty in life. I would have said to that woman:

"Whatever your love may be, it cannot make him happy. You realized that before I did. You were to blame for loving him when he was not free. If your love is what I think, it must be capable of sacrifice, even of secret sacrifice. Be generous, I will bless you and ..."

Choking stopped her, and she was unable to finish that exhausting communication, which implied so much cleverness and such faith in heroism. Philippe came back a little later, but the invalid's condition had grown worse. She tried once again to explain something to him which he was not able to catch, as her words had already become very indistinct. Did she wish him to undertake this strange mission on her behalf? The next day, which was the day of her death, she appeared transfigured, as if indifferent to all that was going on about her. She was resting in peace in advance. Her lips which still moved, showed that she was praying. She paid no attention to Albert's letter which Elizabeth was reading. Nevertheless, turning her eyes toward her daughter, whose grief was overcoming her, she tried to put her hand on her bent head, but it fell back with an uncertain movement. They were saying prayers for the dying, as she did not stir again. And her last breath followed the last verse.

Elizabeth, spent with fatigue and conquered by her nerves, called to her with a loud cry, as if in losing her she lost her love for a second time, and would henceforth be without protection. Her parents, considering her extreme in filial devotion, a virtue which, according to the gossip of the town, their son-in-law had utterly neglected, insisted upon taking her away.

"Now," said Mme. Molay-Norrois, alarmed at her condition, and wishing to quiet her overexcitement, "now stay with us. You have fulfilled every duty and more than your duty. You must take care of your health, for your children's sake and your own."

But who would be there when Albert arrived with despair in his heart? Who would receive him, explain the illness to him, tell him about the last moments of the invalid, give him her last thoughts and that sort of consolation so essential to strong souls: that of exhausting all the details of sorrow? No, no, she had not yet finished her work. In the spirit, if not in actuality, she was Albert's wife. She would be there to palliate the first shock faithfully, to give to the son the substance of the words and injunctions which she had received from his mother. One might accuse her of lack of dignity: what matter? Mme. Derize would be pleased with her.

She had calculated that he would arrive with the morning train at eight o'clock. Before eight she went to the Boulevard des Adieux. Her heart was beating, however, she trembled, she was afraid, but remained there. Philippe, who had gone to the station, came back with Albert, to whom he had broken the sad news. In the carriage along the road he alone had spoken. At the sound of the bell, Fanchette, dragging her feet, came to open the door.

"My poor Fanchette," said Albert, as he embraced her. It was his first word of emotion.

She dried her tears and showed him into the drawing-room.

"Madame is there," she said.

He thought she meant his mother and went in. He found himself face to face with Elizabeth, who was standing and walked to meet him; he made an involuntary movement of surprise, as if he did not recognize her. He no longer found the same Elizabeth, whom he had left eighteen months before, her beauty then somewhat heavy and sluggish, her face round and expressionless, but he now saw a new Elizabeth, thinner, more graceful, looking taller in her mourning gown, pale through lack of sleep, her eyes surrounded with dark circles, her features sunken--all denoting a life of suffering, which counteracted the disadvantages of sorrow. Philippe Lagier who followed him, had not anticipated that she would have the courage to be there. And with a greater freedom of observation, although equally sorrowful, he noticed that she was wearing a bodice which showed her figure to advantage. When the bell rang, she had trembled so that she had been obliged to lean against a table. Then everything seemed to simplify itself for her quickly. The obligation which was imposed upon her could not offend her dignity. She would fulfill it and would then return to the darkness. One imagines in advance difficulties which disappear of themselves. Seeing her husband under such circumstances, she realized a great inner peace, as soon as he came in. With a voice, which too, had changed and become lower, she said at once without speaking his name.

"She was waiting for you. As I had the privilege of helping her in your place, I will tell you about her, of her last days, if you wish."

After shaking hands with her, Philippe expressed his intention of withdrawing, but she detained him for a moment, almost begging for his protection.

"You will come back soon, will you not? In an hour?"

"Yes, Madame."

They were left alone, facing each other, he confused, motionless, finding not a word to say; she, carrying on, with amazing ease, this interview which she had so dreaded.

"I had wired to Paris," she explained. "We did not know where to reach you. At last your letter came from Aosta."

With dry lips, his face drawn by the sorrow to which he would not give way, he murmured:

"I had left her so well only a few days ago! I had no presentiment, I thought I should keep her for a long time to come."

"Yes, we never think we can lose those we love. You must be tired. You have not eaten nor slept. Will you have something? Later we can speak of her."

"I want to see her."

"She is there. Come."

She led him into the death chamber, knelt for a moment at the foot of the bed, motioning to the nun who was watching the body to follow her. She had divined Albert's desire. When he was sure of being alone, his sorrow carried him beyond all bounds, as a river its dam. She who lay there, emaciated and white, her eyes closed, her hands crossed over a crucifix--and what withered hands!--she whose forehead and cheeks, like marble, cold, but not hard, froze his mouth, as he kissed them in vain, she who would never again hear him, never see him or speak to him, she had twice given him life. After giving him birth, she nourished, developed and strengthened him without help or fortune. He owed to her his intellectual power, the moral force of his judgment, the courage to undertake those lengthy works, which demand a continued effort, of which so few are capable. In what intimacy they had spent so many years, the busiest and the happiest of years! He remembered them now with a sorrow that only one word could express, which re-echoed in the silence, like a groan.

"Mother!"

From afar he always felt her protection. She was a witness in his behalf. Now that witness was no more, and parts of his life lost their meaning, their value. With her he would bury his childhood and his youth, a whole period of days, clear as the expression of her eyes in life; a whole period of bright days that he had never found since and could never find again. And it was not he who had closed her eyes.

Was it not better that it was not he? Between them there was a fixed gulf. For a long time she had ceased to reproach him, but the direction of her thoughts was contrary to his, and their conversations, formerly so intimate, so deep, which were to him an inspiration, had for the most part, lost their power to interest and uplift him. Many forgotten details now came back to his memory, expressions of sadness, of words, indirectly imploring. Yes, he had burdened her last months with a sorrow, the weight of which she bore without complaint, but which had finally crushed her. He could not mourn her without a secret remorse. Formerly, when he was still quite a young man, giving way to a naturally quick temper, which he had great difficulty in controlling, he had spoken rudely to her. What shame he had felt! But she, anxious not to wound his pride, came to him as soon as he was quiet, so that he might be spared the first step. Then he learned to despise his faults. And now they were separated forever without a true reconciliation.

He had reached the limit of his despair and was utterly crushed, when Elizabeth came in quietly to join him. She made him sit down, and too weary to resist, he meekly obeyed. Their thoughts so long separated, were at one in the same sorrow. It was one of those unfathomable griefs, in which the only comfort is to weep with another, and they could not mingle their tears. Stricken by the same blow, the embrace which would have brought them comfort, which so many friends can exchange, was forbidden to them. Thus Albert had a keener realization of his solitude.

"Nobody," he said to himself to arouse himself from his suffering, "can know what I have lost. I alone shall carry away the memory and knowledge of the will power which sustained her little body, so fragile beneath the sheet, the fire which animated those closed eyes. Anne could not come with me. She pities me from a distance, but she did not know her. She only knew of her unfriendliness toward her, and her rigid uprightness. Our love is disarmed before this dear, dead woman who belongs solely to me. And she who is here is nothing more to me than a stranger."

"The Stranger," shielded by the beloved presence of the dead, commenced to tell him in a low voice of the beginning of the illness and its successive phases. She told of the invalid's composure, her spirit of calm, her preparation, her desire to see her son again, the good-by she had sent him. She omitted everything that had reference to their separation and to her own devotion. She spoke with so much tact and filial love, that, as he listened, Albert was getting comfort in grief, which can come to us only by deepening our suffering. Overcome by his injustice, he murmured:

"You have taken my place. I know you have been a daughter to her. She said so in all her letters to me. Now I believe it. I thank you."

At these first words expressed with less indifference, inspired by gratitude and decorum, Elizabeth felt she could no longer play her part. Tears and her weakness overcame her, but she gazed mechanically on the pillow, at the face so peaceful and serene, and took sudden comfort from it.

"I have caused her a great deal of sorrow," added Albert, making this confession almost in spite of himself, in response to what he had just heard.

Elizabeth had the strength to reply.

"She had confidence in you."

What did she mean by that? As he tried to interpret it, realizing that this tête-à-tête could not last much longer, she added:

"Come with me."

He followed her out of the room. She led him into the dining-room where Fanchette had laid a place for him.

"You must have some breakfast and warm yourself. It is very cold to-day. I am going back to the children. My friend Blanche Vernier has taken them to her house. I dare not bring them here. They are so little!"

"Marie Louise, Philippe," he said slowly, with a tenderness which made him tremble.

"But you can see them there, or at the home of my parents, or at Philippe Lagier's, as you like."

"At Philippe's."

"Very well. He is coming back. You can arrange with him."

She alone spoke, her mouth drawn, her face tense with the effort. He could only answer her. Philippe Lagier, faithful to his promise, came to relieve their embarrassment. As soon as he arrived, while he was trying, not without a painful acknowledgment, to understand their reciprocal emotions, and while Albert, suffering from hunger, could not make up his mind to eat, Elizabeth dressed herself to go out.

"Our friend," she said, turning towards her husband, "wishes to make all the arrangements. The funeral is the day after to-morrow. I shall be here. Au revoir."

The two men watched her as she was leaving, but did not mention her then. She went back into the death chamber, before she left the flat.

"Mother," she entreated, on her knees.

This cry expressed all the emotion she had felt, but had suppressed, on seeing her husband again; all the torture of love renewed by his actual presence. For the second time, the peace of death calmed her heart.

In the afternoon Albert saw his children at Philippe Lagier's. At first, in kissing them, in comparing them with the past--(on the road at Saint Martin d'Uriage he had held them for only a moment in his arms) he experienced a sad joy which in his sorrowful condition pained him exceedingly, making him almost feverish. They surprised him by telling him the story of Mélusine and that of Lesdiguières.

"Who has told you these stories?"

"Mamma."

He had expected to find a carelessness, a feminine indulgence in the education of the two children, and he discovered instead an unexpected development and liveliness of intelligence and body to which he had contributed nothing. His desertion had not brought with it any loss to them. Instead of giving to Elizabeth the credit for it, he was irritated by it, because it seems cruel to us to discover how unimportant our influence may be.

The little boy was the first to tire of these effusions and put questions which referred to unimportant events in his life, which were insolvable to anyone who had not been directly concerned in them. Marie Louise herself even discontinued her playfulness and fancies, in order to explain to her brother that Papa could not know, that after all Papa was only an amateur father, who was very little in touch with their doings and movements. This was the meaning of her remarks which she uttered in her little decided authoritative voice. Mamma,--she never left them, except to look after Grandmamma.

"It is I who am the stranger here," thought Albert, suffering from such frankness.

The conquest of children, even of his own, could not be undertaken in an hour. He left Marie Louise and Philippe, his heart sick with disappointment, his nerves wrung. As soon as he no longer saw their dear little heads, he was filled with an immediate wish to bring them back, to keep them with him, without saying anything to her who had separated them. And when he came back to his mother's house he took with him an added regret, a deep melancholy which Anne's love could no more satisfy than it could his grief for his mother. He remained in the death chamber until evening, filled with despair in relinquishing one by one the ties which had exalted his life. The next day, spent in the same way, was even more cruel to him. He had a letter and a telegram from Anne who was awaiting him at Lyons. He read them absently and in a spirit of injustice! What could she know of his thoughts?

When on the morning of the funeral he again saw Elizabeth, who came to do the honors of the house, he wished he had been mistaken the evening before in finding that her expression was changed, that she was more awakened and bearing alone a sorrow as great as his own. She asked him complacently how he was, but pitied him with her looks, with her entire uneasy attitude, friendly and dismayed at one and the same time. The Molay-Norrois arrived in their turn, and manifested an attitude of discreet sympathy toward their son-in-law. Then came other relations and friends. He was accepted once more by the family connections, relatives and the social circle with which he had believed all ties were broken. And in his great pride he endured it with bitterness.

The report was circulated in Grenoble that the death of Mme. Derize had reconciled the separated couple. Each one in the large crowd determined to watch for indications of it: to our utmost pity we add so much curiosity and such sudden indifference. The funeral procession was the object of attentive inspection to everyone, from Mme. Passerat, who, having loaned her motor to the invalid, prided herself upon a personal interest, to the little clerk Malaunay, who was concerned in it because of his bet. Elizabeth wished to take her place with the relations who were the chief mourners, behind her husband and her father who followed the hearse. By her presence, she showed besides her affection for the dead woman, her unwavering faithfulness to the name she bore.

The cemetery is only a short distance from the Cathedral, which is the parish church of the Boulevard des Adieux. They had only to go through a gate in the old ramparts and along the avenue L'Ile Verte, all covered with dead leaves, which were crushed beneath the horses' hoofs and the feet of the mourners. The moment when the coffin is lowered into the ground, is one of the most anguish-filled that a loving heart has to bear. Albert instinctively lifted his hand to his eyes. A vision interposed between himself and his sorrow--that of Elizabeth overwhelmed. Did he remember that sentence in his diary: "She does not know my mother--she will never know her. If I were to have the misfortune of losing her, I should mourn for her alone."

On the return, although crushed, she received the procession of guests who came to pay their condolence calls, then went upstairs to give some orders to the old servant. Albert came back, accompanied by Philippe Lagier. Having completed her self-imposed duty, she greeted Philippe with an "Au revoir" and turning to her husband, said:

"Now good-by, keep up your courage."

Not understanding that that was final, but ill at ease, he asked:

"Are you going away?"

"Yes."

"Where are you going?"

"I am going home. Should I send the children to you?"

He hesitated--then in a dull voice, answered:

"No."

She bowed. The door closed behind her. They would never see each other again.

As soon as she had gone, Albert made a few steps forward to call her back. What would he have said to her? Agitated, he walked up and down the room without speaking. In a few hours what emotions, what sorrow had he not experienced! His friend, motionless and silent, read with ease the succession of his thoughts, but by natural inclination had greater pity for the woman.

Fanchette came in to announce luncheon. Albert looked at her, seemed to be reflecting, and his decision made, declared in his clear voice:

"I am going to take you back to Paris."

This statement caused a shock at which she gave way as an old piece of furniture when its wood cracks. She crossed herself at once at the idea of going to that doomed city to wait upon a wicked woman, no doubt, and shaking her head from right to left, she stammered:

"No, no, M. Albert."

"Why will you not accept? Where will you go?

"To Madame Elizabeth."

He frowned.

"You will leave me?"

"Oh, no, Monsieur Albert. Only there are the little ones, and then, Madame Elizabeth has been so kind. You don't know how she took care of madame. Day and night she was always here."

He cut these praises short.

"I know," he said.

Luncheon was hurried and silent. In the drawing-room to which the two men returned together, Albert more and more absorbed and bitter, at last giving full vent to the torrent of his impressions, admitted as if to himself.

"Yes, she has changed a great deal."

He added:

"Does she still refuse the allowance that I have sent to my solicitor every month?"

"Yes."

"I ought to have demanded a promise of acceptance from her. She is depriving me of helping to support my own children and without right. It is unfair."

Philippe, whose passion had purified itself in following the brave efforts of Elizabeth, and who was still under the spell of Madame Derize's last wishes, generously desired to bring about a reconciliation and continued the praises which Fanchette had begun. He told of the lives of the two women at Grenoble and Saint Martin, their intimacy, the sacred devotion of the younger, who had changed the last year of the dead woman's life. In vain he was interrupted sharply with "I know, I know."

"No, you cannot know," he concluded, out of patience.

Albert, who had begun his walk again, stopped suddenly. His face wore that expression which it took on in anger, as his former violence overcame him again in the face of unbearable contradiction. However, he tried to master himself, and the insinuation which followed conveyed only wounding insolence:

"Then it was true what they wrote from Grenoble."

"What then?"

"That you were in love with my wife."

Philippe faced Albert's look, which was hard and imperious.

"Yes," he said calmly. "I have a worshipful admiration for Elizabeth. You may call it what you like."

"Take care, I shall know how to defend her."

"Against what and by what right?"

And influenced by his own unselfishness which inclined him to greatness of soul, desiring to expiate his former deception, he rose and held out his hand to his friend who did not refuse it:

"Come, Albert, how can we talk in this way--here."

Albert returned his handshake with that gratitude we feel toward those who have saved us from our own pettiness:

"I am unjust. They were infamous anonymous letters that I scarcely read. And then, her death has recalled so many memories that I believed to be remote, utterly silenced. A little flame has burst from the embers of my fireside."

"Can you not rebuild it?"

"No. But I could not see my mother on that bed, my wife, my children, without yearning for the right life which might have been mine. Do you understand? Elizabeth closed my mother's eyes; it is she who is bringing up Marie Louise and little Philippe alone. Yesterday she spoke to me with so much emotion and consideration. I was not alone in my grief. She has changed very much. She is more beautiful. And by a strange reaction, now that we are only strangers, the one to the other, it seems as though she had acquired all the characteristics which I formerly wished her to have."

"Strangers? It is not final. There is nothing final."

"Yes, death. Yesterday, I assure you, I envied my mother. Her face was so peaceful, so calm, so pure. One no longer suffers. And, above all, one does not make anyone else suffer. Yes, it is a solution. I have thought of it."

"Albert!"

"The day before yesterday, this morning again. It is a thought which will return to me. Elizabeth would be free. She deserves to be free, to be happy. I can do nothing now to make her so, and do not even wish that she should be: I am so selfish, so illogical."

"You are jealous of her--you still love her."

"I have loved her. The past overwhelms me here. I inhale it with every breath."

The conversation lagged. Philippe sought a word to turn it.

"When are you going away?" he asked, to change the subject.

"This evening."

"So soon. To Paris?"

"No. Anne is waiting for me at Lyons."

"Ah. When will you be back?"

"I don't know. Perhaps never. Like most men I have not ordered my life. I can change nothing, and when I cross this threshold, I feel like a miserable brute. It is odious."

He was exalted by these last words.

"And your children," said Philippe.

"Their mother is not so indifferent to me that I dare to take them from her. They have become her aim in life. How could I tear them away from her?"

And tortured by this question which repeated itself over and over again in his mind, he spoke of it again.

"I am an outsider to my own family. How can I crush my wife by demanding this from her? And then her shortcomings are no longer anything compared with mine."

For the first time he condemned himself.

"Will you answer me?" asked Philippe brusquely. "Are you happy?"

Albert looked at him with an expression of bitter irony.

"I have lost my mother without seeing her again. I have lost my children, my home, my peace--A little while ago I spoke of dying. And you ask me if I am happy."

"I did not mean to offend you, Albert. There is such power in love that it longs to subordinate our greatest misfortunes--or it can give us strength to bear them. You have never known that love--or you no longer feel it."

"You are wrong: I still feel it. But love has never fulfilled a man's entire life."

"One last word. If you gave up ... that love...."

"It is useless to go on. I shall give it up only with my life. Just now, when I was speaking of dying, it was with her. She would follow me, no matter where, even to death."

"I understand. You are all in all to her, but the contrary is not true. How you will both suffer, both of you!"

Albert took his friend's arm.

"Listen, I am not a coward," he said. "The choice of my life is not entirely in my own hands. Circumstances have brought it about that I am everything to Anne. I shall not give her up--no matter what happens."

"You prefer to sacrifice your children?"

"They have their mother."

"And their mother?"

No answer following the question, Philippe added:

"Shall you see her again before your departure?"

"No, what should I say to her? That she should break our legal ties, that she should try to remake her own happiness--she is so young, so lovely, so fascinating--and that I can never be anything to her again?"

"And that you are not happy?"

"What matter."

And those words fell like a stone into a dry well.

All afternoon Elizabeth waited at home for the uncertain event which would bring her husband to her. She could not believe that he would go away without seeing her again. Had she not helped his mother, shared his sorrow with him even that morning? How could he be so cruel as to go away in this manner?

Night came, and she still held the hope, which was sustaining her, as she sat, ardent and motionless, in the same armchair, her ear strained to catch the slightest sound, her eyes vainly fixed on the door. She knew that he must take the 10:40 express. She knew where Anne de Sézery was. Finally she went into her children's room, saw that they were asleep, left them in their nurse's charge, and hastily putting on her hat and cloak, she hurried toward the station.

"If I went to look for him?" Mme. Derize had said one day.

Without pride, humiliated, conquered, here she was hastening to offer to the ungrateful faithless one, the heart which he had broken. She did not find him in the entrance hall. Not daring to cross the station to reach the platform, trembling with the emotion of her sudden impulse, she went out into the darkness and watched for the arrival of the carriages. At last she saw Albert and Philippe get out and she drew back, so as not to be seen. By the light of the lantern she distinguished Albert's set expression, as he paid the coachman. Ashamed of her weakness as soon as they had passed, she fled.

An individual, very smartly dressed--(one of those rich glove merchants of Grenoble who make their large fortunes in Paris or Lyons and who, as a result, have acquired at a high price the right of treating women with familiarity)--after noticing her uneasy manner and her figure, followed her and dared to speak to her in the Rue Lesdiguières,--which is not well illuminated. He did not belong to the society she moved in and did not know her.

"Well, Madame, one must be guided by reason. The king is dead--long live the king!"

He laughed, he stared insolently at her, a little disturbed by the type of beauty he saw, which impressed him in spite of himself. Speechless, she was obliged to stop, and her mouth twisted itself without making a sound. At last she recovered herself and cried:

"Go away!"

Her frightened face, her terrified eyes more than her words, put the blackguard to flight. She dragged herself to her staircase, her limbs giving way under her. This last insult completed her humiliation. She fell into the deepest despair. She, in turn, envied the dead.

"It is over," she said to herself, "all over forever."

Reaching her room like an animal forced to its lair, crushed by so many nights of watching and fatigue, by the uselessness of so many efforts, rebelling against God's forgetfulness, she slid to the floor at the foot of her bed, and there, collapsing, huddled up, through her sobs, she mechanically repeated the words which alone kept her from wishing for death, which, in spite of herself, linked her with life.

"Marie Louise, Philippe--my little ones ..."