Pauline came downstairs very late that morning. When she awoke, it made her happy to find that all the resolutions she had taken during the night remained fixed and unwavering within her. But she began to reflect that she had forgotten what would become of herself, and that she must make some plans for her future altered circumstances. Though she might have the courage to bring about the marriage of Lazare and Louise, she would certainly never be brave enough to remain with them and watch their happiness. Self-devotion has its limits, and she was afraid of some return of her violent outbursts, some terrible scene which would kill her. Besides, was she not really doing all that could possibly be demanded of her, and could anyone have the cruelty to impose useless torture upon her? She came to an immediate and irrevocable decision. She would go away, leave the house, which was so full of disquieting associations. This would mean a complete change in her life, but she did not shrink from it.

At breakfast she showed a calm cheerfulness, which she henceforth maintained. She bravely endured the sight of Lazare and Louise, sitting side by side, whispering and smiling, without any other feeling of weakness than a chilly coldness at her heart. As it was Saturday, she made up her mind to send them out for a long walk together in order that she might be alone when Doctor Cazenove came. They went off, and Pauline then took the precaution of going out into the road to meet the Doctor. As soon as he caught sight of her he wanted her to get up into his gig and drive to the house with him. But she begged him to alight, and they walked along slowly together, while Martin, a hundred yards in the rear, brought on the empty vehicle.

In a few simple words Pauline unbosomed herself to the Doctor. She told him everything—her plan of giving Lazare to Louise and her determination to leave the house. This confession had seemed necessary to her; she was unwilling to act upon mere inspiration, and the old doctor was the only person who could understand her.

Cazenove suddenly halted in the middle of the road and clasped the girl in his long bony arms. He was trembling with emotion, and he kissed her on the hair, as he said affectionately:

'You are quite right, my dear; you are quite right. And it pleases me very much to hear it, for matters might have had a much worse ending. For months past I have been feeling grieved, and I was longing to come and talk to you, for I knew you were very unhappy. Ah! they have plundered you and stripped you nicely, those good folks! First your money, and now your heart!'

The young girl tried to stop him.

'My dear friend, I beg you——You are judging them unfairly.'

'Perhaps so, but that does not prevent me from being glad on your account. Yes, yes! Give up your Lazare! It is not a very valuable present that you are making to the other one! I daresay that he is a very charming fellow, and that he has the best intentions in the world; but I prefer that the other should be unhappy with him, and not you. Those fine fellows who grow bored with everything are far too heavy even for broad shoulders like yours to support. I would rather see you marry some sturdy butcher-lad—yes, I mean it—some butcher-lad who would shake his sides day and night with honest, merry laughter.'

Then, as he saw her eyes fill with tears, he added:

'Ah, well! you love him, I suppose, and so I won't say anything more. Give me a kiss again, since you are brave enough to act so sensibly. Ah! what a fool he is not to see what he is doing!'

He took her arm and drew her close to his side. Then they began to talk seriously together as they resumed their walk. The Doctor told her that she would certainly, do best to leave Bonneville, and he undertook to find her a situation. He happened, he said, to have a rich old relative living at Saint-Lô, who was looking for a young lady companion. Pauline would be perfectly happy with her, and very likely the old lady, who had no children of her own, would grow much attached to her and subsequently adopt her. They arranged everything between themselves, and the Doctor promised Pauline a definite reply from his relative in a few days' time. Meanwhile it was settled she should say nothing about her determination to leave the Chanteaus. She was afraid that if she did it might seem to be in some way a threat, and she was anxious to bring the marriage to an issue and then immediately leave the house like one who could no longer be of use there.

On the third day Pauline received a letter from the Doctor. She was expected at Saint-Lô as soon as she could get away. It was on this same day, during Lazare's absence, that she led Louise to an old seat beneath a clump of tamarisks at the bottom of the kitchen garden. In front of them, above the low wall, they could see nothing but the sea and sky—a measureless expanse of blue, intersected by the far-stretching line of the horizon.

'My dear girl,' said Pauline to Louise with her maternal air, 'let us talk as though we were two sisters. You love me a little, don't you?'

Louise threw one arm round her friend's waist as she exclaimed:

'Indeed I do! You know I do!'

'Well, then, since you love me, it was very wrong of you not to tell me everything. Why do you keep secrets from me?'

'Indeed, I have no secrets.'

'Ah! yes; think again now. Come, open your heart to me.'

Each looked into the other's face so closely for a moment that they felt the warmth of one another's breath. And the eyes of one gradually grew troubled beneath the clear, unruffled gaze of the other. The silence was growing painful.

'Tell me everything. When things are discussed openly it is possible to arrange them satisfactorily, but dissimulation is apt to have an unhappy ending. Isn't that so, eh? It would be very painful for us to disagree again and to have a repetition of what caused us so much grief and trouble.'

At this Louise burst into a violent fit of sobbing. She clasped Pauline round the waist convulsively, and hid her face against her friend's shoulder while stammering amidst her tears:

'Oh! it is very unkind of you to speak of that again! You ought never to have mentioned it again, never! Send me away at once, rather than pain me like this!'

It was in vain that Pauline tried to soothe her.

'No, no!' the weeping girl went on; 'I understand it all. You still suspect me. Why do you speak to me of secrets? I have no secret at all. I do everything quite openly, so that you may have no cause to find fault with me or reproach me. I am not to blame because things happen which disturb you—I who am even careful how I laugh, though you don't know it——But, if you don't believe me, I had better go away at once. Let me go! Let me go!'

They were quite alone in that far-reaching space. The kitchen-garden, scorched by the west wind, lay at their feet like a piece of waste land, while, further away, the calm sea spread out in its immensity.

'But listen to what I have to say,' Pauline cried. 'I am not reproaching you at all; on the contrary, I want to encourage you.'

Then, taking Louise by the shoulders and forcing her to raise her eyes, she said to her gently, like a mother questioning her daughter:

'You love Lazare? And he, too, loves you, I am sure.'

The blood surged to Louise's cheeks. She trembled yet more violently, and tried to liberate herself and escape.

'Good gracious! How clumsily I must express myself if you can't understand me!' Pauline resumed. 'Do you think I should talk to you on such a subject only to torture you? You love each other, don't you? Well, I want to get you married to one another! It's very simple!'

Louise, distracted, ceased to struggle. Stupor checked the flow of her tears, rendered her motionless, with her hands hanging inertly beside her.

'What! And yourself?' she gasped.

'I, my dear? Well, I have been questioning myself very seriously for some weeks past, at night-time especially, during those waking hours when one's mind sees things in a clearer light. And I have recognised that I only feel sincere friendship for Lazare. Haven't you been able to see as much for yourself? We are comrades, chums; like a couple of boys, in fact. We do not feel those loving transports——'

She hesitated, trying to find some suitable phrase which would give an appearance of probability to her falsehoods. But her rival still gazed at her with fixed eyes, as though she had discovered the meaning which was hidden beneath her words.

'Why do you tell me untruths?' she murmured at last. 'Is it possible for you to cease to love where you have once loved?'

Pauline grew confused.

'Well! well!' she said; 'what does that matter? You love each other, and it is quite natural that he should marry you. I—I was brought up with him, and I shall continue to be a sister to him. One's ideas alter when one has been waiting so long——And, then, there are several other reasons——'

She was conscious that she was growing more confused, and, carried away by her frankness, she went on:

'Oh! my dear, let me have my way. If I still love him sufficiently to want to see him your husband, it is because I now believe that you are necessary to his happiness. That doesn't vex you, does it? You would do the same if you were in my place, would you not? Come, let us talk it over quietly. Will you join in the little plot? Shall we come to an understanding together to force him into being happy? Even if he seems vexed about it and persists in believing that he is yet bound to me, you must help me to persuade him, for it is you whom he loves, and it is you who are necessary to him. Be my accomplice, I beg you, and let us get everything arranged at once, now, while we are alone.'

But Louise, seeing how she trembled, how heart-broken she was in making those entreaties, persisted in rebelling.

'No, no! I couldn't think of such a thing! It would be abominable. You still love him; I am sure of it, and you are only planning your own torment. Instead of helping you, I will tell him everything. Yes, as soon as he comes back——'

Then Pauline threw her kindly arms round her again to prevent her from continuing, and drew her face close to her breast.

'Hold your tongue, you wicked child! It must be so. It is he whom we have to think about.'

Silence fell again, while they lingered in that embrace. Her powers of resistance already exhausted, Louise gave way, yielded with affectionate languor, while tears mounted to her eyes—happy tears that trickled slowly down her cheeks. She spoke no word, but pressed her friend to her, as though she could find no discreeter or more sincere way of expressing her gratitude. She recognised that Pauline was so much above her, so lofty, so self-sacrificing, that she dared not raise her eyes to meet her gaze. However, after a few minutes, she ventured to lift her head in smiling confusion, and then, protruding her lips, gave her friend a silent kiss. In the distance the sea stretched out beneath the cloudless sky without a single wave breaking on its blue immensity.

When Lazare returned to the house, Pauline went up to him in his room, that big and well-loved chamber where they had grown up together. She was anxious to finish her task that very day. With her cousin she sought no preliminary remarks, but went straight to the point. The room teemed with associations of their old life. Pieces of dry seaweed still lay about there, the models of the stockades littered the piano, and the table was strewn with scientific treatises and scores of music.

'Lazare,' she began, 'I want to talk to you. I have something serious to say to you.'

He seemed surprised, and then took his stand before her.

'What is the matter? Is my father threatened with another attack?'

'No, listen. It is necessary that the subject should now be mentioned; keeping silence about it cannot do any good. You know that my aunt intended we should be married. We have frequently spoken about it, and for months past it: has been considered a settled matter. Well, I think that it would now be better if all thought of it were abandoned.'

The young man had turned pale, but he did not allow his cousin to finish; he exclaimed excitedly:

'What? What nonsense are you talking? Are you not already my wife? We will go to-morrow, if you like, and ask the priest to put the finishing-stroke to the matter. And this is what you call something serious!'

The girl replied in her tranquil voice:

'It is very serious; and, though it displeases you, I repeat that it is certainly necessary we should speak about it. We are two old friends and comrades, but I am afraid we should never be two lovers. So what is the good of obstinately persisting in an idea which would probably never result in happiness for either of us?'

Then Lazare burst out into a torrent of ejaculations. Was she trying to quarrel with him? She couldn't expect him to spend his whole time clinging round her neck! And, though the marriage had been put off from month to month, she knew quite well that it wasn't his fault. It was unjust of her, moreover, to say that he no longer loved her. He had loved her so warmly, and in that very room too! At this reference to the past a blush mounted to Pauline's cheeks. Her cousin was right. She recollected his passing gusts of passion, and his hot breath fanning her neck. But, ah! how far off were those delicious thrilling moments; and what an unimpassioned, brotherly friendship he manifested for her now! So it was with an expression of sadness that she replied to him:

'My poor fellow, if you really loved me, instead of arguing with me as you are doing, you would be clasping me in your arms and sobbing, and finding some very different way of persuading me.'

He turned still paler, and threw up his hands with a vague gesture of protest as he let himself fall upon a chair.

'No!' the girl went on; 'it is quite clear that you love me no longer. But it can't be helped. We are, no doubt, not suited to each other. When we were shut up here together, you were driven into thinking about me. But all your fancy vanished later on; it did not last, because there was nothing in me that could keep you to me.'

A final paroxysm of exasperation carried him off, and he swayed about in his chair as he stammered:

'Well! what do you want? What is the meaning of all this? I quietly return home, and come up here to put on my slippers, and then you suddenly fall on me, and without the least warning launch out into an extravagant harangue—"I don't love you any longer"—"We are not made for one another"—"The wedding must be broken off." Once more I ask you, what is the meaning of it all?'

Pauline, who had drawn near him, slowly answered:

'It means that you love someone else, and that I advise you to marry her.'

For a moment Lazare remained silent. Then he began to sneer. Good! They were going to have the old scenes over again. Everything was going to be turned topsy-turvy once more by her idiotic jealousy! She couldn't bear to see him cheerful even for a single day without wanting to banish everyone away from him.

Pauline listened with an expression of profound grief; then she suddenly laid her trembling hands upon his shoulders, and an involuntary cry burst from her heart:

'Oh! my dear, can you believe that I want to distress you? Can't you see that my only desire is to make you happy? I would endure anything to win you a single hour's happiness. You love Louise; is that not so? Well, I tell you to marry her. Understand me. I am in the way no longer. Marry her; I give her to you!'

Her cousin looked at her in amazement. With his nervous, ill-balanced nature his feelings rushed to extremes at the slightest impulse. His eyelids quivered, and he burst into sobs.

'Oh, don't talk like that!' he cried. 'I am utterly worthless! Yes, indeed, I despise myself bitterly for all that has happened in this house for years past. I am deeply in your debt. Don't say I am not! We took your money, I squandered it like a fool, and now I have sunk so low that you make me alms of my word and promise, and give them back to me out of sheer pity, as to a man destitute of courage and honour!'

'Lazare! Lazare!' she murmured, quite frightened.

But he sprang furiously to his feet and began striding about the room, drumming on his breast with his fists.

'Leave me! I should kill myself straight off if I treated myself as I deserve. Do I not owe you my love? Isn't it a disgrace and an abomination for me to wish for that other girl, who was not meant for me and isn't nearly so good or so pretty as you are? When a man descends to conduct like this, there must be mud in his soul! You see that I am hiding nothing from you, that I am not attempting to defend myself. Listen to me! Rather than accept your sacrifice, I would myself turn Louise out of the house, and then go off to America and never see either of you again!'

For a long time Pauline tried to calm him and reason with him. Couldn't he try for once, she asked, to take life as it was, without any exaggeration? Couldn't he see that the advice she offered him was good advice, resolved upon after long deliberation? The marriage she advocated would be good for everyone. She was able to speak of it in such calm tones because, far from the thought of it paining her, she now sincerely wished it. Then, carried away by her desire to convince him, she unfortunately made an allusion to Louise's fortune, and hinted that Thibaudier, when the marriage had taken place, would certainly find some post for his son-in-law.

'Ah! that's it!' he broke out violently. 'You want to sell me now! Say plainly that I can no longer care for you, because I have ruined you, and that it only remains for me to be base enough to marry a rich girl. No, no, indeed; that is too mean and degrading! Never will I do it—never! Do you hear me? Never!'

Pauline, whose strength was exhausted, ceased her entreaties. Silence reigned. Lazare had thrown himself on the chair again, while the girl paced slowly up and down the big room, lingering before each piece of furniture. Those old familiar things, the table which she had worn away with the pressure of her elbows, the wardrobe where her childish playthings were still stowed away, all the old souvenirs littered about the room, made a feeling of hope, which she strove to dismiss, spring up in her heart—a hope whose sweetness, in spite of herself, gradually thrilled her. Suppose he did really love her sufficiently to refuse to take another! But she knew too well the weak morrows that followed his passionate outbursts of sentiment. Besides, it was very weak of her to harbour hope, and she must guard against allowing herself to yield to his nerveless vacillating nature.

'You must think it all over,' she said in conclusion, as she stopped short before him. 'I won't bother you any more at present. I am sure you will be more reasonable in the morning.'

The next day, however, was passed in painful constraint. The house once more seemed to be under the depressing influence of a vague bitter sorrow. Louise's eyes were red, and Lazare avoided her and spent whole hours by himself in his room. But again the days went on; the constraint began to disappear, and laughter and whispering once more came back. Pauline still waited, indulging in foolish hopes even against her own convictions. Backed by uncertainty, she thought that she had never before really known what suffering was. But, at last, as she was going down to the kitchen one evening in the dusk to get a candle, she found Lazare and Louise kissing each other in the passage. Louise made her escape laughing; while Lazare, emboldened by the darkness, caught hold of Pauline and imprinted two brotherly kisses on her cheeks.

'I have thought it over,' he murmured. 'You are better and wiser than she is; and I still love you, but I love you as I loved my mother.'

She had just strength to say:

'It is settled, then. I am very glad.'

She felt that she had turned so pale, and her face was so cold, that she dared not go into the kitchen for fear she should faint. Without waiting to get a candle, she went upstairs again, saying that she had forgotten something. When she had shut herself up in the darkness, she thought she was going to die, for she felt suffocated, and could not shed a single tear. What had she done, she cried to herself, that he should have been cruel enough to make her torture still greater? Why couldn't he have accepted her sacrifice on the day when she proposed it to him, when she had possessed all her strength, unweakened by any false hope? Now the sacrifice had become a double one. She had lost him a second time, and all the more painfully since she had allowed herself to hope that she was winning him back. Ah, Heaven! She would be brave and bear it, but it was wicked to make her task such torture.

Everything was speedily arranged. Véronique, quite aghast, could make nothing out of it. She thought that things had got turned upside down since her mistress's death. It was, however, Chanteau who was most surprised by the news. He, who usually took no interest in anything and just nodded his head in approval of any scheme that was mentioned to him, as though he were completely absorbed in the selfish enjoyment of the calm moments which he stole from his tormenting pain, burst into tears when Pauline herself announced the new arrangement to him. He gazed at her, and stammered incoherent protests and confessions. It wasn't his fault: he had wanted to do very differently long ago, both about the money and about the marriage, but, as she knew, he was too ill. However, the girl kissed him, protesting that it was she herself who was making Lazare marry Louise for very good reasons. At first he could scarcely believe her, and, blinking his eyes sadly, he asked her:

'Is that really the truth? Really?'

Then, when he saw her smile, he quickly consoled himself and grew quite gay. It was a great relief to have things settled, for the matter had long been distressing him, though he had never dared to open his mouth about it. He kissed Louise on the cheeks, and in the evening, over the dessert, he sang a merry song. Just as he was going to bed, however, he was troubled by a last disquieting thought.

'You will stay with us, eh?' he asked Pauline.

The girl hesitated for a moment, and then, blushing at her falsehood, she answered, 'Oh! no doubt.'

A whole month was required for the completion of the necessary formalities. Thibaudier, Louise's father, had, however, at once consented to the proposal of Lazare, who was his godson. There was only one dispute between them, a couple of days before the wedding, when the young man roundly refused to go to Paris and manage an Insurance Company, in which the banker was the principal shareholder. He intended remaining for a year or two longer at Bonneville and writing a novel, which was to be a masterpiece, before he started off to bring Paris to his feet. At this Thibaudier just shrugged his shoulders, and in a friendly way called him a big simpleton.

It was arranged that the marriage should take place at Caen. During the previous fortnight there were continual comings and goings, a perfect fever of journeyings. Pauline went about with Louise, seeking to divert her thoughts with all the bustle, and returning home quite exhausted. As Chanteau was not able to leave Bonneville, she had to promise to attend the ceremony, at which she would be the only representative of her cousin's family. The near approach of the day filled her with terror. She had arranged that she would not spend the night at Caen, for she thought she would suffer less if she returned to sleep at Bonneville. She pretended that her uncle's health made her very uneasy, and that she was unwilling to remain long away from him. Chanteau himself vainly pressed her to spend a few days at Caen. He wasn't ill at all, he urged. On the contrary, he was very much excited by the idea of the approaching wedding and the thought of the banquet at which he would not be present; and he was craftily planning to make Véronique supply him with some forbidden dish, such as a young truffled partridge, which he could never eat without the absolute certainty of a fresh attack of gout. However, in spite of all that could be urged, the girl declared that she would return home in the evening. She thought that this course would allow her greater facilities for packing her trunk the next morning and disappearing.

A drizzling rain was falling, and midnight had just struck as Malivoire's old coach brought Pauline back to Bonneville on the evening of the wedding. Wearing a blue silk gown, and ill protected by a little shawl, she was pale and shivering though her hands were hot. In the kitchen she found Véronique sitting up for her and dozing beside the table. The tall flame of the candle made the girl's eyes blink, full as they still were of the darkness of the journey, during which they had remained wide open all the way from Arromanches. She could only drag a few incoherent words from the drowsy servant: the master had been very foolish, but he was asleep now, and nobody had called. Then Pauline took a candle and went upstairs, chilled by the emptiness of the house, heart-sick amidst all the gloom and silence which seemed to weigh upon her shoulders.

When she reached the second floor she wished to take immediate refuge in her own room, but an irresistible impulse, at which she felt surprised, led her to open Lazare's door. She raised her candle to enable her to see, as though she fancied the room was full of smoke. Nothing was changed. Every piece of furniture was in its accustomed place, but she felt conscious of calamity, annihilation; it was a vague terror, as though she were in some chamber of death. She slowly walked up to the table and looked at the inkstand, the pen, and an unfinished page of manuscript still lying there. Then she went away. All was over, and the door closed on the echoing emptiness of the room.

When she reached her own chamber, the same vague sensation of strangeness that she had felt in Lazare's again affected her. Could this indeed be her room, with its wall-paper of blue roses and its little muslin-curtained iron bed? Was it really here that she had lived so many years? Still keeping her candle in her hand, she, who was usually so courageous, made a minute inspection of the apartment, pushed the curtains aside, looked under the bed and behind the furniture. She felt overcome by a strange kind of stupor, which kept her standing in front of the different things. She could not have believed that such keen anguish could ever have possessed her beneath that ceiling, whose every stain was familiar to her; and she now began to regret that she had not stayed at Caen. For she felt frightened in that old house, which was so empty and yet so full of memories of the past, and so cold, too, and so dark that stormy night. The thought of going to bed was intolerable to her. She sat down without even taking off her hat, and for several minutes remained motionless, her eyes fixed upon the candle-flame, which dazzled them. Suddenly, however, she started up in astonishment. What was she doing there, with her head throbbing wildly, with a violence that quite prevented her from thinking? It was one o'clock. She ought to be in bed. And she began to undress with slow, feverish hands.

Her orderly habits showed themselves even in this crisis of her life. She carefully put away her hat, and glanced anxiously at her boots to see if they had sustained any damage. She had folded her dress and laid it over the back of a chair, when her glance fell upon her bosom. Gradually a flush crimsoned her cheeks. In her troubled brain arose the thought of those two others over yonder. Alas! the harvest of love was not for her! To another were given the embraces of that husband for whose coming she herself had looked forward for so many years! Never would she be a wife or mother; the years would come and go, and she would age in utter loneliness. Then wild jealousy came upon her. She yearned to live, to live to the full, to drain the joys of life, she who loved life so dearly! She was more beautiful than that scraggy, fair-haired girl; she was stronger and healthier, and yet her cousin had not chosen her. Never now would he be hers; never, as in the past, might she again wait for him, expect him. She was tossed aside like an old rag. It was, no doubt, her own doing; and yet how awful was the thought of the others being together while she was all alone, shivering with fever in that cold, gloomy house!

Suddenly she threw herself on her bed. She seized the pillow with desperate hands, and bit it with her teeth to stifle her sobs. Long convulsive shivers shook her from head to heels. It was in vain that she closed her eyelids, seeking to shut out all sight; she saw just the same, and ever endured torture. Oh! what was she to do? Even if she were to tear her eyes out she would still see—see perhaps for ever.

The minutes glided on, and she was only conscious of everlasting torment. A paroxysm of fear made her spring to her feet. Some one must be in the room, for surely she had heard the sound of laughter. But she found that it was only her candle, which, having nearly burnt out, had broken the glass socket. Yet if anyone really had seen her! That imaginary laugh still coursed through her wildly. Then at last she slipped on a night-dress and hastily buried herself in bed, pulling up the clothes to her chin, and drawing her shivering body as closely together as possible. When the candle died out, she lay perfectly still, exhausted and overcome with shame for her wild conduct.

In the morning Pauline packed her trunk, but she could not summon up courage to tell Chanteau of her departure. In the evening, however, she was obliged to inform him of it, for Doctor Cazenove was to come the next day and take her to his relative's house. When her uncle grasped the situation he was quite overcome, and stretched out his poor, weak hands with a wild gesture as though to detain her, while in broken, stammering sentences he besought her to stay with him. She could surely never really think of such a thing, he cried; she could not possibly desert him; it would be a murder, for it would certainly kill him. Then, seeing her gently resolute and divining her reasons, he confessed his wrong-doing of the previous day in eating a partridge. He already experienced sharp burning pains in his joints. It was always the same old story. He had yielded once more in the struggle. He knew what the consequences would be if he ate, but he ate all the same, in a state of mingled pleasure and terror, quite certain that agony would ensue. Surely, however, Pauline would never desert him in the midst of one of his attacks.

And indeed it happened that about six o'clock in the morning Véronique came upstairs to inform Mademoiselle that she could hear her master bellowing in his bedroom. The woman was in a very bad temper, and went growling about the house that if Mademoiselle were going she would certainly be off as well, as she had grown quite tired of looking after such an unreasonable old man.

Thus Pauline was once more obliged to take up her position by her uncle's bedside; and when the Doctor arrived to take her away with him, she showed him the sick man, who triumphed, bellowing his loudest, and crying to her to leave him, if she could find it in her heart to do so. Everything had to be postponed.

Every day the young girl trembled at the thought of seeing Lazare and Louise come back. Their new room, the former guest-chamber, had been specially fitted up, and had been waiting ready for them ever since their marriage. They were lingering on at Caen, however, and Lazare wrote to say that he was making notes on the financial world before returning to Bonneville and shutting himself up there to start on a great novel, in which he should reveal the truth about company promoters and speculators. At last he arrived one morning without his wife, and unconcernedly announced that he was going to settle with her in Paris. His father-in-law, he said, had prevailed upon him to accept that post in the Insurance Company, on the ground that he would thus have a good opportunity for making his notes from actual observation. Later on, he added, he might perhaps, come back and devote himself to literature.

When Lazare had filled a couple of trunks with the various articles he required, and Malivoire's coach had come to fetch him and his luggage, Pauline went back into the house, feeling quite dazed and destitute of her former energy. Chanteau, still in great pain, turned to her and exclaimed:

'You will stop now, I hope! Stay and see me buried!'

She was unwilling to make an immediate reply. Her trunk was still packed in her bedroom. She sat gazing at it for hours. Since the others were going to Paris, it would be wrong of her, she thought, to desert her uncle. She had but little confidence in her cousin's resolutions, but, at any rate, if he and his wife should come back, she would then be free to take her departure. And when Cazenove angrily told her that she was throwing away a splendid position for the sake of ruining her life amongst people who had lived upon her ever since her childhood, she virtually made up her mind.

'Be off with you!' Chanteau now repeated. 'If you are to gain so much money and become so happy that way, I won't keep you here bothering about an old cripple like me. Be off with you!'

One morning, however, she replied to him:

'No, uncle, I am going to stay with you.'

The Doctor, who was present, went off, raising his arms to heaven.

'Ah! there is no doing anything with that child! And what a hornets' nest she has got into! She will never get free of it—never!'

IX

Once more did the days glide by in the house at Bonneville. After a very cold winter there had come a rainy spring, and the sea, beaten by the downpour, looked like a huge lake of mud. Then the tardy summer had lasted into the middle of autumn, with heavy, oppressive suns, beneath whose overwhelming heat the blue immensity slumbered. And then the winter came round again, and another spring, and yet another summer, slipping away minute by minute, ever at the same speed, as the hours pursued their rhythmical march.

Pauline, as if her heart were regulated by that clock-like motion, had recovered all her old calmness. The placid sameness of her days, which were passed in the same unvarying occupations, lulled the keenness of her sorrow. She came downstairs in the morning and kissed her uncle, said much the same things to the servant as she had said the day before, sat down twice at table, spent the afternoon in sewing, and then, early in the evening, went to bed. The next day the same programme was gone through, without ever any unexpected incident breaking the monotony of her life. Chanteau, who was becoming more and more disfigured by gout, which had puffed out his legs and warped and deformed his hands, sat silent, when he was not bellowing, quite absorbed in the delight of being free from pain. Véronique, who seemed almost to have lost her tongue, had fallen into a state of gloomy surliness. Only the Saturday dinners brought any relief. Cazenove and Abbé Horteur dined there with great regularity, and chatter was heard till ten o'clock or so, when the priest's wooden shoes clattered away over the stones of the yard, and the Doctor's gig started off at the slow trot of the old horse. Pauline's gaiety—that gaiety which she had so bravely maintained during all her troubles—had assumed a subdued character. Her ringing laughter no longer echoed through the rooms and the staircase, though she still remained all kindliness and activity, and every morning displayed fresh courage and zest for life. By the end of a year her heart had fallen asleep, and she had come to believe that the days would now flow on in that peaceful monotony, without anything ever happening to awake her slumbering sorrow.

For some time after Lazare's departure every letter from him had troubled the girl, though it was only for his letters that she lived, looking out for them with impatience, reading them over and over again, and even adding to them something from her own imagination beyond what they actually contained. For three months Lazare had written very regularly, sending, every fortnight, a very long letter, full of detail and breathing the liveliest hopes. Once more he was wildly enthusiastic. He had launched out into business and was dreaming of a colossal fortune in the immediate future. According to his account, the Insurance Company could not fail to return enormous profits. He was not, however, confining himself to that venture, but was engaging in all kinds of speculations. He appeared to have become quite charmed with the financial and mercantile world, which he now reproached himself for having judged so absurdly. All his literary schemes seemed quite abandoned. Then, too, he was never tired of writing about his domestic joys, and related all sorts of things about his wife—the kisses he had given her, and the life they led together—setting forth at length all his happiness by way of expressing his gratitude to her, whom he called his 'dear sister.' It was those details, those familiar passages, which made Pauline's fingers tremble feverishly.—The odour of love which the paper diffused, the perfume of heliotrope, Louise's favourite scent, which clung to it, seemed to stupefy her. But the letters gradually became fewer and shorter. Lazare ceased to write about business, and in other respects confined himself to sending his wife's love to Pauline. He offered no explanations, but simply ceased to tell her everything. Was he discontented with his position and already sick of finance? Was his domestic happiness compromised by misunderstandings? Pauline was afraid it must be so, and she was saddened by the evidence of her cousin's weariness, which she thought she could detect in certain passages that seemed to have been reluctantly written. About the end of April, after a six weeks' silence, she received a short note of four lines, in which her cousin told her that Louise was enceinte. Then silence fell again, and she had no further news.

May and June passed away. A heavy tide swept away one of the stockades, an incident which for a long time afforded subject for talk. All the Bonneville folk jeered and grinned, and the fishermen stole the broken timbers. Then came another scandalous affair. The Gonin girl, young as she was, had a baby. And afterwards all the old monotony returned, and the village vegetated at the foot of the cliffs as lifelessly as a tract of seaweed. In July it became necessary to repair the terrace-wall and one of the gable ends of the house. As soon as the workmen began to remove the first stones, the rest threatened to fall, and they were kept at work for an entire month, an expense of nearly ten thousand francs being incurred.

It was still Pauline who had to find the money. Thus another big hole was made in her little hoard in the chest of drawers, her little fortune being reduced to about forty thousand francs. She made the family's few hundred francs a month go as far as possible by economical housekeeping, but she was obliged to sell some of her own stock, in order to avoid encroaching upon her uncle's capital. The latter told his niece, as his wife had done before, that it would all be paid back to her some day. The girl would not have hesitated to part with all she had, for the gradual crumbling away of her fortune had destroyed all tendency to cupidity in her, and her only effort now was to keep a sufficient sum in hand for her charities. The thought that she might possibly be compelled to discontinue her Saturday distributions greatly distressed her, for they constituted her chief pleasure of the week. Since the previous winter she had begun to knit stockings, and all the young urchins in the neighbourhood now went about with warm feet.

One morning towards the end of July, as Véronique was sweeping up the rubbish left by the workmen, Pauline received a letter which quite upset her. It was written from Caen, and contained only a few words. In it Lazare informed her that he should arrive at Bonneville on the evening of the next day, but gave no explanation of his coming. She ran off to tell the news to her uncle. They both looked at each other. Chanteau's eyes expressed the fear that his niece would leave him should Lazare and his wife contemplate a long stay in the house. He dare not question her on the subject, for he could read in her face her firm resolution to go. In the afternoon she even went upstairs to look over her clothes; still, she did not wish to have the air of taking flight.

It was about five o'clock, and lovely weather, when Lazare stepped out of a trap at the door of the yard. Pauline hastened to meet him, but, before even kissing him, she stopped short in astonishment.

'What! Have you come alone?'

'Yes,' he replied quietly.

And then he kissed her on both cheeks.

'But where is Louise?'

'At Clermont, with her sister-in-law. The doctor has recommended her to go to a mountainous neighbourhood. Her state of health has made her weak and languid.'

As he spoke he walked on to the house, casting long glances about the yard. He scrutinised his cousin, too, and his lips quivered with an emotion which he struggled to restrain. He showed great surprise as a dog rushed out of the kitchen and barked round his legs.

'What dog is that?' he asked.

'Oh! that's Loulou,' Pauline replied. 'He doesn't know you yet, you see. Down! Loulou! You mustn't bite your master.'

The dog went on growling.

'He is dreadfully ugly, my dear. Where did you pick up such a fright?'

The dog was indeed a wretched mongrel, undersized and mangy. And he had, too, an abominable temper, and was perpetually snarling, and melancholy like an outcast.

'Oh! when he was given me I was told that he would grow up into a huge, magnificent animal, but he has always kept like that. It is the fifth one that we have tried to rear, All the others have died, and this is the only one that has managed to go on living.'

Loulou by this time had sulkily made up his mind to lie down in the sun, and turned his back upon Pauline and her cousin. Then Lazare thought of the old days and of the dog that was dead and of the new and ugly one that now occupied his place. He glanced round the yard once more.

'My poor old Matthew!' he murmured very softly.

On the steps of the house Véronique received him with a nod of her head, without ceasing to pare carrots. Then he walked straight on to the dining-room, where his father, excited by the sound of voices, was anxiously waiting. Pauline called from the threshold:

'You know he has come by himself? Louise is at Clermont.'

Chanteau, whose anxious eyes brightened, began to question his son even before he had kissed him.

'Are you expecting her to follow you? When will she join you here?'

'Oh no! She's not coming here at all,' Lazare replied. 'I'm going to join her at her sister-in-law's before I return to Paris. I shall stay a fortnight with you, and then I shall be off.'

Chanteau's eyes expressed his extreme satisfaction at what he heard, and when at last Lazare embraced him he returned the salute with two hearty kisses. However, he considered that it behoved him to express some regret.

'It is a great pity that your wife could not come. We should have been delighted to have her here. However, I hope we shall see her some other time. You must certainly bring her.'

Pauline kept silent, and concealed her feeling of uneasiness beneath an affectionate smile of welcome. For the second time were her plans being altered; she would not have to go away. She scarcely knew whether she was glad or sorry, so entirely had she now become the property of others. Whatever pleasure she felt in seeing Lazare was tinged with sadness as she noticed his aged appearance. His eyes were dull, and a bitter expression rested on his lips. The lines across his brow and cheeks had been there before, but they were deeper wrinkles now, and she guessed that his ennui and terror had increased. The young man scrutinized his cousin with equal care. She appeared to him to have developed, to have gained additional beauty and vigour, and with a smile he muttered:

'Well, you certainly don't seem to have been any the worse for my absence. You are, all of you, looking quite plump. Father is growing young again, and Pauline is superb. And, really, it is very funny, but the house certainly seems bigger than it used to be.'

He glanced round the dining-room, as he had previously done round the yard, with an appearance of surprise and emotion. His eyes at last rested upon Minouche, who lay upon the table, with her feet tucked under her, in such a state of restful beatitude that she had not moved.

'Even Minouche doesn't seem to have grown any older,' the young man resumed. 'Well, you ungrateful animal, you might rouse yourself to welcome me!'

He stroked her as he spoke, and she began to purr, but still without moving.

'Oh! Minouche is only interested in herself,' Pauline said merrily. 'The day before yesterday five more of her kittens were drowned, and, you see, she doesn't seem to mind it at all.'

The dinner was hastened, as Lazare had made an early breakfast. In spite of all the girl's attempts, the evening proved a gloomy one. The efforts they made to avoid certain subjects interfered with the conversation, and there were awkward intervals of silence. Pauline and Chanteau refrained from questioning Lazare, as they saw that it embarrassed him to reply; they made no attempt to ascertain either how his business at Paris was getting on, or how it came about that his letter to them had been written from Caen. With a vague gesture he put aside all direct questions, as though he meant to reply to them later on. When the tea was brought into the room, a great sigh of satisfaction escaped him. How happy and peaceful they must all be here, said he, and what an amount of work one could get through when all was so quiet! He dropped a word or two about a drama in verse upon which he had been engaged for the last six months. His cousin felt amazed when he added that he intended finishing it at Bonneville. Twelve days would be sufficient, said he.

At ten o'clock Véronique entered to say that Monsieur Lazare's room was ready. But when they had reached the first floor, and she wanted to instal him in the former guest-chamber, which had been subsequently fitted up for the occupation of himself and his wife, he flew into a tantrum.

'You're quite mistaken,' said he, 'if you suppose that I am going to sleep there! I'm going up to the top of the house to my old iron bedstead.'

Véronique began to grumble and growl. Why couldn't he sleep there? The bed had been got ready for him, and, surely, he wasn't going to give her the trouble of preparing another.

'Very well,' he said, 'I will sleep in an easy-chair.'

While Véronique angrily tore off the sheets and carried them up to the top floor, Pauline experienced a sudden delight which impelled her to throw her arms round her cousin's neck, in an outburst of the old chummish feeling of their youth, as she wished him good-night. He was occupying his big room once more, and he was so close to her that for a long time she could hear him pacing about, as though brooding over the recollections which were keeping her awake also.

It was only the next morning that Lazare began to take Pauline into his confidence. Even then he made no clear statement; she had to guess what she could from a few short sentences which he let slip in the course of conversation. By-and-by she took courage and questioned him with an expression of affectionate concern. Were he and Louise still getting on as happily as ever? He replied in the affirmative, but complained about certain little domestic disagreements and other trifling matters which had led to quarrels. Without having come to a definite rupture, they were suffering from the perpetual jarring of two highly-strung temperaments, which were incapable of equilibrium either in joy or sorrow. There existed between them a sort of unconfessed bitterness, as though they were surprised and angry at having mistaken each other, at having discovered each other's real feelings so soon, after all the passionate love of the first days. For a moment Pauline thought she could discover that it was pecuniary troubles that had embittered them; but in this she was mistaken, for their income of ten thousand francs a year had remained almost undiminished. Lazare had simply become disgusted with business, just as he had previously grown disgusted with music and medicine and industrial enterprise; and on this subject he launched out in strong language. Never, he said, never had he come across such a stupid, rotten sphere as that of the financial world. He would prefer anything, the dulness of country life and the mediocrity of small means, to perpetual worries about money, the brain-softening tangle of figures. He had just retired from the Insurance Company, he said, and he was going to try what he could do as a play-writer when he returned to Paris in the following winter. His drama would avenge him; he would portray money in it as a festering sore eating away modern society.

Pauline did not distress herself much about this new failure, which she had already inferred from Lazare's embarrassed expressions in his last letters. What grieved her most was the gradually increasing misunderstanding between her cousin and his wife. She strove to find out the real cause of it, how it happened that those young people of ample means and with nothing to do but to be happy had so quickly reached discomfort. She returned to the subject again, and only ceased to question her cousin about it when she saw the embarrassment she was causing him. He stammered and grew pale, and turned his face away from her as she interrogated him. She well knew that expression of shame and fear, that terror of the idea of death, which he had formerly struggled to conceal as though it were some disgraceful disease; but could it be possible, she asked herself, that the cold shadow of nothingness had already fallen between the young couple so soon after their nuptials? For several days she lingered in a state of doubt, and then, without any further confession from him on the subject, she one evening read the truth in his eyes as he rushed downstairs from his room in the dark, as though he were pursued by ghosts.

In Paris, amidst his love-fever, Lazare had at first forgotten all about death. He had found a refuge in Louise's embraces. But satiety came at last, and then in that wife of his, for whom life centred in caressing endearments, he found no sustaining, no courage-prompting influence whatever. Passion was fugitive and deceitful—powerless, he found, to give a semblance of happiness to life. One night he awoke with a start, chilled by an icy breath that made his hair stand on end. He shivered and wailed out his cry of bitter anguish: 'O God! God! oh! to have to die!' Louise was sleeping by his side. It was death that he had found again at the end of their kisses.

Other nights followed, and all his old torture came on him again. It seized him suddenly as he lay sleepless in bed, without ability on his part to foresee or prevent it. All at once, while he was lying there perfectly calm, a fearful shudder would convulse him; whereas, on the other hand, when he was irritable and weary, he perhaps escaped altogether. It was more than the mere shock of earlier times that he experienced now; his nervous excitement increased, and his whole being was shaken by each fresh attack. He could not sleep without a night-light, for the darkness increased his anxiety, in spite of his constant fear that his wife might discover his secret suffering. This very fear, indeed, increased his distress and aggravated the effects of his attacks; for in the old days, when he lay alone, he had been able to vent his dread, but now the presence of another at his side was a source of additional disquietude. When he started in terror from his pillow, his eyes heavy with sleep, he instinctively glanced at her, fearing he might find her eyes wide open and fixed upon his own. But she never moved, and by the glimmer of the night-light he could watch her quiet slumber, her placid face, thick lips, and little, blue-veined eyelids. And as she never awoke, he at last grew less disturbed on her account, until one night what he had so long feared really happened, and he saw her staring at him. But she said not a word when she saw him all pale and trembling. She, like himself, must have been thrilled by the horror of death, for she seemed to understand what was passing in his mind, and threw herself against him like a frightened woman seeking protection. Then, still desiring to deceive each other, they pretended that they had heard the sound of footsteps, and got out of bed to look under the furniture and behind the curtains.

Thenceforward they were both haunted with nervous fear. Never a word of confession escaped the lips of either. They felt that it was a shameful secret of which they must not speak; but as they lay in bed, with their eyes staring widely into space, they knew quite well what each was thinking of. Louise had become as nervous as Lazare; they must have infected each other with this dread, even as two lovers are sometimes carried off by the same fever. If he awoke, while she continued to sleep, he grew alarmed at her very slumber. Was she still breathing? He could not hear the sound of any respiration. Perhaps she had suddenly died! He would then peer into her face for a moment and touch her hands; but, even when he had satisfied himself that she was alive and well, he could not get to sleep again. The thought that she would certainly die some day plunged him into a mournful reverie. Which of them would go first, he or she? Then his mind dwelt at length on the alternative suppositions; and scenes of death, with the last torturing throes, the hideous shrouding and laying-out, the final heart-breaking separation, presented themselves to his mind. That thought of never seeing each other again, when they had lived together thus as man and wife, drove him to distraction, filled him with revolt; he could not endure the thought of such horror. His very fear made him wish that he himself might be the first to go. Then his heart ached with bitter grief for Louise, as he pictured her as a widow, still carrying on the old routine of life, doing this and that, when he should no longer be there. Sometimes, to free himself from those haunting thoughts, he would gently pass his arms about her without awaking her; but this he could not long endure, for he became still more terrified as he felt the pulsations of her life within his embrace. If he rested his head upon her breast and listened to her heart, he could not hear it beating without alarm, without feeling that all action might suddenly cease. And even love was powerless to drive away that great dread which still hovered around their curtains after every transport.

About this time Lazare began to grow weary of business. He fell back into his old state, and spent whole days in idleness, excusing himself on the ground of the contempt and dislike he felt for money-grubbing. The real truth was that constant brooding over the thought of death was daily depriving him of the desire, the strength to live. He came back to his old question, 'What was the good of it all?' Since it would all end in complete extinction sooner or later, perhaps to-morrow, or even to-day, or a single hour hence, what was the use of troubling and exciting one's self and bothering about one thing more than another? It was all quite purposeless. His existence itself had become a slow, lingering death, continuing day after day, and he strained his ears to listen to the sounds of its progress, even as he had done before in earlier times, and thought that he could detect the mechanism of his life quickly running down. His heart, he fancied, no longer beat so strongly as before, the action of every other organ was becoming feebler, and all would doubtless soon come to a dead-stop. He noted with a shudder that gradual diminution of vitality which growing age was bringing in its train. His very frame was perishing; its component parts were constantly disappearing. His hair was falling off, he had lost several teeth, and he could feel his muscles and sinews shrinking away, as though they were already returning to dust. The approach of his fortieth year filled him with gloomy melancholy; old age would soon be upon him now and make a speedy end of him. He had already begun to believe that his system was quite deranged, and that some vital part would very soon give way. Thus his days were spent in a morbid expectation of some catastrophe. He took anxious note of those who died around him, and every time he heard of the death of an acquaintance he received a fresh shock. Could it be possible that such an one was really dead? Why, he was three years younger than himself and had seemed likely to last a hundred years! And then that other man he knew so well, had he, too, really gone? A man who was so careful of himself, and who even weighed the very food he ate! For a couple of days after occurrences like these he could think of nothing else, but remained stupefied by what had happened; feeling his pulse, carefully observing all his own symptoms, and then falling foul of the poor fellows who had gone. He felt a craving to reassure himself, and accused the departed of having died from their own fault. One had been guilty of inexcusable imprudence, while another had succumbed to so rare a disease that the doctors did not even know its name.

But it was in vain that he tried to banish the importunate spectre; he never ceased to hear within himself the grating of the wheels which he fancied had so nearly run down; he felt that he was helplessly descending the slope of years, and the thought of the deep, black pit that lay at the bottom of it threw him into an icy perspiration and made his hair stand on end with horror.

When Lazare ceased going to his office, quarrels broke out at home. He manifested excessive irritability, which flared up at the slightest opposition. His increasing mental disorder, which he tried so carefully to conceal, revealed itself in angry snappishness, fits of moody sulking, and wild, mad actions. At one time he was so possessed by the fear of fire that he removed from a third-floor flat to one on the ground floor, in order that he might more easily escape whenever the house should burn. A perpetual anticipation of coming evil completely poisoned the present, and prevented him from deriving any enjoyment from it. Every time a door was opened rather noisily he started up in fear; and his heart throbbed violently whenever a letter was put into his hand. He suspected everybody. His money was hidden in small sums in all sorts of places, and he kept his simplest plans and intentions secret. He felt embittered, too, against the world, thinking that he was misunderstood and underrated, and that all his successive failures were the result of a general conspiracy against him. But ever-growing boredom dominated everything else—the ennui of a man whose mind was unhinged and to whom the incessant idea of death made all action distasteful, so that he dragged himself idly through life on the plea of its nothingness and worthlessness. What was the use of troubling? The powers of science were miserably limited; it could neither prevent nor foresee. He was possessed by the sceptical ennui of his generation, not the romantic ennui of Werther or René, who regretfully wept over the old beliefs, but the ennui of the new doubters, the young scientists who worry themselves and declare that the world is unendurable because they have not immediately found the secret of life in their retorts.

In Lazare the unavowed terror of ceasing to be was, by a logical contradiction, blended with a ceaseless braggart insistence upon the nothingness of things. It was his very terror, the want of equilibrium in his morbid temperament, that drove him into pessimistic ideas and a mad hatred of life. As it could not last for ever, he looked upon it as a mere fraud and delusion. Was not the first half of one's days spent in dreaming of happiness and the latter half in regrets and fears? He fell back again upon the theories of 'the old one,' as he called Schopenhauer, whose most violent passages he used to recite from memory. He expatiated on the desirability of destroying the wish to live, and so bringing to an end the barbarous and imbecile exhibition of existence, with the spectacle of which the master force of the world, prompted by some incomprehensible egotistical reason, amused itself. He wanted to do away with life in order to do away with fear. He always harped upon the great deliverance; one must wish nothing for fear of evil, avoid all action since it meant pain, and thus sink entirely into death. He occupied himself in trying to discover some practical method of general suicide, some sudden and complete disappearance to which all living creatures would consent. This was perpetually recurring to his mind, even in the midst of ordinary conversation, when he freely and roughly gave vent to it. The slightest worry was sufficient to make him cry that he was sorry he was not yet annihilated; a mere headache set him raging furiously at his body. If he talked with a friend, his conversation immediately turned upon the woes of life, and the luck of those who were already fattening the dandelions in the cemeteries. He had a perfect mania for mournful subjects, and he was much interested in an article by a fanciful astronomer who announced the arrival of a comet with a tail which would sweep the earth away like a grain of sand. Would not this indeed prove the expected cosmical catastrophe, the colossal cartridge destined to blow the world to bits like a rotten old boat? And this desire of his for death, this constant theorizing about universal annihilation, was but the expression of his desperate struggle with his terror, a mere vain hubbub of words, by which he tried to veil the awful fear which the expectation of his end caused him.

The knowledge that his wife was enceinte gave him a fresh shock. It caused him an indefinable sensation, compounded of joy and an increase of disquietude. Notwithstanding the contrary views of 'the old one,' the thought of becoming a father thrilled him with pride—indeed, a vain wonder, as though he were the first person whom such a thing had befallen. But his joy quickly became poisoned; he tormented himself with forebodings of a disastrous issue; already making up his mind that his wife would die, and that the child would never be born. And, indeed, it happened that Louise's health became very bad, for she was far from strong; and then the confusion of the household and the upsetting of their usual habits, together with their frequent bickerings, soon made them both thoroughly miserable. The expectation of a child, which ought to have brought the husband and wife more closely together, only served, indeed, to increase the misunderstanding between them. Thus, when Louise's doctor suggested a visit to the mountains, Lazare was delighted to take her to her sister-in-law's and secure a fortnight's freedom for himself on the plea of going to see his father at Bonneville. At the bottom of his heart he really felt ashamed of this flight; but, after arguing the matter with his conscience, he persuaded himself that a short separation would have a tranquillising effect upon both of them, and that it would be quite sufficient if he joined his wife before the expected event.

On the evening when Pauline at last learned the whole history of the past eighteen months she remained for a moment unable to speak—quite overcome, indeed, by the pitiable story. They were sitting in the dining-room; she had put Chanteau to bed, and Lazare had just finished making his confession in front of the cold tea-pot, beneath the lamp which was now burning dimly.

After an interval of silence Pauline at last exclaimed:

'Why, you don't love each other any longer!'

Her cousin rose to go upstairs, and replied, with an uneasy smile:

'We love each other as much as is possible, my dear girl. You don't understand things, shut up here in this hole. Why should love fare better than anything else?'

As soon as she had closed the door of her own room Pauline fell into one of those fits of despondency which had so often tortured her and kept her awake, on the very same chair, while all the rest of them were sleeping. Was there going to be a renewal of trouble? She had hoped it was all done with, both for others and herself, when she had torn her heart asunder and given Lazare to Louise; and now she found how useless her sacrifice had been. They had already ceased to love each other; it was all to no purpose that she had wept bitter tears and martyred herself. To this wretched result had she come, to fresh trouble and strife, the thought of which added to her grief. There seemed to be no end to suffering!

Then as, with her arms hanging listlessly in front of her, she sat watching her candle burn away, the oppressive thought arose from her conscience that she alone was guilty. She tried, but in vain, to struggle against the facts. It was she alone who had brought about that marriage, without understanding that Louise would never prove the wife that her cousin needed. She saw it now clearly enough. She recognised that the other was much too nervously inclined herself to be able to steady him, for she lost her head at the merest trifle, and her only charm lay in her caressing nature—a charm of which Lazare had already tired. Why did all this only occur to her now? Were not these, indeed, the very reasons which had determined her to let Louise take her place? She had thought that Louise possessed a more loving nature than her own; she had believed that Louise, with her kisses and caresses, would be able to free Lazare from his gloomy despondency. Ah! the pity of it all! To have brought about evil when she had striven to accomplish good, and to have shown such ignorance of life as to have brought ruin upon those she yearned to save! Yet she had felt so sure that she was right and was perfecting her good work on the day when their happiness had cost her such bitter tears! Now she felt contempt for her kindliness, since kindliness did not always create happiness.

The house was wrapped in sleep. In the quiet of her room she could hear nothing but the throbbing of her temples. Within her was gradually surging a rebellious regret. Why had she not married Lazare herself? He had been hers; she had had no right to give him to another. Perhaps he might have been wretched and despondent at first, but by-and-by she would have restored his courage and protected him from his insane fancies. She had always felt foolishly doubtful of herself, and from that alone all the unhappiness had arisen. The consciousness of her own robust health and strength and all her power of affection forced itself upon her again. Was she not superior in every way to that other girl? How foolish she had been in weakly effacing herself! She loved her cousin sufficiently well to disappear if the other girl could make him happy; but since she knew not how to keep his love, was it not her duty to act and break that wicked union? And her anger grew apace; she felt that she was both braver and more beautiful than the other. Conviction flashed upon her mind; it was she who ought to have married Lazare.

Then she was overwhelmed with regret. The hours of the night passed, one by one, yet she did not think of seeking her bed. She sat there, staring at the tall flame of the candle without seeing it, in a vivid waking dream. She was no longer in her old bedroom. She thought she had married Lazare, and their life unrolled itself before her eyes in a series of pictures of love and delight. They were at Bonneville, by the edge of the blue sea, or in Paris, in some busy street. They were in a peaceful little room, with books lying about it and sweet roses on the table; the lamp gave out a soft, clear light, while the ceiling was steeped in shadow. Every moment their hands sought each other. Lazare had recovered all the careless gaiety of his early youth, and she loved him so much that he had again come to believe in the eternity of existence. Just now they were sitting at table; now they were going out together; to-morrow she would go over the week's accounts with him. She loved those little domestic details; she made them the foundation of their happiness, which knew no break from the laughing toilet in the morning until the last kiss at night. In the summer they travelled. Then one day she discovered that she was likely to become a mother. But just then a shivering shudder dissipated her dream, and she was no longer far away, but in her own room at Bonneville, staring at her expiring candle. A mother! Ah! the misery of it! It was that other who would be one; never would any of those things happen to herself, never would those joys be hers! The shock was so painful that tears gushed from her eyes, and she wept distractedly, sobbing like one heart-broken. At last the candle burnt out, and she had to seek her bed in darkness.

That feverish night left Pauline with a feeling of deep emotion and charitable pity for the disunited husband and wife, and for herself. Her grief melted into a kind of affectionate hope. She could not have told on what she was reckoning; she dared not analyse the confused sentiments which agitated her heart. But, after all, why should she trouble herself in this way? Hadn't she at least ten days before her? It would be time enough to think of matters by-and-by. What was of immediate importance was to tranquillise Lazare, so that he might derive some benefit from his stay at Bonneville. And she assumed her old gaiety of demeanour, and soon they plunged afresh into their life of former days.

At first it seemed a renewal of the old comradeship of early youth. 'Don't bother about that tiresome play of yours. It will only get hissed. Come and help me to look whether Minouche has carried my ball of thread on to the top of the cupboard,' said Pauline.