ome out. But above all, there existed for him a sacred
sanctuary which he could not enter without trembling--the chamber where
she had confessed her love. He kept the key of it; he had not moved
a single object from its place since the sorrowful morning of her
departure; and a skirt which she had forgotten lay still upon her
armchair. He opened his arms wildly to clasp her shade floating in the
soft half light of the room, with its closed shutters and its walls hung
with the old faded pink calico, of a dawnlike tint.

In the midst of his unremitting toil Pascal had another melancholy
pleasure--Clotilde's letters. She wrote to him regularly twice a week,
long letters of eight or ten pages, in which she described to him all
her daily life. She did not seem to lead a very happy life in Paris.
Maxime, who did not now leave his sick chair, evidently tortured her
with the exactions of a spoiled child and an invalid. She spoke as if
she lived in complete retirement, always waiting on him, so that she
could not even go over to the window to look out on the avenue, along
which rolled the fashionable stream of the promenaders of the Bois; and
from certain of her expressions it could be divined that her brother,
after having entreated her so urgently to go to him, suspected her
already, and had begun to regard her with hatred and distrust, as he did
every one who approached him, in his continual fear of being made use of
and robbed. He did not give her the keys, treating her like a servant to
whom he found it difficult to accustom himself. Twice she had seen her
father, who was, as always, very gay, and overwhelmed with business; he
had been converted to the Republic, and was at the height of political
and financial success. Saccard had even taken her aside, to sympathize
with her, saying that poor Maxime was really insupportable, and that she
would be truly courageous if she consented to be made his victim. As she
could not do everything, he had even had the kindness to send her,
on the following day, the niece of his hairdresser, a fair-haired,
innocent-looking girl of eighteen, named Rose, who was assisting her
now to take care of the invalid. But Clotilde made no complaint; she
affected, on the contrary, to be perfectly tranquil, contented, and
resigned to everything. Her letters were full of courage, showing
neither anger nor sorrow at the cruel separation, making no desperate
appeal to Pascal's affection to recall her. But be