the same landau, and Olivier Bertin remained alone with
Musadieu in the Place de l'Opera.

Suddenly he felt a sort of affection for this man, or rather that
natural attraction one feels for a fellow-countryman met in a distant
land, for he now felt lost in that strange, indifferent crowd, whereas
with Musadieu he might still speak of her.

So he took his arm.

"You are not going home now?" said he. "It is a fine night; let us take
a walk."

"Willingly."

They went toward the Madeleine, in the mist of the nocturnal crowd
possessed by that short and violent midnight excitement which stirs the
Boulevards when the theaters are being emptied.

Musadieu had a thousand things in his mind, all his subjects for
conversation from the moment when Bertin should name his preference; and
he let his eloquence loose upon the two or three topics that interested
him most. The painter allowed him to run on without listening to him,
and holding him by the arm, sure of being able soon to lead him to
talk of Annette, he walked along without noticing his surroundings,
imprisoned within his love. He walked, exhausted by that fit of jealousy
which had bruised him like a fall, overcome by the conviction that he
had nothing more to do in the world.

He should go on suffering thus, more and more, without expecting
anything. He should pass empty days, one after another, seeing her from
afar, living, happy, loved and loving, without doubt. A lover! Perhaps
she would have a lover, as her mother had had one! He felt within him
sources of suffering so numerous, diverse, and complicated, such an
afflux of miseries, such inevitable tortures, he felt so lost, so far
overwhelmed, from this moment, by a wave of unimaginable agony that he
could not suppose anyone ever had suffered as he did. And he suddenly
thought of the puerility of poets who have invented the useless labor
of Sisyphus, the material thirst of Tantalus, the devoured heart of
Prometheus! Oh, if they had foreseen, if they had experienced the mad
love of an elderly man for a young girl, how would they had expressed
the painful and secret effort of a being who can no longer inspire love,
the tortures of fruitless desire, and, more terrible than a vulture's
beak, a little blonde face rending a heart!

Musadieu talked without stopping, and Bertin interrupted him, murmuring
almost in spite of himself, under the impulse of his fixed idea:

"Annette was charming this evening."

"Yes, de