minded him that the session of the Chamber was
about to open. He made his health a pretext for delay, saying that he
felt weak and wished to send in his resignation as deputy. She induced
him only by her urgent prayer to content himself with asking leave of
absence.

"But you, my beloved!" he said, "I am condemning you to a sad
existence!"

"With you," she replied, "I am happy everywhere and always!"

It was not true that she was happy, but it was true that she loved
him and was devoted to him. There was no suffering she would not have
resigned herself to, no sacrifice she would not make, were it for him.

From this moment the prospect of worldly sovereignty, which she thought
she had touched with her hand, escaped her. She had a presentiment of
a melancholy future of solitude, of renunciation, of secret tears; but
near him grief became a fete. One knows with what rapidity life passes
with those who busy themselves without distraction in some profound
grief--the days themselves are long, but the succession of them is rapid
and imperceptible. It was thus that the months and then the seasons
succeeded one another, for Camors and the Marquise, with a monotony
that left hardly any trace on their thoughts. Their daily relations were
marked, on the part of the Count with an invariably cold and distant
courtesy, and very often silence; on the part of the Marquise by an
attentive tenderness and a constrained grief. Every day they rode out
on horseback, both clad in black, sympathetic by their beauty and their
sadness, and surrounded in the country by distant respect. About the
beginning of the ensuing winter Madame de Campvallon experienced a
serious disquietude. Although M. de Camors never complained, it was
evident his health was gradually failing. A dark and almost clayey tint
covered his thin cheeks, and spread nearly to the whites of his eyes.
The Marquise showed some emotion on perceiving it, and persuaded him
to consult a physician. The physician perceived symptoms of chronic
debility. He did not think it dangerous, but recommended a season at
Vichy, a few hygienic precautions, and absolute repose of mind and body.

When the Marquise proposed to Camors this visit to Vichy, he only
shrugged his shoulders without reply.

A few days after, Madame de Campvallon on entering the stable one
morning, saw Medjid, the favorite mare of Camors, white with foam,
panting and exhausted. The groom explained, with some awkwardness,