much; I
found her lying here, and she has not moved since."

Pierre's eyes were becoming accustomed to the dimness. In the fast
fading light he saw aunt Dide stretched, rigid and seemingly lifeless,
upon her bed. Her wretched frame, attacked by neurosis from the hour of
birth, was at length laid prostrate by a supreme shock. Her nerves had
so to say consumed her blood. Moreover some cruel grief seemed to have
suddenly accelerated her slow wasting-away. Her pale nun-like face,
drawn and pinched by a life of gloom and cloister-like self-denial, was
now stained with red blotches. With convulsed features, eyes that glared
terribly, and hands twisted and clenched, she lay at full length in her
skirts, which failed to hide the sharp outlines of her scrawny limbs.
Extended there with lips closely pressed she imparted to the dim room
all the horror of a mute death-agony.

Rougon made a gesture of vexation. This heart-rending spectacle was very
distasteful to him. He had company coming to dinner in the evening, and
it would be extremely inconvenient for him to have to appear mournful.
His mother was always doing something to bother him. She might just
as well have chosen another day. However, he put on an appearance of
perfect ease, as he said: "Bah! it's nothing. I've seen her like that a
hundred times. You must let her lie still; it's the only thing that does
her any good."

Pascal shook his head. "No, this fit isn't like the others," he
whispered. "I have often studied her, and have never observed such
symptoms before. Just look at her eyes: there is a peculiar fluidity, a
pale brightness about them which causes me considerable uneasiness. And
her face, how frightfully every muscle of it is distorted!"

Then bending over to observe her features more closely, he continued
in a whisper, as though speaking to himself: "I have never seen such a
face, excepting among people who have been murdered or have died from
fright. She must have experienced some terrible shock."

"But how did the attack begin?" Rougon impatiently inquired, at a loss
for an excuse to leave the room.

Pascal did not know. Macquart, as he poured himself out another glass
of brandy, explained that he had felt an inclination to drink a little
Cognac, and had sent her to fetch a bottle. She had not been long
absent, and at the very moment when she returned she had fallen rigid on
the floor without uttering a word. Macquart himself had carried her to
the b