he who knows her inmost soul found too
easily the terrible word, the only word that could strike and touch her
to the quick. She alone felt it; she finds herself now alone in the
church (the crowd no longer exists for her), and alone she sees herself
falling into the infernal dark abyss. "Father, reach me your hand! I
feel I am sinking!"

Not yet, it is not yet time! She must struggle and fall still lower,
then rise a little to sink lower still. Now, she comes to him every
day more grieving, and more pressing. How she prays and insists! But
she will not yet get the comforting word: "To-day? No, on Saturday."
And on Saturday he puts her off till Wednesday.[1] What! three days
and three whole nights in the same anxiety? She weeps like a child.
No matter; he resists and leaves her, but he is troubled even in
resisting her. In thus humbling this _belle madame_, he tastes a
secret pleasure of pride; and yet he thinks himself that he has been
too harsh towards her: he loves her, and he has made her weep!

Cruel man! do you not see that the poor woman is dying? that she is
becoming weaker at every burst of grief? What is it you want? her
downfall? But in this prostration of strength, in this terror of
despair and abandonment of dignity, is there not already a complete
downfall? No; what he wants till now, is, that she may suffer as he
does, resemble him in sufferings, and be his partner in his woes and
frenzy. He is alone; then let her be alone. He has no family; he
hates her as a wife and mother; he wants to make her a lover, a lover
of God: he is deceiving himself in deceiving her.

But in the midst of all this, and fascinated as she is, she is not,
however, so blind as you might believe. Women, even children, are
penetrating when they are afraid; they very soon get a glimpse of what
may comfort them. This woman, whilst she was dragged at his feet as a
frightened yet caressing suppliant, did not fail to notice, through her
tears, the emotion she excited. They were both in emotion
together--this is to be an accomplice. They both know (without,
however, knowing it clearly, but confusedly through instinct and
passion) that they have a hold upon each other, she by desire, and he
by fear.

Fear has much to do with love. The husband in the middle ages was
loved by the wife for his very severity. His humble Griselda
recognised in him the right of the paternal rod. The bride of William
the Conqueror, hav