d resignation of the two unfortunate
creatures.

CHAPTER XXXII. SUICIDE.

Cephyse and her sister continued with calmness the preparations for
their death.

Alas! how many poor young girls, like these sisters, have been, and
still will be, fatally driven to seek in suicide a refuge from despair,
from infamy, or from a too miserable existence! And upon society
will rest the terrible responsibility of these sad deaths, so long as
thousands of human creatures, unable to live upon the mockery of wages
granted to their labor, have to choose between these three gulfs of
shame and woe; a life of enervating toil and mortal privations, causes
of premature death; prostitution, which kills also, but slowly--by
contempt, brutality, and uncleanness; suicide--which kills at once.

In a few minutes, the two sisters had constructed, with the straw of
their couch, the calkings necessary to intercept the air, and to render
suffocation more expeditious and certain.

The hunchback said to her sister, "You are the taller, Cephyse, and must
look to the ceiling; I will take care of the window and door."

"Be satisfied, sister; I shall have finished before you," answered
Cephyse.

And the two began carefully to stop up every crevice through which a
current of air could penetrate into the ruined garret. Thanks to her
tall stature, Cephyse was able to reach the holes in the roof, and
to close them up entirely. When they had finished this sad work, the
sisters again approached, and looked at each other in silence.

The fatal moment drew near; their faces, though still calm, seemed
slightly agitated by that strange excitement which always accompanies a
double suicide.

"Now," said Mother Bunch, "now for the fire!"

She knelt down before the little chafing-dish, filled with charcoal. But
Cephyse took hold of her under the arm, and obliged her to rise again,
saying to her, "Let me light the fire--that is my business."

"But, Cephyse--"

"You know, poor sister, that the smell of charcoal gives you the
headache!"

At the simplicity of this speech, for the Bacchanal Queen had spoken
seriously, the sisters could not forbear smiling sadly.

"Never mind," resumed Cephyse; "why suffer more and sooner than is
necessary?"

Then, pointing to the mattress, which still contained a little straw,
Cephyse added, "Lie down there, good little sister; when our fire is
alight, I will come and sit down by you."

"Do not be long, Cephyse."