ffered terribly at that thought. The
child's love was dead; there was no bond between them; the child would
not have held out his arms when he saw him. He had even looked at him
angrily.

Then, by degrees he grew calmer, his mental torture diminished, the image
that had appeared to his eyes and which haunted his nights became more
indistinct and less frequent. He began once more to live nearly like
everybody else, like all those idle people who drink beer off
marble-topped tables and wear out their clothes on the threadbare velvet
of the couches.

He grew old amid the smoke from pipes, lost his hair under the gas
lights, looked upon his weekly bath, on his fortnightly visit to the
barber's to have his hair cut, and on the purchase of a new coat or hat
as an event. When he got to his cafe in a new hat he would look at
himself in the glass for a long time before sitting down, and take it off
and put it on again several times, and at last ask his friend, the lady
at the bar, who was watching him with interest, whether she thought it
suited him.

Two or three times a year he went to the theatre, and in the summer he
sometimes spent his evenings at one of the open-air concerts in the
Champs Elysees. And so the years followed each other slow, monotonous,
and short, because they were quite uneventful.

He very rarely now thought of the dreadful drama which had wrecked his
life; for twenty years had passed since that terrible evening. But the
life he had led since then had worn him out. The landlord of his cafe
would often say to him: "You ought to pull yourself together a little,
Monsieur Parent; you should get some fresh air and go into the country. I
assure you that you have changed very much within the last few months."
And when his customer had gone out be used to say to the barmaid: "That
poor Monsieur Parent is booked for another world; it is bad never to get
out of Paris. Advise him to go out of town for a day occasionally; he has
confidence in you. Summer will soon be here; that will put him straight."

And she, full of pity and kindness for such a regular customer, said to
Parent every day: "Come, monsieur, make up your mind to get a little
fresh air. It is so charming in the country when the weather is fine. Oh,
if I could, I would spend my life there!"

By degrees he was seized with a vague desire to go just once and see
whether it was really as pleasant there as she said, outside the walls of
the great city.