fat was obliged to
accompany her into the dressing room, for she shook at the idea of being
alone there for one moment, even though she had left the door open. When
he had lain down again she still roamed about the room, visiting its
several corners and starting and shivering at the slightest noise. A
mirror stopped her, and as of old she lapsed into obvious contemplation
of her nakedness. But the sight of her breast, her waist and her thighs
only doubled her terror, and she ended by feeling with both hands very
slowly over the bones of her face.

"You're ugly when you're dead," she said in deliberate tones.

And she pressed her cheeks, enlarging her eyes and pushing down her jaw,
in order to see how she would look. Thus disfigured, she turned toward
the count.

"Do look! My head'll be quite small, it will!"

At this he grew vexed.

"You're mad; come to bed!"

He fancied he saw her in a grave, emaciated by a century of sleep, and
he joined his hands and stammered a prayer. It was some time ago that
the religious sense had reconquered him, and now his daily access of
faith had again assumed the apoplectic intensity which was wont to leave
him well-nigh stunned. The joints of his fingers used to crack, and he
would repeat without cease these words only: "My God, my God, my God!"
It was the cry of his impotence, the cry of that sin against which,
though his damnation was certain, he felt powerless to strive. When Nana
returned she found him hidden beneath the bedclothes; he was haggard; he
had dug his nails into his bosom, and his eyes stared upward as though
in search of heaven. And with that she started to weep again. Then they
both embraced, and their teeth chattered they knew not why, as the same
imbecile obsession over-mastered them. They had already passed a similar
night, but on this occasion the thing was utterly idiotic, as Nana
declared when she ceased to be frightened. She suspected something, and
this caused her to question the count in a prudent sort of way. It might
be that Rose Mignon had sent the famous letter! But that was not the
case; it was sheer fright, nothing more, for he was still ignorant
whether he was a cuckold or no.

Two days later, after a fresh disappearance, Muffat presented himself
in the morning, a time of day at which he never came. He was livid;
his eyes were red and his whole man still shaken by a great internal
struggle. But Zoe, being scared herself, did not notice his trouble