r the obscure vault of
a church. My eyes, full of the bright sunshine, accustomed themselves
gradually to this artificial night.

"Monsieur is your old school-friend," she said to Louis.

He made no reply. At last I could see him, and it was one of those
spectacles that are stamped on the memory for ever. He was standing, his
elbows resting on the cornice of the low wainscot, which threw his body
forward, so that it seemed bowed under the weight of his bent head. His
hair was as long as a woman's, falling over his shoulders and hanging
about his face, giving him a resemblance to the busts of the great men
of the time of Louis XIV. His face was perfectly white. He constantly
rubbed one leg against the other, with a mechanical action that nothing
could have checked, and the incessant friction of the bones made a
doleful sound. Near him was a bed of moss on boards.

"He very rarely lies down," said Mademoiselle de Villenoix; "but
whenever he does, he sleeps for several days."

Louis stood, as I beheld him, day and night with a fixed gaze, never
winking his eyelids as we do. Having asked Mademoiselle de Villenoix
whether a little more light would hurt our friend, on her reply I opened
the shutters a little way, and could see the expression of Lambert's
countenance. Alas! he was wrinkled, white-headed, his eyes dull and
lifeless as those of the blind. His features seemed all drawn upwards to
the top of his head. I made several attempts to talk to him, but he did
not hear me. He was a wreck snatched from the grave, a conquest of life
from death--or of death from life!

I stayed for about an hour, sunk in unaccountable dreams, and lost in
painful thought. I listened to Mademoiselle de Villenoix, who told me
every detail of this life--that of a child in arms.

Suddenly Louis ceased rubbing his legs together, and said slowly:

"The angels are white."

I cannot express the effect produced upon me by this utterance, by the
sound of the voice I had loved, whose accents, so painfully expected,
had seemed to be lost for ever. My eyes filled with tears in spite of
every effort. An involuntary instinct warned me, making me doubt whether
Louis had really lost his reason. I was indeed well assured that he
neither saw nor heard me; but the sweetness of his tone, which seemed
to reveal heavenly happiness, gave his speech an amazing effect. These
words, the incomplete revelation of an unknown world, rang in our souls
like some glor