happy face. A man, also young,
joined them. It was evidently a wedding-party; the mother accompanied
them, to see them safely on board the train.

Now there is the confusion of departure, the last stroke of the bell,
the steam escaping with a hissing sound, mingled with the hurried
footsteps of belated passengers, the slamming of doors and the rumbling
of the heavy omnibuses. Sidonie comes not. And Frantz still waits.

At that moment a hand is placed on his shoulder.

Great God!

He turns. The coarse face of M. Gardinois, surrounded by a
travelling-cap with ear-pieces, is before him.

"I am not mistaken, it is Monsieur Risler. Are you going to Marseilles
by the express? I am not going far."

He explains to Frantz that he has missed the Orleans train, and is going
to try to connect with Savigny by the Lyon line; then he talks about
Risler Aine and the factory.

"It seems that business hasn't been prospering for some time. They were
caught in the Bonnardel failure. Ah! our young men need to be careful.
At the rate they're sailing their ship, the same thing is likely to
happen to them that happened to Bonnardel. But excuse me, I believe
they're about to close the gate. Au revoir."

Frantz has hardly heard what he has been saying. His brother's ruin, the
destruction of the whole world, nothing is of any further consequence to
him. He is waiting, waiting.

But now the gate is abruptly closed like a last barrier between him and
his persistent hope. Once more the station is empty. The uproar has been
transferred to the line of the railway, and suddenly a shrill whistle
falls upon the lover's ear like an ironical farewell, then dies away in
the darkness.

The ten o'clock train has gone!

He tries to be calm and to reason. Evidently she missed the train from
Asmeres; but, knowing that he is waiting for her, she will come, no
matter how late it may be. He will wait longer. The waiting-room was
made for that.

The unhappy man sits down on a bench. The prospect of a long vigil
brings to his mind a well-known room in which at that hour the lamp
burns low on a table laden with humming-birds and insects, but that
vision passes swiftly through his mind in the chaos of confused thoughts
to which the delirium of suspense gives birth.

And while he thus lost himself in thought, the hours passed. The roofs
of the buildings of Mazas, buried in darkness, were already beginning to
stand out distinctly against the brightening