most
terrible of all!

While she is thus sadly reviewing her life in the cool of the evening
and the calm of the deserted house, a gust of happy laughter rose from
the rooms beneath; and recalling the confidences of Andre, his last
letter telling the great news, she tried to distinguish among all these
fresh and limpid voices that of her daughter Elise, her son's betrothed,
whom she did not know, whom she would never know. This reflection added
to the misery of her last moments, and loaded them with so much remorse
and regret that, in spite of her will to be brave, she wept.

Night comes on little by little. Large shadows cover the sloping
windows, where the immense depth of the sky seems to lose its colour,
and to deepen into obscurity. The roofs seem to draw close together for
the night, like soldiers preparing for the attack. The bells count the
hours gravely, while the martins fly round their hidden nests, and the
wind makes its accustomed invasion of the rubbish of the old wood-yard.
To-night it sighs with the sound of the river, a shiver of the fog; it
sighs of the river, to remind the unfortunate woman that it is there
she must go. She shivers beforehand in her lace mantle. Why did she come
here to reawaken her desire for a life impossible after the avowal she
was forced to make? Hasty steps shake the staircase; the door opens
precipitately; it is Andre. He is singing, happy, in a great hurry, for
they are waiting dinner for him below. But, as he is striking the match,
he feels that someone is in the room--a moving shadow among the shadows
at rest.

"Who is there?"

Something answers him like a stifled laugh or a sob. He believes that
it is one of his little neighbours, a plot of the children to amuse
themselves. He draws near. Two hands, two arms, seize and surround him.

"It is I."

And with a feverish voice, hurrying as if to assure herself, she tells
him that she is setting out on a long journey, and that before going--

"A journey! And where are you going?"

"Oh, I do not know. We are going over there, a long way, on business in
his own part of the world."

"What! You will not be here for my play? It is in three days. And then,
immediately after, my marriage. Come now, he cannot hinder you from
coming to my marriage?"

She makes excuses, imagines reasons, but her hands burning between her
son's, and her altered voice, tell Andre that she is not speaking the
truth. He is going to strike a light;