anything, except that she was mounting through the air,
floating in it, flying in it, that something was raising her above the
earth. From time to time she heard the loud laughter, the noisy voice
of Quasimodo in her ear; she half opened her eyes; then below her she
confusedly beheld Paris checkered with its thousand roofs of slate and
tiles, like a red and blue mosaic, above her head the frightful and
joyous face of Quasimodo. Then her eyelids drooped again; she thought
that all was over, that they had executed her during her swoon, and that
the misshapen spirit which had presided over her destiny, had laid hold
of her and was bearing her away. She dared not look at him, and she
surrendered herself to her fate. But when the bellringer, dishevelled
and panting, had deposited her in the cell of refuge, when she felt his
huge hands gently detaching the cord which bruised her arms, she felt
that sort of shock which awakens with a start the passengers of a vessel
which runs aground in the middle of a dark night. Her thoughts
awoke also, and returned to her one by one. She saw that she was in
Notre-Dame; she remembered having been torn from the hands of the
executioner; that Phoebus was alive, that Phoebus loved her no longer;
and as these two ideas, one of which shed so much bitterness over the
other, presented themselves simultaneously to the poor condemned girl;
she turned to Quasimodo, who was standing in front of her, and who
terrified her; she said to him,--"Why have you saved me?"

He gazed at her with anxiety, as though seeking to divine what she was
saying to him. She repeated her question. Then he gave her a profoundly
sorrowful glance and fled. She was astonished.

A few moments later he returned, bearing a package which he cast at
her feet. It was clothing which some charitable women had left on the
threshold of the church for her.

Then she dropped her eyes upon herself and saw that she was almost
naked, and blushed. Life had returned.

Quasimodo appeared to experience something of this modesty. He covered
his eyes with his large hand and retired once more, but slowly.

She made haste to dress herself. The robe was a white one with a white
veil,--the garb of a novice of the Hotel-Dien.

She had barely finished when she beheld Quasimodo returning. He carried
a basket under one arm and a mattress under the other. In the basket
there was a bottle, bread, and some provisions. He set the basket on the
floor and