mmonplace young fellow? How had she
succeeded in making someone of him? Then he thought of all the hidden
mysteries of people's lives. He remembered what had been whispered about
the Count de Vaudrec, who had dowered and married her off it was said.

What would she do now? Whom would she marry? A deputy, as Madame de
Marelle fancied, or some young fellow with a future before him, a higher
class Forestier? Had she any projects, any plans, any settled ideas? How
he would have liked to know that. But why this anxiety as to what she
would do? He asked himself this, and perceived that his uneasiness was
due to one of those half-formed and secret ideas which one hides from
even one's self, and only discovers when fathoming one's self to the
very bottom.

Yes, why should he not attempt this conquest himself? How strong and
redoubtable he would be with her beside him!

How quick, and far, and surely he would fly! And why should he not
succeed too? He felt that he pleased her, that she had for him more than
mere sympathy; in fact, one of those affections which spring up between
two kindred spirits and which partake as much of silent seduction as of
a species of mute complicity. She knew him to be intelligent, resolute,
and tenacious, she would have confidence in him.

Had she not sent for him under the present grave circumstances? And why
had she summoned him? Ought he not to see in this a kind of choice, a
species of confession. If she had thought of him just at the moment she
was about to become a widow, it was perhaps that she had thought of one
who was again to become her companion and ally? An impatient desire to
know this, to question her, to learn her intentions, assailed him. He
would have to leave on the next day but one, as he could not remain
alone with her in the house. So it was necessary to be quick, it was
necessary before returning to Paris to become acquainted, cleverly and
delicately, with her projects, and not to allow her to go back on them,
to yield perhaps to the solicitations of another, and pledge herself
irrevocably.

The silence in the room was intense, nothing was audible save the
regular and metallic tick of the pendulum of the clock on the
mantelpiece.

He murmured: "You must be very tired?"

She replied: "Yes; but I am, above all, overwhelmed."

The sound of their own voices startled them, ringing strangely in this
gloomy room, and they suddenly glanced at the dead man's face as though
the