ger of another. Of what other?

The letter and will made by Florent disclosed to her the threat of a
fatal duel suspended over the head which was the dearest to her. So she
had driven to a tragical encounter the only being whom she loved.... The
disappointment of the heart in which palpitated the wild energies of a
bestial atavism was so sudden, so acute, so dolorous, that she uttered an
inarticulate cry, leaning upon her brother's desk, and, in the face of
those sheets of paper which had revealed so much, she repeated:

"He is going to fight a duel! He!.... And I am the cause!".... Then,
returning the letters and the will to the drawer, she closed it and rose,
saying aloud:

"No. It shall not be. I will prevent it, if I have to cast myself between
them. I do not wish it! I do not wish it!"

It was easy to utter such words. But the execution of them was less easy.
Lydia knew it, for she had no sooner uttered that vow than she wrung her
hands in despair--those weak hands which Madame Steno compared in one of
her letters to the paws of a monkey, the fingers were so supple and so
long--and she uttered this despairing cry: "But how?".... which so many
criminals have uttered before the issue, unexpected and fatal to them, of
their shrewdest calculations. The poet has sung it in the words which
relate the story of all our faults, great and small:

"The gods are just, and of our pleasant vices
Make instruments to plague us."

It is necessary that the belief in the equity of an incomprehensible
judge be well grounded in us, for the strongest minds are struck by a
sinister apprehension when they have to brave the chance of a misfortune
absolutely merited. The remembrance of the soothsayer's prediction
suddenly occurred to Lydia. She uttered another cry, rubbing her hands
like a somnambulist. She saw her brother's blood flowing.... No, the duel
should not take place! But how to prevent it? How-how? she repeated.
Florent was not at home. She could, therefore, not implore him. If he
should return, would there still be time? Lincoln was not at home. Where
was he? Perhaps at a rendezvous with Madame Steno.

The image of that handsome idol of love clasped in the painter's arms,
plunged in the abyss of intoxication which her ardent letters described,
was presented to the mind of the jealous wife. What irony to perceive
thus those two lovers, whom she had wished to strike, with the ecstacy of
bliss in their eyes! Lydia