lly in the quarters
where the working class live, the houses are too high, the streets too
narrow, the air too murky for heaven to be seen.

It was Death alone at which the little cripple was gazing so earnestly.
Her course was determined upon at once: she must die. But how?

Sitting motionless in her easy-chair, she considered what manner of death
she should choose. As she was almost never alone, she could not think of
the brazier of charcoal, to be lighted after closing the doors and
windows. As she never went out she could not think either of poison to be
purchased at the druggist's, a little package of white powder to be
buried in the depths of the pocket, with the needle-case and the thimble.
There was the phosphorus on the matches, too, the verdigris on old sous,
the open window with the paved street below; but the thought of forcing
upon her parents the ghastly spectacle of a self-inflicted death-agony,
the thought that what would remain of her, picked up amid a crowd of
people, would be so frightful to look upon, made her reject that method.

She still had the river. At all events, the water carries you away
somewhere, so that nobody finds you and your death is shrouded in
mystery.

The river! She shuddered at the mere thought. But it was not the vision
of the deep, black water that terrified her. The girls of Paris laugh at
that. You throw your apron over your head so that you can't see, and
pouf! But she must go downstairs, into the street, all alone, and the
street frightened her.

Yes, it was a terrible thing to go out into the street alone. She must
wait until the gas was out, steal softly downstairs when her mother had
gone to bed, pull the cord of the gate, and make her way across Paris,
where you meet men who stare impertinently into your face, and pass
brilliantly lighted cafes. The river was a long distance away. She would
be very tired. However, there was no other way than that.

"I am going to bed, my child; are you going to sit up any longer?"

With her eyes on her work, "my child" replied that she was. She wished to
finish her dozen.

"Good-night, then," said Mamma Delobelle, her enfeebled sight being
unable to endure the light longer. "I have put father's supper by the
fire. Just look at it before you go to bed."

Desire did not lie. She really intended to finish her dozen, so that her
father could take them to the shop in the morning; and really, to see
that tranquil little head bending