ubt he could keep them open this entire night.

But he deceived himself; when he heard the calm and regular respiration
of Phillis with her head on his shoulder, and felt the mild warmth of
her body penetrate his, in the quiet imposed upon him, without being
conscious of it, believing himself far from sleep, and convinced that he
required no effort to keep awake, he suddenly slept. When he awoke a ray
of pale sunlight filled the room, and leaning her elbow on the bolster,
Phillis was watching him. He made a brusque movement, throwing himself
backward. "What is the matter?" he cried. "What have I said?" Instantly
his face paled, his lips quivered; he felt his heart beat tumultuously
and his throat pressed by painful constriction. "But nothing is the
matter," she answered, looking at him tenderly. "You have said nothing."
To come to the point, why should he have spoken? During his frightful
dreams, his nights of disturbed sleep, he might have cried out, but he
did not know if he had ever done so. And besides, he had not just waked
from an agitated sleep. All this passed through his mind in an instant,
in spite of his alarm. "What time is it?" he asked. "Nearly six
o'clock." "Six o'clock!" "Do you not hear the vehicles in the street?
The street-venders are calling their wares." It must have been about
one o'clock when he closed his eyes; he had then slept five hours,
profoundly, and he felt calm, rested, refreshed, his body active and his
mind tranquil, the man of former times, in the days of his happy youth,
and not the half-insane man of these last frightful months.

He breathed a sigh.

"Ah, if I could have you always!" he murmured, as much to himself as to
her.

And he gave her a long look mingled with a sad smile; then, placing his
arm around her shoulders, he pressed her to him.

"Dear little wife!"

She had never heard so profound, so vibrating, a tenderness in his
voice; never had she been able, until hearing these words, to measure
the depth of the love that she had inspired in him; and it even seemed
that this was the declaration of a new love.

Pressing her passionately to him, he repeated:

"Dear little wife!"

Distracted, lost in her happiness, she did not reply.

All at once he held her from him gently, and looking at her with the
same smile:

"Does this word tell you nothing?"

"It tells me that you love me."

"And is that all?"

"What more can I wish? You say it, I feel it. You give me the