a heap of bricks lying on the grass of one of
the adjoining work-yards.

The sincere grief which his old and affectionate friend displayed upset
Pierre far more than any angry reproaches or curses would have done.
Tears had come to his own eyes, so acute was the suffering he experienced
at this meeting, which he ought, however, to have foreseen. There was yet
another wrenching, and one which made the best of their blood flow, in
that rupture between Pierre and the saintly man whose charitable dreams
and hopes of salvation he had so long shared. There had been so many
divine illusions, so many struggles for the relief of the masses, so much
renunciation and forgiveness practised in common between them in their
desire to hasten the harvest of the future! And now they were parting;
he, Pierre, still young in years, was returning to life, leaving his aged
companion to his vain waiting and his dreams.

In his turn, taking hold of Abbe Rose's hands, he gave expression to his
sorrow. "Ah, my friend, my father," said he, "it is you alone that I
regret losing, now that I am leaving my frightful torments behind. I
thought that I was cured of them, but it has been sufficient for me to
meet you, and my heart is rent again.... Don't weep for me, I pray
you, don't reproach me for what I have done. It was necessary that I
should do it. If I had consulted you, you would yourself have told me
that it was better to renounce the priesthood than to remain a priest
without faith or honour."

"Yes, yes," Abbe Rose gently responded, "you no longer had any faith
left. I suspected it. And your rigidity and saintliness of life, in which
I detected such great despair, made me anxious for you. How many hours
did I not spend at times in striving to calm you! And you must listen to
me again, you must still let me save you. I am not a sufficiently learned
theologian to lead you back by discussing texts and dogmas; but in the
name of Charity, my child, yes, in the name of Charity alone, reflect and
take up your task of consolation and hope once more."

Pierre had sat down beside Abbe Rose, in that deserted nook, at the very
foot of the basilica. "Charity! charity!" he replied in passionate
accents; "why, it is its nothingness and bankruptcy that have killed the
priest there was in me. How can you believe that benevolence is
sufficient, when you have spent your whole life in practising it without
any other result than that of seeing want perpetuated