PART III

I

THE FIRST STAGE

A German legend, intended to illustrate that time is a mere convention, tells of the marvelous adventure of a young monk, who, doubting eternity, was attracted by the song of a bird in a wood near his hermitage. It was such a delightful song that one never tired of listening to it. When the monk returned to his convent he recognized no one there, and according to his recollections, it was found that three hundred years had elapsed since his departure. He had thought they were only a few minutes.

Elizabeth, after sitting up all night, was so worn out that she believed, on the contrary, that she bore the weight of long years. She was not prepared to penetrate so far into the forest of life. She had sought the way so keenly, that she was tired to death. Her health suffered for it, and she was obliged to remain in bed several days. Her illness was attributed to the treachery of early September evenings which simulate the softness of the summer, and are really cold. This enforced rest allowed her to deepen the resolutions which were to change her life. She felt herself unequal to seeing the visitors who wished to pay her a sick-call, and unable to recommence the worldly show, of which her new point of view showed her the emptiness. As soon as she was well, she declared her intention of settling at St. Martin d'Uriage.

"That is madness," her father objected, "nobody lives in the mountains in the autumn, particularly when recovering from a bad fever. And what will our friends say?"

Quietly, but firmly, she gave her reasons:

"To begin with, it is not the mountains. The sharper air will give me back my health and strengthen the children. And, moreover, I want to see fewer people. It is better in my position. And you will come to us frequently."

"To Albert's," corrected M. Molay-Norrois, who was surprised to find such determination in place of her usual pliable indifference.

Offended, she replied:

"It is true, but he will not come there."

"And if you were mistaken?"

"You will take me, Father."

Pleased to have proved in a word, the value of his paternal rôle, he no longer insisted.

The country house at Saint-Martin was opened again. The children recognized again with shouts of joy, the wooden porches which encircle the walls. A large garden, enclosed by a hedge, separated it from the country road. It was rather a deserted orchard where fruit trees, wild plants and flowers grew without cultivation. On the side of the farm, groups of pine-trees, an arbor and a stream gave it the appearance of a park. Opposite the entrance gate, an alley of plane trees extended to the church, which, new-built, stands against an old Roman steeple with a stone roof, the last vestige of an ancient chapel.

The village of St. Martin is built on a projection of the slopes of Chamrousse. From the mountain, a sea of verdure, meadows and pine woods seem to burst forth into these scattered hamlets, as if to submerge them. Below, that is in the foreground, the Chateau of Saint-Ferriol, standing bolt upright on a wooded promontory, with a pretty swaggering air, looks defiantly at the fortress with its towers, gables and superimposed terraces. Some seven hundred feet below, the fresh valley of Uriage is stretched out. From this terrace hidden by trees, one looks out on an extended view which is bordered by the mountains of Drac and by the Chartreuse in the distance. As the bell nearby sounded the last Angelus, Elizabeth, who had just finished putting her room in order, saw from her window the flocks returning, as evening came up from the plain. The peace of the country was so complete that she felt it in her heart.

The lights in the Casino and the hotels were being turned on. She was happy to be so far away from them. Here, she could master herself. An impression which dated from the first days of her marriage naturally recurred to her. Albert, on such an evening, had taken her hand to kiss it.

"See," he had said, "we are separated from the whole world. With my work and you, I want nothing more."

She had not understood the fullness of happiness which he hoped to find in her, and that this simple happiness must be jealously guarded.

Night began to frighten her. She feared sleeping in this old building, with its long passages and huge rooms, in which every corner seemed as if it concealed some unknown danger. She dared not inspect the rooms, nor fall asleep. For a long time she heard the tick of an old clock standing in the corridor, which seemed at every stroke to announce ghosts. She had never been afraid of anything when Albert was there. Henceforth it would require training to establish her courage and strengthen her weakness.

Marie Louise and Philippe had soon exhausted the novelty of change. The friendship of the farmers' children, calling in the fowls to give them corn, the mystery of the barns and the farm implements, the heat of the stables, the joy of going into the fields with the cows in the charge of their nervous governess, only made them forget for a few days their motor trips and the children's dances at the casino. They imperiously demanded more refined amusements. Their mother tried to take them walking to Prémol or to the Oursière Waterfall in the Chestnut woods. But she did not know the difference between mushrooms and toadstools, and the untiring youngsters wanted to drag her too far; unaccustomed to walking, she became exhausted before they did. This dual inferiority lessened her in their esteem. She ended by forgetting herself in trying to read stories to them. The library at Saint Martin, carelessly arranged on white pinewood shelves, contained all kinds of curious old books, novels of chivalry, collections of popular legends, ballads of France and other countries. Elizabeth had often seen her husband glance hurriedly over them and take out a volume which she thought was chosen at random, but from whose pages, fantastic heroes escaped. When she wished to do likewise, she saw how ignorant she was.

"You don't know," said Marie Louise condescendingly. "Papa knew. And then he did not read--he told us stories. It's much nicer."

And the impertinent little girl finished by saying:

"I will tell you the story of the 'Cup of Happiness.'"

How difficult it was to keep a resolution! After the sad exaltation of her night of awakening, which had inspired her so tremendously in her desire for change and sacrifice, she was now hesitating at little daily obstacles and struggling against them. She would never attain the object which she sought. What was the good of trying? Albert would know nothing of it. The irreparable separated them. He belonged to another love. Thus discouraged, she ceased all resistance and gave way. But she increased her sorrow by worrying, as one irritates a wound by frequent probings. And, at night, the sight of the lights attracted her. She was already considering going back, renouncing the decision made at a time of deadly insomnia. Only self-love still retained her. She pictured the ironical glances of Mme. Passerat or of Mme. de Vimelle.

One day, as she was walking sadly down the plane-tree avenue, whose heavy leaves are the first to become discolored, after the arrival of autumn, she accepted the invitation of the chapel, the door of which was wide open. She never went there, except to take the children to Mass on Sunday. She tried to pray, but no prayer came to her--only complaints and recriminations against her fate. She remembered one of Albert's reflections:--although an unbeliever, he still recognized the motive power of religious faith, but denied the existence of that faith in all those whose life was not the proof of it, at least in serious circumstances. And he added that he had scarcely known--except in the case of his mother--that constant elevation of thought in the humblest actions which are transfigured by the expression of an inner joy. This made her remorseful. She had had no news of Mme. Derize since she left Grenoble. She always spent the summer at Saint Martin: how had she stood the heat? Why should she have been thus deprived of the country air and the companionship of her grandchildren? Why strike her, punish her for a fault which she could not even understand, and so strongly condemned? Elizabeth was ashamed of her forgetfulness, and promised herself to make up for it the following day, while the heat and light of the whole month of September still permitted it. That was her prayer.

Next day, she had the children dressed early. They were delighted to go to Grenoble. But when it was time to leave, Marie Louise looked complainingly at the empty road:

"I don't see the motor," she said.

"We are going to walk as far as Uriage where we are to take the street car."

"The car?" repeated the youngsters bitterly.

Spoiled by the Passerat motor, they had little liking for this mode of travel. Nevertheless, they were resigned. At the Boulevard des Adieux when they had to climb a dark staircase, they complained again.

"It is not nice, not nice," said the little girl insolently.

"It is all dark," Philippe added.

Children do not willingly take the part of those who are conquered: it is life that makes them do so. Elizabeth quieted them with difficulty. She was already worrying about her mother-in-law's welcome, and did not want to bring two badly behaved children to see her. Old Fanchette, who opened the door for them, wore a cross face, as she greeted the young woman, but when she saw her thus accompanied, she was wreathed in smiles. Mme. Derize received her in her sweet, gentle way, as if she had not noticed the neglect she had suffered. In this way she prevented any apologies and awkwardness. She admired the rosy cheeks of the two children who were holding back, uncertain as to whether they should obey their instinctive respect for age, or respond to the tenderness she showed them.

"Back again in Grenoble?" she asked Elizabeth.

"Only for a time. We have come to lunch with you, Mother."

Fanchette, who was listening, muttered between her teeth:

"Now we must feed them, the dinner-hunters!"

"You will fare very badly," Mme. Derize replied in her quiet voice, "but so much the worse for you."

"I have brought a pie with me and some of those little strawberries that you liked from the Chamrousse woods."

"Ah, you spoil me."

"Just as if we had nothing to give them to eat!" still grumbled the servant, who made no pretense of being logical.

This addition to the menu was very welcome. During the meal, Elizabeth realized, with a sense of details which only a woman can recognize, that there was a decrease of the comforts of life. She looked more attentively at Albert's mother and saw a change in her face, which she had not noticed on her arrival. She attributed it to the heat of a long summer, endured without once leaving the town, surrounded by a chain of mountains which seem to focus the rays of the sun on the plain. How wicked she had been in not asking her to come up to Saint Martin, where every year she had enjoyed the good air! Immediately after luncheon, she made the offer which was in her mind.

"Mother," she said, "we are going to take you to Uriage."

"It is very late now," objected Mme. Derize, who blushed immediately, fearing that her words would be construed as a complaint.

But the slight flush did not color her cheeks very long. She added:

"I mean to say that the season is already well advanced."

"We have still part of September and October. Autumn often has many fine days. The church is only a few steps from the house. You will have the children. Come, I beg of you."

Fanchette, who was clearing away the table, was still a victim of contradictory emotions, and rattled her dishes. They might have asked madame before, but a stay in the mountains would still do her good.

Mme. Derize, somewhat surprised at so much insistence, was looking kindly at her daughter-in-law. She asked herself to what this unexpected manifestation was due. Had she been right to entrust Albert's books to the care of Philippe Lagier to be given to his young wife? She had blamed her initiative very much. She had often been remorseful and somewhat afraid. Could her mind be at ease, and did she even see a light in the dark future?

"I shall be very pleased to join you," she finally accepted.

"No, no. This is a kidnapping. We are going to carry you off with us this evening."

Like weak, shy people, Elizabeth manifested a nervous obstinacy. With an uncertain will, one seeks only immediate results.

"Well, let us make up our bundles," answered the old lady almost gayly, understanding that state of mind.

When the arrival of Mme. Derize became known at Uriage, the entire Molay-Norrois set unanimously condemned Elizabeth. It was an absurdly sentimental concession. It would have been better to have continued to maintain her dignity. Saint Martin was little frequented. Nobody bothered to meet an old woman of commonplace family. M. Passerat, who had formerly had occasion to converse with her, took her part, but as usual, showed himself to be a coward.

"She is an educated woman, I assure you."

"Yes, a former post-mistress," said Mme. de Vimelle curtly.

Philippe Lagier, who had left for Florence the day following his distressing defeat, was no longer there to make them respect his old friend. However, Mme. Molay-Norrois visited her daughter more frequently, and even made advances to Albert's mother. Elizabeth, absorbed in her one idea, showed herself to be unjust in not noticing these praiseworthy efforts. Another drama was being played about her which she never suspected.

The absent member of the family was never mentioned at Saint-Martin, but the thought of him abided there. It occupied the two women unceasingly, one of whom, the young wife, kept silent from pride, and the other from a motive of delicacy, feeling awkward even in presence of the children--in order not to violate instructions that she understood, but regretted. Mme. Derize did not compare the faults of her daughter-in-law with those of her son. She simply wanted to incline Elizabeth to indulgence. Orderly in her own inner life and very skeptical about the duration of illegitimate passions, she did not give up hope of Albert's return.

For a fortnight this strained condition continued. In the evenings after Marie Louise and Philippe had gone to bed, it became particularly unbearable. The two women worked under the same lamp; one, wearing spectacles and bent over a thick woolen stocking intended to warm some poor neighbor's baby in the wintertime; the other, very erect; guiding herself from a pattern of some tapestry on which she worked idly and without pleasure. They exchanged a few commonplaces, then the conversation stopped. The stillness of the country at night was all about them, penetrating and quieting them.

"Why does she not speak to me?" thought Elizabeth, reopening her wound. "Albert considered her so intelligent, so superior to poor silly little me. She does not bother with me. I am not worth the trouble. Then why did she come?"

She did not know that the older woman was reproaching herself in the same way.

"She is suffering," the latter said to herself. "She would suffer less, if she told me her secret which I guess, yet fear I may be mistaken. I ought to get closer to her, draw her to me and comfort her, and yet, I dare not--I feel a weight in my heart, which is choking and oppressing me. My lips are about to open, they do open, and I remain silent. Why, O my God, have I so little courage?"

Elizabeth, overcome, was the first to make up her mind, as they were walking along the plane tree avenue, lightly crushing the dead leaves.

"Mother, do you know where _he_ is now?"

Trembling with emotion, Albert's mother answered quickly:

"He does not write to me very often, and not at length. He is traveling."

"In which country?"

"His last letter was dated from Iran in Spain."

She added, as Elizabeth asked no further:

"It is on the other side of the Pyrenees, but quite near the frontier."

This poor sentence fell like one of those heavy autumn leaves, which the slightest breeze carries off. And that was all. The opportunity they had so long awaited had passed.

That evening Elizabeth did not go to bed until very late. She came back into the drawing-room after her mother-in-law had gone, and tried to read a book to cool her fever. To concentrate her attention, she put her hands on either side of her face. Half an hour passed and she had not turned one page. She was still reading the same words--

"He is traveling--he is traveling."

She recalled the uncommon trips on which she had accompanied her husband to Germany, Munich and Nuremberg, to Touraine, to the castles on the bank of the Loire. The departure was to Albert an exuberant happiness, a "joy of conquest" he called it:--he was going to take possession of new countries. In the picture-galleries, as he stood before a landscape rich in historical association, he would grow enthusiastic, explain, comment, make comparisons that she did not even try to grasp. Little by little this good humor changed--he became distrait, absorbed in himself, and ceased to tell her his impressions. And their return was silent and unresponsive. Why?

Why? She had never inquired. Dull and passive, she asked herself very few questions, and did not try to live her own life, or even Albert's with him. What companionship did she give him? As soon as she began to question herself thus, a quantity of small forgotten details came back to her mind.--How much luggage she had always needed! And what importance she had attached to the thousand inconveniences which no traveler avoids! She needed so many things, she complained of everything, as if Albert could keep the trains from smoking, the rain from falling, the sun from overheating, the hotel kitchen from smelling, the tradesmen from stealing, the women from wearing big hats in the theaters, and fatigue from coming. The worst of all was that she had no curiosity. Curiosity is an incentive which lessens the annoyances of the trip for the sake of the pleasures which are before us. "Nothing interests you," he had said one day with a forced laugh. She now understood the mistake she had made in giving the same value to the petty necessities of life as to serious, vital, new experiences. But most women make this mistake, and that was one excuse. Of what use was an excuse with a husband like Albert who had so often offered to guide her?

She got up slowly to look in the dictionary, then in an atlas for this mysterious Iran. She found it on the Spanish side of the Pyrenees, in the heart of the Basque country. He had planned this journey a long time ago. It was a necessary voyage for material for one of his volumes on "The Peasant." There, he said, in the shelter of the mountains, the traditions of the family were preserved in their primitive purity. Some time ago he had suggested taking her there, but with little insistence, when he learned that comforts had to be dispensed with. She found in a Baedeker of Spain with which he had provided himself in advance, praise of the countries which bathe the Bidassoa, and an account of the customs peculiar to the province of Guipuzcoa. These strange syllables which had formerly amused her, now made her thoughtful. She, who had never, so to speak, exercised her imagination, saw clearly, on an evening richer in warmth and color than those of Dauphiné, a peasant cart at Iran, driving along a road separated from a river by leafless bushes, and on the back seat of the cart, close to each other, sat Anne de Sézery and Albert, who was covering his companion's shoulders with an old horse blanket. "Thus clad, she had never appeared more charming to me"--a little sentence from his diary which was indelibly engraved on her heart. That woman would never take account of any inconveniences on a journey, or glance anxiously, with her much praised golden eyes at the changing scene.

Elizabeth fell asleep thinking of these sad pictures. The next day, she was vexed with the old lady, whom she blamed for her nightmares. When the postman came, she was surprised to find herself watching the mail, to see if there were a letter from Albert to his mother. One day a letter came, bearing the postmark of Paris. She was a little relieved by it, as if the intimacy which was torturing her would be lessened by the return.

The embarrassment which had crept in between her mother-in-law and herself increased like a thick fog in which neither could distinguish her real feelings. What comfort could she expect from this presence? Anything which reminded her of Albert irritated her, weakened her, and everything did recall him. Did Mme. Derize take into account the uselessness of her intervention? She manifested a desire to return to Grenoble. October gave every indication of being cold. The morning of her departure, succeeding in overcoming her fear, she at last said to Elizabeth that which she had been preparing since the day after her arrival:

"My child, have confidence and be patient. Your time will come. It cannot fail to come. Only you must not find morbid pleasure in your sorrow."

But the young wife showed an expressionless face.

"I do not understand you, Mother. I have no sorrow. I never give a thought to it."

Mme. Derize tried to smile.

"You came," she said, "to see me, to hear news of him."

"You are wrong. It was not right that you should be deprived of your grand-children's company on his account."

Then Albert's mother, who had exhausted the limit of her boldness, was silenced, when Elizabeth could no longer keep back her tears.

"My dear little girl, why are you crying?"

"I don't know. It is nervousness."

"I know it is, and I love you all the more for it. I shall always be with you. But why make your trouble harder to bear? Wait with perseverance, but with calmness. Occupy yourself with Marie Louise and Philippe. They are your reason for hope and you belong entirely to them at this time. Be busy, very busy. Fill your days. And pray."

"I no longer know how."

"Go back soon to Grenoble--I shall teach you. Good-by, my child. May God keep you."

The two women kissed each other. Elizabeth watched the jaunting-car which took Mme. Derize to Uriage, until it disappeared round a corner and was hidden by a chestnut tree.

"Why has she gone?" she sighed, when she could no longer see.

After this departure her parents fled from deserted Uriage. Alone and made keen by sorrow, she experienced that melancholy, which, with the coming of autumn, arises from the earth at every step in the country, and which, until now, she had considered only as poet's imaginings. She understood now just what Albert had felt two years ago--the unhappiness of an incomplete or misunderstood life, so powerful to vivify all nature. The plane tree avenue, heaped up with thick, strong leaves, no longer hid the Chapel whose invitation, on that account, became more evident; but that was not where she chose to walk. She preferred the roads which go into the heart of the chestnut woods, and where, from time to time one glimpses the picturesque mountains. But she did not venture far because of her fear. Her children were surprised at her changed mood. She thought less about them than of her sorrow. In the evening when she saw the cattle come home and drink from the little pond, she hated this peace that the animals and their drivers inhaled. October enveloped her with an anguish in which she knew a charm. It was a pleasure to experience pain.

Her entire household was conscious of this weakened condition. At last one day she received some news from Grenoble. Madame Derize, uneasy at not seeing her come back, wrote her a pressing letter, the ending of which revealed a power to foresee:

"My dear Elizabeth," wrote the lady, "this time of year and loneliness are not good for you. And you are not thinking of Marie Louise and Philippe. It is time to occupy yourself with their studies, to give them companions for their work and play. You yourself need a little distraction and social intercourse. Come to Grenoble, I beg of you. We shall see each other often, shall we not? If you do not come this week, I shall come and bring you myself--because I am anxious about you, my child...."

She was amenable to the first influence. She hastened her preparations, to the great joy of the two youngsters, satiated with the pleasures of the country.

"All the same," said Marie Louise, "Grenoble is not Paris."

"It is not Saint Martin either," answered Philippe philosophically.

When it was time to get into the carriage, Elizabeth did not want to go away. In town, she would resume her ordinary life: the home of her parents where she was not at home, and the trial for separation, with reference to which she had had several questions from her lawyer that she had left unanswered. She would lose that liberty of suffering from which she derived so much comfort. She would be obliged to busy herself with her children, to use her days, instead of which she had been giving herself entirely to her own sorrow.

When she lost sight of the Château of Saint-Ferriol which overlooks the valley of Uriage, and when she had entered the valley of Gière, whose sides were covered with hardy golden bushes, it seemed to her that her life was also narrowing, and that she was going far away from her love which she mistook for her sorrow. The children laughed and their merriment pained her. She was coming back to real life, in which actions count for more than wishes and regrets.

II

ELIZABETH'S DAY

Maître Tabourin's four clerks, knowing that their chief was lunching in town with a wealthy client, began their afternoon by playing cards. That contempt for the public, which characterizes the small official in France, whether in the service of the state or of a private individual, prevented their stopping or hiding their game when someone knocked at the door.

"Come in," said Vitrolle indistinctly, unhappy in having no trumps.

But to the amazement of his colleagues, the junior clerk, Malaunay, left the card table to meet the intruder, to whom he bowed respectfully. They understood, however, when they caught sight of Mme. Derize, whose soft, blonde hair, lit up by the rays of the winter's sun, contrasted with the reddish fur she was wearing. In spite of the weight of her cloak, she seemed very tall. The cold air out of doors had reddened her cheeks. A black hat, turned up at the side, trimmed with a single feather, gave her the appearance of an English portrait. Hearing of Maître Tabourin's absence, she seemed confused.

"He asked me to come to-day," she said.

"But he will be back, Madame."

"Then I will wait."

They showed her into the little room adjoining his office. And the game continued. When it was over, Lestaque and Dauras, who had won, suggested another. The senior clerk prudently refused, and each one took up a document without enthusiasm. For want of something better to do they talked, paying no attention to the person who was waiting indefinitely. What is more natural than for a client, however charming, to remain in the waiting-room.

"How about our bet?" asked Malaunay.

"What bet?"

"The Derize case. I was the only one who bet on the husband."

"You were wrong."

"Well, well, we shall see."

"We know now."

Lestaque and Dauras thought little, but at the same time interrupted:

"How far have we gotten with the case?"

"Well," explained the clerk with an air of importance. "After the petition to the president, a verbal record of non-reconciliation was filed. M. Derize did not appear, and his wife obtained the temporary care of the children, as well as an allowance. We sent the summons last October. M. Derize has not shown his intention and it is now January. The delays for conclusion have expired, and the case is written on the records to go by default. We have evidence which constitutes a written proof. The separation will be given _de plano_."

"Has anyone seen that evidence?" asked the junior clerk.

"No. Mme. Derize has it. She does not answer our letters, and the delay in the case is due to her silence. I suppose she is bringing it to us. It is high time."

Dauras sought the information which Lestaque enjoyed giving.

"And what is M. Lagier doing, M. Derize's lawyer?"

"What is he doing?" answered Malaunay, expressing envy and admiration on his mobile face. "He is flirting with his lovely enemy. At Uriage they were always together."

"Yes, but at Grenoble they never see each other."

"They are keeping under cover. And yet you can believe that Mme. Derize is in no hurry to get her separation."

"Well, what will she do then?"

"Ah well, she will console herself. Once consoled, she will become reconciled to her husband. It will be a household of four. That is the custom in Paris."

For the little clerk, dazzled by Paris, was much impressed by its free habits. Always on the lookout for something new, and with his eye fixed on the door, he had only time to whisper "Take care!" to them. The chief entered. M. Tabourin had lunched well--too well, in fact. His face was scarlet, his hair--which he had to dampen a great deal to accomplish such a result--flat. Instead of adopting the new fashion and covering his linen with a high vest, he displayed a shirt front, which he had spotted in many places as a result of his lively excitable gestures. As he was finishing his cigar, he assumed the indifferent air of a man of the world, for the especial benefit of Malaunay, who was watching him carefully; but the first word of the head clerk aroused him.

"Madame Albert Derize is waiting for you in your office."

"Ah, ah," he said, "she is making up her mind at last. It is time to get a judgment by default."

A last hasty puff, and then he disappeared. A few minutes later, someone knocked at the office door.

"Maître Lagier," announced the junior clerk jokingly.

It was he. They would like to have laughed, but the newcomer knew how to command respect. The clerks restrained their mirth.

"M. Tabourin is here?"

"Yes, sir," answered Vitrolle. "He is in his office with Mme. Derize. I will tell him you are here."

"No need to. I shall come back."

Then he did not care to meet Mme. Derize? Upset in their calculations, the clerks were astonished, when the Chief reappeared opportunely with his client. He showed every evidence of an unpleasant interview. Philippe Lagier, discovered, just as he was leaving, made a hurried movement of retreat and embarrassment which could not escape so keen an observer as Malaunay; but the young woman, after an imperceptible hesitation, came toward him.

"Monsieur," she said, "I should very much like to speak with you. Will you go a short way with me?"

"Willingly, Madame," he stammered confusedly.

What had become of that self-possession which had never been known to fail him? Why this emotion on so ordinary an occasion? He recovered his composure at once and bowed to the lawyer and his clerks before he went out with the beautiful Mme. Derize. M. Tabourin had other things on his mind than to observe these fine distinctions. The door was hardly closed when he announced tragically to his colleagues:

"The Derize case has fallen through!"

"How? Why?" asked the clerks.

"Mme. Derize withdraws her petition."

Vitrolle, Lestaque and Dauras wore appropriate expressions of despair to fit the occasion. But the junior clerk dared to show unbounded joy and cried:

"I've won!"

The Chief, not understanding, stared at him and repeated mechanically:

"Won?"

"Certainly," explained the clerk insolently. "We had a bet on that case."

"A bet?"

"It is done in all offices. With nothing at stake what interest would we have in a case? Mme. Derize wanted a separation. Her husband demanded nothing--I bet on him. Nothing has happened--therefore I have won."

Leaving M. Tabourin perplexed, he turned towards his comrades.

"You each owe me a dinner at a restaurant of my own choice. Three dinners, what luck!"

The others protested. The lawyer, surprised, but greedy, hesitated a second between the desire for an invitation and the dignity of his position. The latter won, and he grew very angry:

"Take care, sir. You don't treat business matters seriously, and I have already noticed your dangerous inclination to pleasure. Did you not recently win another bet at the Café du Commerce on the longest time one could take to smoke a cigar? The longest time! At your age, I should have understood the shortest. You took more than an hour to do it. It was a sufficient cause, you know, to dismiss you. The interests of a business must be sacred to its employés, and I will not have my clerks betting on the loss of my cases."

And with this speech, in which he gave vent to his anger (a good thing for him, as he needed some helpful exercise to aid his digestion)--he inconsiderately distributed some work to his mournful listeners.

Saint-André's Square is two steps from the Quai de la République, where the Molay-Norrois lived. Instead of going toward the Isère, Elizabeth directed her steps toward the park. Philippe Lagier, who was silently walking beside her was surprised.

"Where are we going, Madame?"

"To my house."

"Then you have left your parents?"

"Did you not know about it? I have taken a flat in the Rue Haxo, almost opposite the Botanical Gardens."

"Ah," said he, making no comment.

"I have been very much criticised for it. Still it is better as it is. I see my parents almost every day, but a mother needs a little liberty to bring up her children."

The park seemed numbed with the cold. Behind the houses, the young elms and plane trees reared their light branches and twigs against the delicate winter sky, so clear and pale. The water in the pond was frozen, and the ice had been broken in one small place to give a little black swan room to swim; but the poor bird, feeling imprisoned, scarcely moved his feet. Near Elizabeth, Philippe remembered the day last summer in this same garden, when before Counselor Prémereux, he had pleaded the cause of passion, against the Molay-Norrois majority.

They scarcely spoke a word, as they walked along the crowded streets which led from there to the Place de la Constitution, out of which branches the Rue Haxo. This square, symmetrical and even, surrounded by office buildings, was almost deserted, and the Rue Haxo was still more so.

"There it is," she said, as they stopped in front of a tall house of modest appearance near the Boulevard des Alpes, bordered by the grassy slopes of the old ramparts.

They walked up four flights. She preceded him going into her apartment.

"There is no fire in the drawing-room. Excuse my receiving you in this room, Monsieur. It is our school-room."

It was a work-room simply furnished, with a large ink-spotted table; and its one window overlooking the trees of the Botanical Gardens.

"My children write their exercises here--at least, Marie Louise does, because your godson can only amuse himself as yet."

She appeared constrained, embarrassed by what she wished to say to him and could not. Philippe Lagier was conscious of it, but could not help her. Remembering the path at Uriage where he had known humiliation and shame, he could not realize that he was again face to face with her. She had tried to smile in saying "Your godson," which was a bond between them. It was a smile of such distress that he finally concluded to aid her by giving to this conversation the motive it required.

"I have had a letter from your husband, Madame,--from Albert. That was my reason for visiting your lawyer, just now when I met you. His solicitor at Grenoble, Maître Randon, tells him that you refuse every month to accept the allowance which he sends you regularly."

"That is so."

"He was astonished and asked me the reason for it, and begged me to insist or to make them prevail upon you to accept it in your own interests, and if you refuse for yourself, then in the interests of Marie Louise and Philippe, who are in your charge."

After giving this explanation with a severe authority due to embarrassment, he looked at the young woman whose confusion he noted; either coming from the cold air outside to the warm air of the room had caused the blood to mount to her cheeks, or else this flush was caused by the awkwardness she experienced in advance, knowing what her answer must be. Blushing, her eyes filled with tears, she regained her breath as if she were choking, and replied with great effort:

"My husband has wrecked his home himself. He has deprived us of his moral support. From now on, I have decided to dispense with his financial support.

"I will bring them up myself. Later, they can do as they like."

"It is the tenth month. The lawyer has already received ten thousand francs in your name. He does not wish to keep it."

"Let him send it back to M. Derize."

"Albert will not take it back. You know him well. He has pride ... like you."

With a gesture of indifference, she indicated that she had nothing to do with the disposal of the money. However, Philippe Lagier's answer, that allusion to Albert's unselfish nature, was secretly pleasant to her. It put an end to the unpleasant memories which the presence of the lawyer would otherwise have awakened. He replied, with a little less assurance:

"May I ask you a question? Do you not need this allowance, which is legal and which you can--which you ought to receive?"

She explained her situation with simplicity. She had received a dowry of two hundred thousand francs, the interest of which would be sufficient for her. She did not add that her parents had not yet given her the last quarter of it, and that she found her income reduced to six thousand francs a year. Philippe really knew this, but only said:

"It is not the position you are accustomed to."

The apartment in which she was living was certainly neither like the one in the Rue Bara in Paris, nor that of the Molay-Norrois on the banks of the Isère.

"I shall get used to it," she said, smiling. "It is nothing. I have no need to wear the garb of a martyr."

The clothes she was wearing suited her so well, bringing out with such brilliance the beauty of her complexion, that he wanted to protest against this. He had lost the right to do so, and he therefore refrained.

"My children's education," she continued, "will suffer in no wise from this reduction. I have promised myself and I shall keep my word. See, I have already begun. I correct Marie Louise's exercises, and I am teaching her her lessons."

"You give yourself much trouble."

"It gives me something to do. One must be occupied with other people when one's own life no longer has a purpose."

She had risen. He believed that she was asking him to go. But she opened the drawer of a writing-table and came over to him to give him a packet, carefully folded, which he recognized.

"I asked you to come back with me so that I could give you M. Derize's note-books. I thank you for having given them to me. I have kept them a very long time, but you did not ask me for them."

He bowed without speaking.

"And here is the letter which had been sent to him and which I kept without the right to do so. You will return it to him."

Philippe, dumbfounded, refused the envelope she held out to him.

"This telegram belongs to you. It is your weapon. You cannot give up the possession of it."

"I have no further need of it."

"But, Madame...."

"I am giving up my petition for separation. Albert may do as he likes."

For the first time in this conversation she used her husband's Christian name. It was the only indication of her emotion.

"Ah!" murmured Philippe, who did not expect this new development. "Does Albert know?"

"I have just told my lawyer. His lawyer will tell him about it in turn."

"You will give me permission to tell it to him?"

"Certainly."

After that there was nothing left for him to do but to go. Standing in front of her he did not know how to show her his respect. In the course of this unlooked-for interview, he had constantly looked for an opportunity to ask her pardon. To the humiliation of his recollections was now added that of his inadequacy in a situation in which he most desired to use the resources of his mind. But there was another surprise in store for him. Elizabeth offered him her hand, and with a trembling voice, said:

"I also wished to tell you, Monsieur, that I have forgotten your last words at Uriage. Give me your hand. You had misjudged me; it was my fault. A woman alone has to be so careful. Remain Albert's friend, and be a little friendly to me, will you? We shall meet seldom. I only remember the truths I heard from you one day, which have made me understand one's own contribution to one's unhappiness.--"

Philippe, bending down, kissed the fingers which she gently drew away.

"Madame," he repeated. "Madame."

And when he could master his emotion, he said:

"I shall be worthy of your pardon. Ah, if you only knew how I have reproached myself! Now I feel so much younger, so much lighter. Ah, one's own contempt is hard to bear."

"Sh!" she said, her finger on her lips as a signal to him not to continue the subject, never to speak of it again.

He bowed.

"Good-by, Madame. You will never have a more devoted friend."

When he had left, Elizabeth took off her hat and her furs. Her cheeks were burning and her hands frozen. The children, who had been out walking with their governess on L'Ile Verte, were about to return home: she would resume her daily work with them which sometimes made her so tired. She sat down by the fire, leaning against the back of her chair motionless, in that position in which one seeks relaxation after intense fatigue. She felt a great need of rest--of not having to think of or do anything more. Darkness was coming on, but she did not light the lamp. Before her, through the window, she saw the snow of Belledonne on the trees, lit up by the rays of the setting sun, and delicately colored like early spring flowers. Kissed by the sun, the glaciers were melting, and yet, even from a distance in the clear evening light, their coldness was apparent. Despite so many praiseworthy efforts, which seemed to give power to her poor, deserted, young life, she felt the touch of death.

What courage she had used, in order to triumph little by little over her natural indolence, to accomplish so many decisions, even the generosity of which, once they were executed, could no longer sustain her! No reward, no hope would be given her. Far away from her, the one close to the other, Albert and his mistress were freely enjoying their love. However, they would know her greatness of soul, her pride, her new and difficult life. She would force them to remember. During that very day, had she not shown of what she was capable? Did Anne's biography, which had been kept with so much admiration, contain a finer page? This comparison with her rival in exciting her jealousy and poisoning her wound, had given her a little energy. Her children, who came in in the semi-darkness to kiss her, aroused her from her torpor. She thought that Albert's mother would approve of her, would thank her, and, in this unaccustomed activity which had demanded of her sluggish youth a display of strength, the use of which she now understood, she found, despite so many causes for despair, that wonderful peace in fatigue which healthful exercise gives to the body. And this new sensation came as a surprise and a relief to her.

III

MADAME MOLAY-NORROIS

Elizabeth had resolved after her return to Grenoble, not to be at home to visitors in her new house. But on the advice of her parents, to her great surprise sanctioned by her mother-in-law as well, she had decided to have a reception-day. In Paris, preferring her own acquaintances, she had taken little trouble to keep up connections useful or pleasant to her husband. Little by little Albert had left her free and had withdrawn from society. But now the sacredness of social life was impressed on her by the Molay-Norrois, and Mme. Derize begged her to avoid solitude.

"I am confident," she said, "that the future will brighten for you. But you must arrange a normal existence for yourself. It is not always a good thing to live with one's memories."

"But how about you?"

"Oh! I am quite old and the past suffices for me. Marie Louise and Philippe will have friends whose parents you will know. You have given me great happiness in renouncing your separation."

"Nobody knows of it as yet."

"Since you bear Albert's name it is right that the sympathy and esteem of the public should go to you. If God wills that some day you shall take up your life together ..."

"I shall never live with Albert again. He has caused me too much unhappiness...."

After the protest, she decided, not from personal conviction, but because of weakness and the need of distraction, to take the advice of Mme. Derize. One of her school friends, Blanche Servin, of whom she had lost track, had married an ordinary clerk, M. Vernier; and knowing that Elizabeth was unhappy, this friend plucked up courage to come to see her, which she would never have cared to do before, because of the difference in their positions. She turned out to be one of those women, who at first glance, seem very insignificant, and find time to devote to good work because they never think about themselves. Elizabeth was surprised at her tact, her radiant sweetness, the gentle gayety she displayed, despite all the difficulties and troubles she had known in raising a large family. What determination she had developed in so commonplace a lot! She promised to return her call, and to bring Marie Louise and Philippe with her.

Then, now and again, the friends of the Molay-Norrois appeared. Mme. Passerat, always active and in a hurry, came first, accompanied by the old Counselor Prémereux, an admirer over whom she held the whip-hand, since M. Molay-Norrois, the victim of an attack of gout, found himself obliged to stay in his room. With her effusive graciousness she looked about the place and ran to the window to enjoy the view.

"Trees, trees of every kind. And Belledonne on the horizon. It is wonderful! But how pretty you look, my dear! You are right always to get your clothes in Paris."

"It is a dress from last winter," explained Elizabeth, whose toilette contrasted with the shabby furniture. "I had it altered here."

Mme. Passerat burst out laughing.

"What an innocent child I One does not mention such things."

The young woman, determined to meet all advances coldly, was nevertheless obliged to recognize her visitor's charming ease of manner. But, having exhausted her ordinary subjects of conversation, in order to gain a confidence which was being withheld, she let Elizabeth understand, with a condescending air, that she knew all about the withdrawal of the petition. Certainly M. Tabourin's office kept no secrets from anyone.

"Yes," she added, "your settling here is only temporary. You are thinking of going back to Paris soon."

"I think not, Madame," answered Elizabeth, who drew herself to her full height at this intrusion into her private life.

"Yes, you will, you will. Your father will be delighted. He has such good judgment, your dear father, such great experience. Listen to me, my child, brilliant surroundings, the movement and glitter of a drawing-room are necessary for the duration of a passion. Men are so vain. Your husband has withdrawn from society. It is a foolish whim which will not last."

"You know better whether it can last, Madame. But you must allow me to be the best judge of my own case," said Elizabeth.

She was surprised at herself in giving utterance to this sentence of double meaning which concluded with a half threat. Mme. Passerat, disconcerted, hesitating at the allusion, was on her guard, and thought: "Still waters run deep."

Mmes. de Vimelle and Bonnard-Basson, intimate because of their husbands' business association, drove together to the out-of-the-way Rue Haxo. Not so fashionable as Mme. Passerat, and therefore given to petty provincial competition, they noticed with silent satisfaction, the condition of the house and the number of storeys. They had hardly entered, when, while conversing, they made an inventory of the furniture, and unpleasantly estimated the value of Elizabeth's dress, which bore the hallmark of its Parisian origin, and was set off in so modest a frame, a contrast which they considered in very bad taste. After the usual exchange of compliments, Mme. de Vimelle smirked, while her friend tried to regain her breath, which she had lost in coming up the stairs.

"We have heard about your new decision, Madame. It is quite right. You have defeated your adversary's plans."

"What plan? What decision?" asked Elizabeth, puzzled.

"Grenoble is a small town where one knows everything that is going on."

"Everything," said Mme. Bonnard-Basson promptly, to emphasize that she had nothing to hide.

"But what?"

"Well, your husband changed from separation to divorce in order to marry the corespondent. You cut the grass from under his feet by giving up your case."

"I had never thought of that."

And Elizabeth, indignant, asked herself by what right they penetrated so impertinently into the sorrows and doubts of her soul. And she let them know it, not without firmness. Mme. de Vimelle took it upon herself to reply:

"Heavens, Madame, a divorce is like a book or a crime--it belongs to the public."

After the ladies had gone, Elizabeth, who had made enemies of them, compared them to Blanche Vernier who was far from brilliant, and who had not mentioned her equivocal position, but had so spontaneously offered her a sincere, loyal, active friendship. From actual experience, day by day, she saw externalities crumble, and the truth which demands a cruel apprenticeship to be understood, appear.

She expected no one else. She had invited Mme. de Crozet, whose children were friends of Marie Louise and Philippe, but she had expressed her regrets in a short note, which was an evident refusal to have anything to do with a woman who was separated from her husband. That first insult was very painful to her. Did it forbade others?

It was already late when her mother came to see her. She had not consulted her about relinquishing her rights and felt remorseful. It was a very general case in family histories:--the wife, after her marriage, continues to remain under her parents' direction, and particularly under that of her mother, even when they do not seek to exert that influence. She asks their advice on every occasion. Then, one fine day, she asserts herself, paying no attention to the painful astonishment, which so radical a change cannot fail to provoke. Elizabeth, after her despair at Uriage, took a long time to release herself. Feeling she was not understood, and realizing that she had been ill-advised in the past, she had without consideration taken her freedom. Made self-centered by sorrow, as happens with weak natures, she did not notice the grief of other people. Mme. Molay-Norrois had suffered from her daughter's reserve, particularly painful to her, but had not been able to do anything but burden her with impolitic advice; so the gulf between them had widened day by day. They exchanged only a few insignificant words like feeble calls which cannot be heard across a ravine.

Elizabeth inquired for her father's health.

"He is bored in bed," explained her mother. "He is very impatient. I read to him. He needs so much distraction--he is so unaccustomed to suffering!"

What were they going to say, now that they had touched upon their only common interest? Mme. Molay-Norrois hesitated then, timidly ventured, looking down on the floor to lessen her seeming boldness.

"So you ... you are resigned ... as well?"

Quite taken aback by this last word which might have been accidental, referring without definite application to similar cases, and merely said to fill in the silence, Elizabeth looked at her mother attentively. At one glance, she noticed on the face, still youthful, patient and smiling, traces of suffering, which she would have been unable to see several months before. She had no doubts--she could have no doubts--as to her discovery.

"Mother," she sighed affectionately, throwing herself into her arms.

The two women remained for a long time in each other's embrace. Unhappiness restored their intimacy of former days, when one of them was only a little girl.

Without a word they understood each other. Daughterly modesty prevented Elizabeth, who remembered her bitterness at Uriage, from questioning her mother, and she asked herself how long must she have lived with this terrible secret. What strangers we are to one another! How little we can know of the deepest anguish of beings who are dearest to us, and how difficult it is to see and to understand! To perform a duty is easier than to know it, and no one directs or perfects in himself this delicate and complex art of knowledge. Mme. Molay-Norrois was the first to feel the necessity of an explanation.

"My dear, I am finding you again. I thought I had lost you." "Oh, Mother!"

"I did not understand why you were estranged from me. But I blamed myself."

"Blamed yourself?"

"Yes, when you came back to us from Paris ... after Albert's ... deception, I did not admit for a moment that your separation was not inevitable. I aroused you against him, instead of calming you. I still retained, at my age, so many illusions about happiness, about life! Now, I have no more, you understand. I had thought so little about those things. Forgive my mistake."

Elizabeth covered the poor weeping eyes with kisses. In a low voice she asked:

"Is it a long time ... since you found out?"

"The last day at Uriage. And you knew then?"

"Yes."

"You did not tell me--you went away from me.

"Not from you, Mother--from father. How could I have spoken?"

"You are right."

She hesitated a moment, then wished to defend herself, although she had not been accused.

"It is too late. After thirty-two years of marriage. On account of you and your brothers, for the sake of their careers, my hands are tied. What should I have done? I said nothing. He did not even notice it. He is somewhat selfish. Still I have suffered terribly. My ideals are shattered."

"Dear Mother, let us say no more. Lean on me. Let me soothe you, as if I were your mother."

"No. Listen. You must know about it. He is not entirely to blame. When he was in the army and his post was changed, I insisted that he resign. He had nothing to do, and was very attractive. I wanted to live--I did wrong. We are often responsible for the sorrows which crush us."

"Oh, you did not deserve that grief."

"Now he is ill and old age is coming on. It is sad to think, but old age and illness are working in my behalf. _She_ comes less willingly. He prefers my care. That is something."

She tried unsuccessfully to smile. Elizabeth continued to hold her hands, not growing weary in observing on the poor, aging face, traces of distress, which seemed living reproaches to her. In spite of her affection, she had for some months misjudged her mother, who was giving her a lesson in endurance, silence, self-denial and resignation. But she did not wish to be resigned. When asked what she thought of doing, she answered:

"I do not know."

"You are still his wife. If he came back to you, would you receive him?"

"I do not think so."

"Well, what are you expecting?"

Elizabeth let her arms fall.

"I am not making any further plans. One day I hope, another, I rebel--or I lose hold of myself. I have not yet chosen my path."

"Dear little girl, there is only one for us. I see it quite clearly now. And I have turned you away from it."

"Oh, it's not you, Mother. But there is another course, that of a new life without any links with the past. I do not wish it. It is of no use to women like us."

"Well?"

"There must be a third."

"Which?"

"I am looking for it."

Elizabeth passed the winter in alternate states of energy and weakness. Her weakness was still the strength of other beings who were dependent upon her. Did she not have to amuse her father, to comfort her mother, to keep in check Marie Louise's rich and exuberant nature, and to develop that of Philippe, less active? All these cares occupied her, filled her days and prevented her from feeling her loneliness too much, but they did not satisfy, and sometimes crushed her. At night she went to bed in despair, giving herself up to sorrow more completely than ever to love, and on awakening, she again found that despair. A visit to Mme. Derize, who welcomed her affectionately, gave her valuable, practical advice and made her turn to God, restored her patience for a while. The old lady had found a way of speaking to her favorably of Albert: it was of Albert as a child that she told her all sorts of forgotten episodes, so as to give her a memory of him less bitter than that she had. Tormented one afternoon, as she was walking with Marie Louise, who constantly demanded stories, Elizabeth tried to repeat one of those childish tales, and was soon drawn, almost in spite of herself, to speak to the children of their father.

One day, as she was crossing the Place de la Constitution with her little girl, she suggested taking her into the museum:

"What is a museum?"

"You will see pictures which represent figures or landscapes."

"Oh, yes, let's go in."

In the first room, Marie Louise stood right in front of the dazzling portrait of Mlle. de Barral, whom Largillière has depicted laughing, in a magnificent red dress, as conspicuous as a sign post.

"Look at this beautiful lady, Mamma."

Elizabeth instantly recalled her own remarks to Albert, as he selected for her, in this same museum, the pictures which could mold her taste. She found the old man, by Fragonard, which was to be found beside the Largillière, and studied it attentively. She had no difficulty in interesting herself in this lined face, which sums up the whole life story of a hard-working peasant, a dreamer, and somewhat of a drunkard. How easy to understand these works of art, which one thinks are only admired by a select few! It was only necessary to compare them with reality, to consider them a more exact transposition in a better frame, of the too vast and complicated panorama of life. Albert's remarks, which she recalled, deepened her vision. She drew Marie Louise towards the old portrait.

"Leave that expressionless face. Look at this one. How much more it tells you! We had a neighbor at St. Martin who was like him. He was found drowned in a stream, one night, but nobody in church sang better than he did. He was not a bad man. He drank too much. He was well punished."

"Mamma," said the little girl, "I like it when you tell stories...."

Another time, resuming her piano study, which had been fairly far developed, but in rather a mechanical way, she took up Beethoven's sonata, so rightly named _The Appassionata_, and lived it so intensely that she forgot her sorrow, or rather, gave to it its pathetic interpretation. After the allegro, harassed, but lightened by the recurrence of a sadly ardent love motive, and the andante which lifts itself above human storms to perfect serenity, she began the third part, which is interrupted as if by despairing cries, when she heard Marie Louise, whose presence she had forgotten, weeping.

"What is the matter, dearest?"

"I don't know. Your playing is so sad."

"I should not have played that for you."

"Oh, yes; I love it when it is sad."

She had been able, then, to transmit her feeling, and to cultivate in her daughter that deep sensibility which the child inherited from her father, and which, developed, might become a source of noble joys and dignity to her. Albert, if he met her later, would be obliged to admit that, separated from him, his children had not deteriorated. That would be the revenge of the deserted woman.

In the spring, Elizabeth, who from time to time watched the book-store windows, saw a new book of her husband's advertised, the third volume of the "History of the Peasant." It was the first he had published since their separation. She had never desired so passionately to read a book. Fascinated, and yet not daring to buy a copy, she passed again and again. In Grenoble she was too well-known for this purchase not to be noticed and become the talk of the town. What was she to do? Her curiosity was so keen that it left her no peace. She discovered near her home in the Rue de Strasbourg, a little book-shop with a wretched window, where she certainly would not be known. At nightfall she slipped into the shop.

"Will you give me the last volume of the 'History of the Peasant' by Albert Derize, if you please?"

"Albert Derize? Don't know him."

She, who had said these syllables with an effort, was irritated to hear them despised. She went out without thanking him, and hastened to the principal book-shop of the town on the Place Victor-Hugo, where, without dissembling, she bought the volume she coveted. As she was hurrying along with her treasure, she met Counselor Prémereux, who, always gallant to the ladies, came up to her. After the usual polite platitudes, he pointed to the parcel.

"I wager it is a novel," he said.

"Yes, it is a novel."

"But, no, it is not the shape...."

She blushed, and finding no ready lie, changed the conversation. As soon as she could get away, she ran home to hide herself. She had never read anything so eagerly. Disturbed by the children's questions, she waited for the evening to devote herself entirely to it.

It was, like the previous volumes, a very scholarly book, but so well constructed that it sustained itself, as it were, and rose page by page like a great building; and moreover, it seemed vibrant with light and filled with experience like one of those old stories of the past, which time cannot kill. Elizabeth imagined that the warmth and light, by which Albert's personality usually manifested itself, were particularly evident in this last volume, and she sought them in her eagerness with a new sensitiveness. She bore a grudge against the despised source of inspiration, and in consequence, her distress was increased. Panting, oppressed, tortured by the reading, and yet unable to put the book down, she reached, in the middle of the night, the last part, which dealt with the customs of the Basque country, and quoted them as examples of the strongest consolidation of a race, through the maintenance of a rural home and the family spirit. The author gave his own observations on the power of inheritance, on the active force of tradition. Following Le Play and Cheysson, he took up the history of the Melouga family, and passing into Spain, he quoted other examples of respect for the land joined with respect for the head of the family. The book finished with a sort of hymn in honor of the race and the soil.

No doubt such a conclusion did not lack irony. By what right was he, who thus exalted the family and the home, and in so solemn, exact and eloquent a style, qualified to speak of them? He showed the importance of unity in the family, of fixed inheritance, indissolubility of marriage; and he himself, voluntarily out of society, had left his wife and children, and visited the Basque countries to gather this sheaf of reflections there, in the company of his mistress. For a reader who knew the circumstances, this must be amusing. So many who lead regular lives, it is true, write anarchistic books, that one must expect by contrast, to receive lessons in conventionality from those who live irregularly, whose weakness in private life touches only the heart or the senses without corrupting the mind. It is so easy, so tempting, so flattering, to convert one's passions into theories, to transform one's own misfortunes into public calamities, to generalize one's mistakes, that it required a clear-sighted point of view to distinguish the lack of solidity in his power of resistance to his own experience, and to understand that this implied a rare force of thought in him.

Elizabeth, when she closed the volume, had not grasped the irony of the contrast. But the realization that Albert had not changed in his social analyses and remained resolutely faithful to his first theories on the subject, which she now remembered having heard him outline, seemed to indicate to her that in place of a lost heart, a mental link still connected him with those whom he had deserted, and that she had not been betrayed as thoroughly as she thought.

IV

THE NEW LIFE

At the end of May, Elizabeth left Grenoble to settle in the old house at Saint Martin. Her daughter, a little anæmic and nervous, needed a change of air, and the doctor advised the mountains. She asked her parents, not without a secret mental reservation, to accept her hospitality. M. Molay-Norrois refused her invitation.

"We will go to Uriage in the great heat, of course. But in the middle of winter!"

"The middle of winter, Father? It is spring, and to-morrow it will be summer."

"Well, you must not count on me."

As he appreciated the country only if he could enjoy city pleasures there, with a great deal of social intercourse, he would wait until the hotels of the little watering place were filled. After this refusal, Elizabeth begged Mme. Derize to accompany her.

"You," she said to her, "will be our hostess. I had made up my mind to accept nothing more from Albert, and the property of Saint-Martin belongs to him. Marie Louise's illness necessitates our going. When you are up there with me I shall have no such scruples."

"Why have them? Albert has only one hearth, yours. He owes you his assistance."

"I refuse it. Do you not understand?"

"No, a father has the care of his children. This separation causes me so much pain. As much as to you. He cannot realize it himself."

"Never speak to him of me."

"Of what should I speak to him, if not of his duty? Until my dying day, he will hear my complaint, if he persists in his wicked passion."

"And what does he answer you?"

"Never a word about this subject."

"You see, then!"

"We do not know his thoughts. Those who are proud do not willingly tell them, and his sin must increase his pride. When we are far from the truth, our spirit of rebellion naturally feeds on our wickedness. But comfort yourself, Elizabeth. When it is a question in my letters of you and your children I know how to spare your pride. I only want to ensure his recollection, his remorse."

"Oh, his remorse!"

"He is asleep, perhaps, but he will awaken. Each of us has his hour, and particularly when we add to the numerous sorrows of life those of our own creation."

She added, more sorrowfully:

"I feel old age coming on. Every day I ask God to grant me the joy of seeing you reconciled before I die."

And as if she were following for herself alone the thread of her own reflections:--

"That will bring them together, perhaps."

"What will, Mother?" asked Elizabeth. Mme. Derize looked at her, as if she had come back from afar, and said smilingly:

"Oh, nothing, my dear girl. One sometimes has strange ideas ..."

The life of these two women at Saint-Martin d'Uriage was quite simple and monotonous. The care of the children, some reading, walks, and a little music or long conversations in the evening filled their days, which began and ended early. Mme. Derize often walked along the plane avenue which led to the Chapel. As Elizabeth did not accompany her there, she chose, by preference, the time when the latter took Marie Louise and Philippe out walking in the open air, in the woods or meadows nearby. Her limbs soon felt the fatigue which her mind, remaining active and even keen until old age, did not know.

Elizabeth, recalling that Albert had praised the benefit of physical fatigue in his note-books, trained herself to take a longer walk each day. At the beginning she had to listen to sarcasm from Marie Louise, who ran down the roads like a hare and reproached Philippe and her mother for their laziness. Little by little, as her physical condition improved, she covered greater distances and found that she took a new pleasure in this exercise that she had formerly disliked. On the slopes of Chamrousse, as far from the house as the little legs of her son would allow him to go, she looked with surprise (as if she had only just discovered them) at the high arches formed by the pine trees with their straight tops, resembling the columns of a cathedral. She was impressed by them with a sense of awe. Nature ceased to be to her, as in the previous autumn, a sorrowful companion.

Almost every evening, from the porch, she watched night come on. The flocks and their shepherds, who crowded around the pond, gave her that feeling of peace, which, at the close of day, the country exhales like a perfume.

Marie Louise had to admit that her mother walked almost as well as she did.

"But you can't run!"

"Let us try."

The young woman gathered up her skirts and tried. Her children, who had never seen her so merry, shouted joyfully and forgot to run with her. This new superiority aroused their enthusiasm.

"Certainly," concluded the little girl, "the only thing left for you is the ravine."

"Which ravine?"

"Papa's."

It was a mysterious, wild place, which she had never been able to find herself. Her father had once taken her there, and they had found difficulty in getting out, owing to the interlaced branches and briars and pebbles. She had retained a heroic memory of it with which she used to dazzle her friends on exceptional occasions.

Albert's mother, who was informed of these adventures, told of the prowess of her son, who, in his first youth, had loved the mountains for the purity of their air, for their commanding views, and above all, for their dangers. Elizabeth, little by little, learned of her husband's youth--after his childhood, about which she had never been curious. She was obliged, as well, to satisfy her children, who asked for stories of adventure. And there she was again, but now with method and a desire to succeed, at times kneeling on the floor, again mounted on a ladder, to explore the library shelves which stocked an entire room from floor to ceiling, into which she had previously seldom gone. After many searches, she found a volume of stories of Dauphiné, and began to wade through these tales; then, as she grew more familiar with them, she learned to change them, to bring out the dramatic effects, and to modify the endings in an optimistic way, so as not to sadden Marie Louise, who was too fond of the characters in her stories, while Philippe interpreted the catastrophes more philosophically. The devil who built a wall of enclosure round the park at Vizille, and who was captured by Marshall de Lesdiguières; the fairy Mélusine, who lived in the Sassenage caves, whose daughter was a siren and became a woman through love, especially aroused the children's imagination, because they had visited these same places of enchantment the previous year in the Passerat's motor, which was for them quite sufficient to give an air of reality to the legend.

"We did not see Mélusine at Sassenage, Mamma," exclaimed Marie Louise.

"She is not there now."

"Where is she?"

"Very far away in the sea."

The little girl remained thoughtful, and then said:

"They ought to have told me her story while we were in the cave. It is so stupid to walk about a cave without hearing anything about the fairy!"

Elizabeth's thoughts flew naturally to Albert, who would have been so amused at this remark. It was the artless criticism, so flattering to an historian, of so many travelers, who go around the world, seeing nothing but outward appearances, knowing of nothing but more or less picturesque forms. As to Philippe, he liked best the devil who builds walls and who is paid in monkey's money.

Now that the library was in use again, the young woman made a habit of rummaging among the books. After attending to the needs of her children, she busied herself with her own. She reread certain of her husband's works, which she had previously scanned hastily, merely from a sense of duty, and now found great pleasure in them. Then she read; biographies for preference, or memoirs which, because of their direct contact with life, suited her nature, more realistic than imaginative. Little by little, without being conscious of the slow metamorphosis which was taking place within her, she came to a better understanding of the human imprint of ancient civilization in our own country, and the importance of the past, of great men, of monuments and of works of art. By a strange conversion, she found herself acquiring her husband's tastes when she was separated from him--no doubt forever. The influence of intellectual activity which he had never exercised over her in eight years of married life, was now being felt from a distance, and he would never know anything of it.

Better prepared for conversation, having reinforced her thoughts by new excursions into the world, it happened in the evening that the usual hour of bed-time passed, as she was talking to her mother-in-law--whose cultivated mind she at last understood--of subjects which formerly would not have interested her for a moment. Then glancing at the clock, one of them remarked:

"How late it is!"

And Elizabeth, tired out, soon fell asleep, instead of more freely and sorrowfully reviewing her troubles in the darkness of night, as she had for a long time been in the habit of doing.

Among the elements of instruction which the two women, assisting each other, gave to the children, she had reserved music for herself, in which she tried to cultivate their taste by singing simple popular airs, which she made them repeat. The house, on certain days, was filled with song and the village children stopped in front of the gate to listen. Little Philippe threw his big bell-like voice into the music like a ball into a game of nine pins, and the notes came out with great force. His sister used to be annoyed at this, but the dispute always ended in shouts of laughter.

This gayety seemed to an old peasant, Claude Terraz, who was passing down the road in his cart, to be a good sign, and seeing through the railings Mme. Derize, Sr., working in her garden, he allowed himself, by the established rights of a neighbor, to inquire:

"Well, Madame, has M. Albert come home?"

"Not yet, Claude."

"But he will come back?"

"Soon, my friend. We are expecting him."

"Ah, so much the better. There must be a man in the house. A man for the spade--a woman for the soup, and both to feed the youngsters."

And with this statement he whipped up his team of oxen and went on his way.

Those were the good days. There were bad ones too. Elizabeth, more refined and sensitive, had become very susceptible, irritable, and overemphasized the little things, or again settled into her former apathy. She knew the rebellion which crushes us as we battle in vain against the indifference of fate, and the despair which plunges our souls into the depths. In those hours, she wished she might hear of Albert's death to put an end to the suffering which her jealousy brought. With delicate tact, but without words or allusions, Mme. Derize healed her wounds, as do those nurses in a sick-room, who work silently, but are never idle.

The heat of July brought back the summer crowd to the little station at Uriage. But the Molay-Norrois were not as socially active as they had been. Although they were again occupying Mélèzes on the slope which leads to the Castle of Saint-Ferriol, the Passerats had given up their villa and had rented one in the lower part of the valley near Vaulnaveys. The two families still saw each other, but less frequently. Through the Vimelles, the Passerats were making very aristocratic connections. M. Molay-Norrois, on a strict diet since his last attack of gout, was obliged to agree that he was better off at home, and was grateful for it to his wife. Attention to the state of his health had replaced every other thought in his mind. He took care of himself with the solicitude and keen zest with which he had always sought to please, and now indulged himself with consultations and medicines, as he had formerly done with the secret pleasures of love. He had not given up society, but had subordinated it to his health, and now entered into it with moderation. He who had spent hours on his toilette, and created fashions, now found an intimate charm in putting on his slippers and smoking a pipe after dinner, in noting with satisfaction that his digestion was in good order. Mme. Molay-Norrois, while she herself attended to his special soups and broths, a new occupation for her, took hope again, and did not wish for a too rapid or radical cure. Their two sons, Oliver and Victor, who came on leave one after the other, manifested toward Elizabeth a protecting affection which annoyed her. But they gave up no pleasures for her sake, and neither the one nor the other thought of curtailing his mode of living, which might have permitted their parents to make some arrangement about her dowry, which the young woman, living willingly on her own money, had never requested.

The motor picnics began again. The Derizes were invited. Elizabeth, not wishing to give her children luxurious habits, refused, quoting the advice of their physician, who advocated walking. She often went into Saint Martin to visit her father and mother, and one day, walking under the shade of the chestnut trees, she met the two young men, who, when they recognized her the previous year, had loudly praised her. Wearing a loose-fitting white flannel dress, which made her look younger, she held Philippe by the hand, while Marie Louise, who had spied some huckleberries, had climbed the hill a few steps behind. They stared at her with that coolness which our manners allow and do not stamp as a proof of bad breeding. Involuntarily the blood mounted to her cheeks. She wished to hurry on, and turned awkwardly to call her daughter. They also turned and slackened their steps. Marie Louise joined her at a gallop to tell her:

"You know, Mamma, you are more beautiful than you were last year."

"Silly little thing, instead of talking nonsense, it would be better next time if you did not leave me."

But the child clung to her idea which she would not give up.

"It is not nonsense. Those gentlemen down there said so."

"Why did you listen to them?"

"Because they were talking about you."

"That is no reason."

The little girl would not allow herself to be quieted.

"There was a dark one and a light one. The dark one talked like this: 'She has lost, she is thinner.'

"What have you lost, Mamma? And the light one said: 'She is beautiful.'"

"Be quiet," said Elizabeth. "I don't like children who listen to the conversations of passersby."

It was more than sixteen months since she had separated from her husband. She had certainly changed very much, and did not notice it herself until she had made alterations in her old dresses, which, as a matter of economy, she still wished to wear. Slighter, she appeared to be like those stems, which add grace to a flower, as they grow longer. Her limbs, a little long in proportion to her figure, had gained, by her habit of walking, a greater ease, a freer gait. Her long neck, very white, which she generally left bare, carried her head more gracefully. It might be said that she had let her overweight, which had made her body heavy and weak, fall from her like a garment. The friends of her family, for the most part, regretted it, thinking she was pining away, and that it was so sad for such a pretty woman. The open air and her natural good health fortunately counteracted the slow results of the mental anguish which was undermining her. But even these assets could not prevent the imprint of suffering on her youthful face. Two creases had stamped themselves at each corner of her little mouth. The outline of her face was finer. A little wrinkle showed between the eyebrows. Her dark eyes, outlined by the bluish circle around them, reflected a deeper life. Sometimes languid, sometimes ardent, their expression always revealed to those who understood, a little fright and homesickness, like the tender look of those tame deer, who as they eat from your hand, are always afraid of being ill-treated, and are thinking of their broad native woods. The play of color on her cheeks was also quicker; it came and went at almost the same moment. And even her voice had taken on a more serious intonation, and seemed to have a deeper tone. Thus changed, with her flimsy gowns and big summer hats, she looked more and more like those English portraits which give to women so much charm and dignity. But it was one of those portraits which one comes back to see again, because of not gaining at one glance a full sense of its beauty.

The new peace she found at Les Mélèzes, made her mother happy. But Elizabeth heard and disliked the echo of gossip which, as in all watering places, was making the rounds at Uriage. What did it matter to her that Mme. de Vimelle could no longer seriously ignore her husband's liaison, or that Mme. Passerat had promoted Counselor Prémereux to the degree of chief steward of her kitchen? One day they told her of the coming marriage of Philippe Lagier, who had been living for some time at the Park Hotel.

"To whom?" she asked, interestedly.

"To Mlle. Berthe Rivière."

She recalled the girl who had played tennis with a grace intended to attract the spectators. Before going home to Saint Martin, she went out of her way to go to the tennis-court. Mlle. Rivière, chuckling with laughter which sang the joy of life, was scoring, while her partner, Philippe Lagier, transformed into a faithful knight, was disrespectfully devouring her with his eyes.

"Yours!" they shouted to him.

But he lost the ball. And the young girl, sure of her power, let him lose the game without a murmur.

"Already!" thought Elizabeth, as she walked along the chestnut path which took her back to her solitude.

How soon one was forgotten! What lies, these love vows! It only needed a smile revealing gleaming teeth, a fresh skin, a movement of the hips to substitute a new desire for the most exalted emotion. But perhaps she was not one of those who inspire lasting passions. Perhaps she left only a fleeting impression, soon to vanish, as she had sometimes heard it said of certain women with pure impassive features. This little wound to her self-love she added to that from which she was suffering, and which would never be healed.

A few days later, invited to dinner at Mélèzes with some other people, she found herself placed at table next to Philippe Lagier, who had Mlle. Rivière as his dinner partner. Would she take advantage of this? The barrister turned toward her, and to keep her attention, made use of all the resources of a mind trained to please. He understood perfectly the art of conversation which lends color and picturesqueness to all subjects, and which seems to imply a flattering sympathy. The glare of the lights, the bright dresses, the bare shoulders, the air warm, but invigorating, which came in through the open window, contributed to a harmony in which life unfolds itself in an atmosphere of joy. She was listening to Philippe, whose intelligent features were unattractive only when in repose. Near him, she gave no further thought to the scene which had separated them. Soothed, forgetting her trouble, happy, she was enjoying her success. All at once, raising her head, she saw fixed upon her the gaze of Mlle. Rivière. It was a look of distress, expressing not hatred, but despair and admiration. It said so clearly, "You are too beautiful. I know well that I cannot struggle against you--have pity!"--that she was upset by it, because it made her think of herself. Thus for a few minutes she had fully enjoyed her power over a man whose dead or dying passion for her, self-love induced her to revive; and at the same time, she had felt herself to be mastered by the conversation of this man whose subtle meaning she still feared. In addition she had unscrupulously risked breaking another heart. She was ashamed of her vanity, and particularly of her weakness for which she reproached herself as a traitor. Turning from Philippe, she gave him back to Mlle. Rivière, but he had lost his high spirits. At the end of the evening, she refused his offer to escort her home to Saint Martin. On the road at night, as she passed the place where the year before she had rebelled so violently, her new conduct seemed incomprehensible and the humiliation she felt in her own estimation, aroused in her a greater indulgence toward the faults of others, and at the same time a resolution to watch herself more closely.

V

A GHOST

With the first autumn rains, the bathers left Uriage. M. Molay-Norrois had not waited until the end of September to pack up and go away.

"Don't you feel the dampness, my dear?" he said twenty times a day to his wife, even when the weather was dry, though not quite so warm. "It drifts into this narrow valley. Let us get back to town where we can make ourselves comfortable."

After a little opposition, Mme. de Molay-Norrois gave in. No doubt she wanted to be near her daughter and grandchildren, but thought more of her invalid's happiness. Soon Elizabeth recovered the solitude in which she had been so happy the previous year. Somewhat rheumatic, and wishing not to become a burden on her daughter-in-law in this resourceless village, her mother-in-law had gone back to Grenoble at the beginning of October.

"Come back to me soon," she said at parting. "Solitude at your age is not a good counselor."

But the youngsters were in splendid health, and Elizabeth let herself sink into that supine state, which comes with the last rays of the autumn sun and the treacherous charm of Nature. The view of a deeper forest, a more impassioned feeling which she was beginning to understand, filled her this season with a bitterness which soothed her. She was conscious of her weakness, afraid of it, and forced herself to struggle against it. In order not to take up the routine of the city so soon, she invited Blanche Vernier to spend a week or two at Saint Martin with her children. These, four in number, put themselves under the yoke of Marie Louise and Philippe who surpassed them in brains and cleverness. Elizabeth was entertained for several days by the simple joy expressed by her friend, in following the work in the fields, which was entirely new to her, in running down the wild paths, in which, accustomed to city life, she found an almost exaggerated charm. Then she grew weary of her exclamations, even of her pretty sayings which were somewhat vulgar. She wearied of it, because, abandoned and neglected, she was more sensitive and susceptible than usual, at this season which deepens one's suffering. Then she allowed Blanche to take the crowd of children out, and remained alone to express her sadness in the music she interpretated, to begin but not finish books, whose contagious melancholy she knew, and still more uselessly, to think, aimlessly, hopelessly and without any object, for no purpose but the pleasure of giving herself as much pain as possible. And, rousing herself from that state of languor, she determined that she could no longer remain in the country.

One day, when she had stayed in the house, she understood, when the children came in, and from the expression of Blanche Vernier's face, that something unusual had happened during the walk. Marie Louise, a little troubled, wore a mysterious circumspect air which was very evident, while big Philippe was swelled with his own importance almost to the bursting point. The others tried to explain that they had met a gentleman--a remarkable phenomenon at Saint Martin at this season--but the little girl interrupted them brusquely in an authoritative voice:

"Be quiet."

Over the heads of the youngsters, Blanche gave lively signals which bespoke no good.

"Go and have tea in the dining-room," commanded Elizabeth, out of patience, and when the drawing-room was empty, she asked her friend, "What has happened: Anything serious?"

"Well, as we were coming down towards the Château of Saint-Ferriol we met a man...."

"Who?"

"Wait a minute--a man whom I did not know."

Elizabeth, nervous, asked these questions:

"What was he like?"

"You know I can't distinguish men very well, one from the other. It seemed to me he was very tall, rather thin, sharp features and a military air. Is that he?"

"Go on."

"He looked at us as we passed, then after we had gone a few steps he turned round and called: 'Marie Louise.' Your daughter raised her head and then ran to him."

"You should not have allowed her to speak to a stranger."

"You know very well that he was not a stranger. Naturally I did not know it, and I called out and then stopped. But the little girl paid no attention to what I said. She made a sign to her brother to join her. So I came up to interfere more directly, and it is to my credit, because you know how shy I am. 'These children are in my charge.' 'I give them back to you, Madame,' he replied, bowing very politely to me. 'I am a relative and I allowed myself to stop them.' He was very much touched. He was holding Marie Louise and Philippe by the hand. I even think he had tears in his eyes."

"You are not sure?"

"I am a little short-sighted, and I am always afraid of being indiscreet in looking too closely. Then he kissed the children passionately--almost madly. I was sorry for him. I could have cried too. I cry so easily.

"'Come with us,' Marie Louise said to him.

"'I can't--'

"'Mamma did not see you, did she?'

"'I must go away.'

"'Already? This is not a visit. You will come back?'

"'Yes.'

"He passed on hurriedly. I thought he had disappeared behind the chestnut trees, but as I turned back, I saw him looking after us--"

"That is all?"

"Yes, that is all."

"I placed my children in your charge. You should not have left them--"

"Left them?"

"Yes, even for a minute...."

This reproach was manifestly unjust. Although not far-sighted, Blanche Vernier possessed that instinct of the heart which penetrates the hidden causes of our acts or our feelings--Divining her friend's emotion, she bore this absurd accusation without defending herself. Elizabeth trembled at the thought that she might have met her husband, not knowing in her confusion whether she regretted or dreaded this meeting.

"Listen," she said in a softer voice. "Go to the children and send Marie Louise to me."

A few minutes later, the little girl came in, not with her nose in the air and a bright face, with the dancing step with which she shook her blonde curls as she tripped through the house, but instead with a stiff walk and lowered eyes.

Her mother drew her towards her too jealously and held her arms--

"Look at me!"

As the child hesitated in her embarrassment, Elizabeth who was very nervous, grew angry.

"But look at me--whom did you meet on the road?"

Marie Louise who did not know how to tell a lie, nevertheless answered:

"Nobody."

"Nobody? How can you deceive your mother. That is bad. That is naughty."

The little girl who was bravely holding her own against this threatening tone, weakened before this outburst of sorrow. And then, it became great news to announce--

"Well, yes, we met papa."

"Why did you not tell me when you came back?"

"I don't know, Mamma."

"Did he say you were not to tell?"

"Oh, no."

"You should have no secrets from your mother."

The child began to cry, and had to be consoled--Her silence which she could not explain, was the mysterious intuition of the divorce of her parents, whom she had to love separately without the knowledge of either of them, for fear of hurting them. She could not think that she might have both a father and mother at the same time like her little friends--And yet both were alive--The meeting that afternoon had settled all doubts concerning the existence of her father, whom she never saw, and about whom she had even heard it said that he was dead to her. But these complications put her in a state of uneasiness which wearied one of her age. Elizabeth continued her questions more tenderly this time:

"You recognized him at once?"

"I did not look at him when he passed us--but afterwards he called me...."

"He called you?"

"Yes, then I knew him."

"Tell me about it, dearie."

"He called: 'Marie Louise.' I raised my head and I ran. When I was quite near him I cried, 'Papa.' He held me so tight that I choked--and he wet my cheeks because he was crying. Why, Mamma?"

"He was touched at seeing you after such a long time."

Marie Louise seemed to reflect.

"Why didn't he come home before? He said to me, 'And Philippe?' So I called 'Philippe!' Philippe came, but he said, 'Who is that?' I said, 'It's papa.' Then Mme. Blanche came up too. They quarreled."

"Quarreled?"

"No, not quarreled, but they looked at each other crossly. Then papa went away."

Elizabeth overcame her hesitation and again asked:

"He sent no message to me?"

"I said to him, 'Come and see mamma.'"

"Ah, and what did he answer?"

"He did not answer. He said, 'I will come back.'"

"That is all?"

"Yes. Why are you crying, Mamma?"

"I am not crying--"

She pressed her daughter passionately to her heart and covered with kisses the face that Albert had kissed. With an imperious longing for affection she murmured in her daughter's ear.

"Do you love me?"

"Oh! dear Mamma--"

"And your father?"

"Papa too, but not as much as you."

"Why?"

"He is never here--You know, he looks sad."

"Really. He looks sad? Are you quite sure?"

"Yes, does that make you glad?"

"Oh, darling--"

"He has promised to come back. You want him to come back, don't you?"

"For your sake and Philippe's--yes, perhaps--Some day a long time from now."

"No, right away."

Reassured little by little, Elizabeth told little Marie Louise, who was too impressionable, to go back to her playfellows. She herself being unable to regain her self-possession, walked up and down the house. At last she crept on tiptoe to the door. Erect and motionless, on the point of going out, she looked down the road as far as the trees. Perhaps Albert was wandering about there, being unable to decide to leave these places which must recall his childhood and so many memories. So many memories? No, he had seen his children, nothing else could interest him. He had gone back, no doubt. Nevertheless, "he seemed sad," Marie Louise had said. If he were suddenly to appear at the turn of the road, there before her, what would she do? She did not know, she reached no decision and time went on.

Evening came, an autumn evening sharp and almost freezing. She looked for a shawl to cover her shoulders and continued to gaze distractedly, as if before the day ended, she were calling the danger she feared. Darkness which already filled the valley, was ascending the mountain, hastening to overtake the forest of thick, black pine trees, which seemed like a foretaste of night. The red of the sunset streaked the sky: the first star shewed itself above Les Quatre Seigneurs.

Elizabeth could not make up her mind to go in. The change in the light gave an appearance of motion to the bushes and to the trees on the road. Every moment she thought she saw someone coming and stood trembling, her feet glued to the threshold. After many mistakes, she recognized a human shape coming up the road. Fear made her knees tremble. No, it was not he; it was a woman, bent, thin and slow. It was Albert's mother. Out of breath, her limbs weak, overcome with weariness, she was painfully dragging herself along. Elizabeth, reassured, freed herself with a great effort, ran to her, saw that she was worn out; took her arm, made her come in, and placed her beside the hearth.

"Why did you not tell me you were coming, Mother? I would have sent the farmer to meet you with his car. There is no carriage at Uriage now, and you have had to walk all the way."

Mme. Derize smiled in a way which meant, "How often I have done without carriages!" But she had not reckoned with her age, nor her weakness, and was regaining her breath with difficulty. Marie Louise, Philippe and the little Verniers, who surrounded her, watched her with the surprise of children at old age or illness. Elizabeth begged her friend Blanche to take them away. Left alone with her mother-in-law for whom she prepared a cup of boiling tea, with a little rum in it, she saw her become refreshed little by little, and then sit up, her face expressing that peace, so pure and noble, yet tinged with sadness, with which she accepted all the happenings of life. Then Elizabeth asked herself the reason for her departure from Grenoble, and whether that unexpected visit did not have something to do with Albert's arrival. Mme. Derize did not let her wait long for an explanation which she was eager to give.

"Elizabeth, my son has been with me for three days. He has changed very much, he is worried, uneasy and nervous. He is not happy."

Attentive and anxious, Elizabeth was silent.

"He went away this morning," continued the old lady.

"He was here just now."

"Here. You have seen him?"

Albert's mother bent toward her daughter-in-law, her cheekbones suddenly flushed with a rush of color, contrasting with the pallor of her face, her eyes fixed and shining with fever, in a state of unaccustomed exaltation foreign to her nature.

"Not I. But the children."

Elizabeth told the short story of the meeting of Marie Louise and Philippe with their father. Mme. Derize, resting against her chair, lost her abnormal excitement as she listened.

"Just now," she said, "I thought he was here, that you were reconciled, that he had been unable to go away. I was so happy--so happy."

"Oh, Mother, could you hope that?"

"I always hope it. And you do, too, do you not?"

"I no longer know. I am so weary of suffering! And then how can I forgive him, how can I forget him? He has gone back to _her_."

The old woman took Elizabeth's hand and held it.

"My child, if you prayed to God, as I do, your hope would be strengthened. Illicit passions can never bring happiness. Happiness means peace in one's heart. They are powerless to insure that."

"They bring with them a more passionate existence. I do not understand. That people desire them and die for them suffices to make them endure."

"If you could have seen him, listened to him, you would not speak thus. It is not on my account that he came to Grenoble. He thought he would meet the children there. He had no idea that you would remain so late in the mountains. And this morning, instead of leaving for Italy, he came up here without further reflection, in the hope of seeing his children. He has forgotten nothing."

"Oh, Mother, and me?"

"You, Elizabeth? Did you not understand that it was because of you that he has never tried to see his children until now?"

"He never asked to see them. If he had asked, I should not have refused. He could not have them come to him, however, in Paris."

"Listen, Elizabeth. All the time he was overwhelming me with questions about them. He was obsessed with the thought of them."

"And he has never given them any indication that he was still alive."

"Because he did not want to trouble your life, to impose painful obligations upon you, or remind you of a tie which he thinks is sorrowful to you."

And she added in a tone of prayer, as if to protect her son:

"At least that is the way I explain it--particularly since his promise."

"What promise?"

"Yesterday I asked him to put nothing definite between you and himself."

"Definite?"

"Yes, not to seek a divorce."

And in a lower voice, she added:

"I should never have survived it."

"What did he answer?" asked Elizabeth anxiously.

"After a slight hesitation, he replied: 'I promise you. Only, it is Elizabeth's right.' Elizabeth, I believe he will come back to us. Will you not help him?"

The young woman turned away with that frightened expression which she often wore.

"What do you wish me to do, Mother? I cannot contend for him with that woman--I do not know how."

"No, but promise me that if he comes back some day you will receive him, you will welcome him in spite of the past."

"He will not come back."

"If I went to look for him?"

Elizabeth repeated despairingly:

"He would not come back...."

"And if ..."

"Mother, what is the matter with you?"

"If I fell ill? He would have to come back, would have to see you."

Mme. Derize looked so pale, so fragile, that this suggestion seemed a reality. Elizabeth, uneasy, realizing that the attack was growing worse, put her to bed and watched over her. In the evening the old woman laid her feverish hand on the bent head of her companion:

"I was right when I told him...."

"What, Mother?"

"That you are my daughter."

VI

MADAME DERIZE

After eighteen months, Elizabeth was awaiting her husband. The sad event which was bringing them together had had its beginning on the evening when Albert's mother had walked too quickly to Saint Martin. After Madame Derize's night of suffering, the young wife, foreseeing danger, instinctively made the wisest decision and telegraphed to her parents and to her doctor at Grenoble. She asked for immediate help, realizing that while there was still time, they would have to get away at once from a village so primitive and resourceless, and requested the most comfortable means of transport. M. Molay-Norrois--and his wife made no objection--and told Mme. Passerat how useful her motor would be under such circumstances; and she, with that keen executive ability and rapidity of action, of which she had so often given proof in organizing society fêtes, gave orders that her 40 h.p. car be arranged as an ambulance, and sent, with it a doctor and a necessary medicine chest to the mountains of Uriage.

"This is the first time I have traveled in a motor," murmured the invalid smilingly, as she was carried into it on the bed arranged for her.

In the afternoon she was brought to her home on the Boulevard des Adieux, and her daughter-in-law took her place at her bedside. The next day Blanche Vernier came down with the children, of whom she had offered to take charge. The case was diagnosed as congestion of the lungs, which grew no worse until the fifth day. Immediately upon her arrival at Grenoble, Elizabeth had begged Philippe Lagier to wire to Albert's address in Paris. As there was no answer, she sent repeated telegrams, all of which were returned to her marked "Absent." When the invalid was questioned she could give no exact information. As her son left her, he had spoken of a rapid journey to Piedmont, returning to Paris over the Simplon.

"I shall write to you during the trip," he had added.

A post card came, which bore the name of an unknown village in Italy. On a detailed map they found that it was in the neighborhood of Ivrée. In accordance with his usual plan, the traveler was journeying through out of the way places to gain information for his book. Another telegram, directed there as a last resort, did not reach him. At last he wrote from Aosta, and his letter stated that he would spend a week there. Informed directly, he wired that he would leave with all possible haste. It was the eighth day and his mother had passed away the night before. They did not tell him so, but he could draw that conclusion from the telegram.

She would no doubt have recovered from an illness whose symptoms had not at first given rise to much alarm, had it not been for her age, and more especially for that gradual weakening, which in time, results from financial worries, sorrows and mental strain. After the death of her husband, she had known the worry of financial straits, the necessity for work, and all the demands of the noblest maternal ambition. This son, the thought of whom had comforted her broken life, for whose development she had paved the way, whose success she had followed with so much joy and confidence, had now in turn, made her suffer, by renouncing the duty she considered most sacred, the devotion which in the innate consciousness of one of her race, seemed to her to be most important; that of continuing, of upholding the tradition of the family. She had bitterly reproached herself for the excess of delicacy which had prevented her from acting as peace-maker between Albert and Elizabeth, in whom she often told herself, she should have been able earlier to realize the virtue which had lain dormant until it was gradually brought out by a crisis. This separation had slowly undermined and weakened her. She exhausted herself in prayer, and in her faith in the expediency of sacrifice, as of a burnt offering to obtain from God the return of him, whom she called in secret her prodigal son. With what haste she had gone to Saint Martin, after her son's last visit, to cheer up Elizabeth's languishing hopes. On the way she had faced the fatigue which weakened her limbs, often stopping to take breath, sustained by the idea that she was bringing a little comfort to the deserted woman. For a moment she believed that Albert had gone before her. He had come, but had not remained. Then she had that vision of unusual exaltation; that perhaps her death might bring about what her life had been unable to accomplish.

If not at once, at least after the second day she understood, alone, that it was the end, and prepared herself for it. The illness hovered over her without crushing her, at last took hold of her, but without that violence which suppresses thought and destroys the intellectual faculties, in that last struggle that frees an inert body. She departed, with her brain intact and her heart full. Her calmness was surprising, almost terrifying to those about her. She asked for religious help and received it with a piety, which was like the natural breath of her soul.

"Jean," she said several times.

It was the name of her husband, whom no one had heard her mention for a long time. She was reserved about her most intimate emotions. This name, so peacefully invoked, revealed the endurance of a deathless love which eternity would satisfy--or again she would ask:

"Is he coming?"

By this she meant her son. And it was only this question which she asked so often that had the power to dim her clear eyes, to still her features, already motionless and almost fixed with a serenity which anticipated death. She began on the third day, despite the reassuring prognosis, to show some evidence of what was so soon to occur. With great composure she told Fanchette, who protested against it, where to find the sheets and her bridal dress. She asked for a humble funeral, without flowers or wreaths. She saw Philippe and Marie Louise, tried to smile at them and begged that they should not be brought again.

Elizabeth, assisted with the best of good-will by Mme. Molay-Norrois, possessing that almost supernatural strength of woman at the bedside of invalids--watched over and took care of her day and night. When she came near her, she felt a sort of fear in seeing her so peaceful and almost relaxed. Once, being unable to hear the advice her mother-in-law was quietly giving her, she burst into sobs.

"Do not leave me, Mother," she entreated. "What shall I do without you--you are still Albert."

"I shall not leave you," said the dying woman with conviction.

And, with infinite tenderness, she added faintly:

"My daughter.--I had formerly regretted having had no daughter. One is always in a hurry to pity oneself!"

Then she seemed to gather a little strength, sufficient to inquire:

"Elizabeth, he will come back some day, I am certain of it. When he does, will you promise me that you will forgive him, forgive him without any restriction?"

How could Elizabeth refuse?

"I promise you," she said solemnly.

"That is right," answered Mme. Derize, "if he were there, I should have tried to join your hands. It is not time yet."

On the fifth day she appeared to be resigned to the fact that her son would not return. It was her last hope. She wished to see Philippe Lagier, who came every day to inquire about her. Their interviews, entirely alone, were of short duration; talking was already too much for her. She charged him to tell his friend of Elizabeth's devotion and of the change which had taken place in her. Was he not called to that mission and how could she, in the purity of her heart, suspect the humiliation he had known, which quite recently, he had believed to be incompatible with his engagement? Finally with great effort and frequent pauses, she expressed this singular confidence, which revealed to what degree she had thought of all the possibilities of reconciliation.

"On Albert's last visit, so few days ago, I knew that he was not happy. I was expecting that. Happiness cannot endure, except in truth. Then I thought that I would go to Paris, that I would go to see her."

"To see her?" repeated Philippe, who could not believe his ears.

"Yes, her. I have thought a great deal about it. Albert could not have broken so many ties for a miserable love. I knew him to be incapable of wickedness, although he is passionate and proud. Now this plan can no longer be realized...."

"When you are better."

"I shall never be better. Come closer. I want you to hear what I should have said to her, to her alone. Of his own accord, Albert will not leave her. I feel it: he has replaced the duty he has renounced with another, the chains of which he has tightened for himself. It is well said that one can never escape from his duty in life. I would have said to that woman:

"Whatever your love may be, it cannot make him happy. You realized that before I did. You were to blame for loving him when he was not free. If your love is what I think, it must be capable of sacrifice, even of secret sacrifice. Be generous, I will bless you and ..."

Choking stopped her, and she was unable to finish that exhausting communication, which implied so much cleverness and such faith in heroism. Philippe came back a little later, but the invalid's condition had grown worse. She tried once again to explain something to him which he was not able to catch, as her words had already become very indistinct. Did she wish him to undertake this strange mission on her behalf? The next day, which was the day of her death, she appeared transfigured, as if indifferent to all that was going on about her. She was resting in peace in advance. Her lips which still moved, showed that she was praying. She paid no attention to Albert's letter which Elizabeth was reading. Nevertheless, turning her eyes toward her daughter, whose grief was overcoming her, she tried to put her hand on her bent head, but it fell back with an uncertain movement. They were saying prayers for the dying, as she did not stir again. And her last breath followed the last verse.

Elizabeth, spent with fatigue and conquered by her nerves, called to her with a loud cry, as if in losing her she lost her love for a second time, and would henceforth be without protection. Her parents, considering her extreme in filial devotion, a virtue which, according to the gossip of the town, their son-in-law had utterly neglected, insisted upon taking her away.

"Now," said Mme. Molay-Norrois, alarmed at her condition, and wishing to quiet her overexcitement, "now stay with us. You have fulfilled every duty and more than your duty. You must take care of your health, for your children's sake and your own."

But who would be there when Albert arrived with despair in his heart? Who would receive him, explain the illness to him, tell him about the last moments of the invalid, give him her last thoughts and that sort of consolation so essential to strong souls: that of exhausting all the details of sorrow? No, no, she had not yet finished her work. In the spirit, if not in actuality, she was Albert's wife. She would be there to palliate the first shock faithfully, to give to the son the substance of the words and injunctions which she had received from his mother. One might accuse her of lack of dignity: what matter? Mme. Derize would be pleased with her.

She had calculated that he would arrive with the morning train at eight o'clock. Before eight she went to the Boulevard des Adieux. Her heart was beating, however, she trembled, she was afraid, but remained there. Philippe, who had gone to the station, came back with Albert, to whom he had broken the sad news. In the carriage along the road he alone had spoken. At the sound of the bell, Fanchette, dragging her feet, came to open the door.

"My poor Fanchette," said Albert, as he embraced her. It was his first word of emotion.

She dried her tears and showed him into the drawing-room.

"Madame is there," she said.

He thought she meant his mother and went in. He found himself face to face with Elizabeth, who was standing and walked to meet him; he made an involuntary movement of surprise, as if he did not recognize her. He no longer found the same Elizabeth, whom he had left eighteen months before, her beauty then somewhat heavy and sluggish, her face round and expressionless, but he now saw a new Elizabeth, thinner, more graceful, looking taller in her mourning gown, pale through lack of sleep, her eyes surrounded with dark circles, her features sunken--all denoting a life of suffering, which counteracted the disadvantages of sorrow. Philippe Lagier who followed him, had not anticipated that she would have the courage to be there. And with a greater freedom of observation, although equally sorrowful, he noticed that she was wearing a bodice which showed her figure to advantage. When the bell rang, she had trembled so that she had been obliged to lean against a table. Then everything seemed to simplify itself for her quickly. The obligation which was imposed upon her could not offend her dignity. She would fulfill it and would then return to the darkness. One imagines in advance difficulties which disappear of themselves. Seeing her husband under such circumstances, she realized a great inner peace, as soon as he came in. With a voice, which too, had changed and become lower, she said at once without speaking his name.

"She was waiting for you. As I had the privilege of helping her in your place, I will tell you about her, of her last days, if you wish."

After shaking hands with her, Philippe expressed his intention of withdrawing, but she detained him for a moment, almost begging for his protection.

"You will come back soon, will you not? In an hour?"

"Yes, Madame."

They were left alone, facing each other, he confused, motionless, finding not a word to say; she, carrying on, with amazing ease, this interview which she had so dreaded.

"I had wired to Paris," she explained. "We did not know where to reach you. At last your letter came from Aosta."

With dry lips, his face drawn by the sorrow to which he would not give way, he murmured:

"I had left her so well only a few days ago! I had no presentiment, I thought I should keep her for a long time to come."

"Yes, we never think we can lose those we love. You must be tired. You have not eaten nor slept. Will you have something? Later we can speak of her."

"I want to see her."

"She is there. Come."

She led him into the death chamber, knelt for a moment at the foot of the bed, motioning to the nun who was watching the body to follow her. She had divined Albert's desire. When he was sure of being alone, his sorrow carried him beyond all bounds, as a river its dam. She who lay there, emaciated and white, her eyes closed, her hands crossed over a crucifix--and what withered hands!--she whose forehead and cheeks, like marble, cold, but not hard, froze his mouth, as he kissed them in vain, she who would never again hear him, never see him or speak to him, she had twice given him life. After giving him birth, she nourished, developed and strengthened him without help or fortune. He owed to her his intellectual power, the moral force of his judgment, the courage to undertake those lengthy works, which demand a continued effort, of which so few are capable. In what intimacy they had spent so many years, the busiest and the happiest of years! He remembered them now with a sorrow that only one word could express, which re-echoed in the silence, like a groan.

"Mother!"

From afar he always felt her protection. She was a witness in his behalf. Now that witness was no more, and parts of his life lost their meaning, their value. With her he would bury his childhood and his youth, a whole period of days, clear as the expression of her eyes in life; a whole period of bright days that he had never found since and could never find again. And it was not he who had closed her eyes.

Was it not better that it was not he? Between them there was a fixed gulf. For a long time she had ceased to reproach him, but the direction of her thoughts was contrary to his, and their conversations, formerly so intimate, so deep, which were to him an inspiration, had for the most part, lost their power to interest and uplift him. Many forgotten details now came back to his memory, expressions of sadness, of words, indirectly imploring. Yes, he had burdened her last months with a sorrow, the weight of which she bore without complaint, but which had finally crushed her. He could not mourn her without a secret remorse. Formerly, when he was still quite a young man, giving way to a naturally quick temper, which he had great difficulty in controlling, he had spoken rudely to her. What shame he had felt! But she, anxious not to wound his pride, came to him as soon as he was quiet, so that he might be spared the first step. Then he learned to despise his faults. And now they were separated forever without a true reconciliation.

He had reached the limit of his despair and was utterly crushed, when Elizabeth came in quietly to join him. She made him sit down, and too weary to resist, he meekly obeyed. Their thoughts so long separated, were at one in the same sorrow. It was one of those unfathomable griefs, in which the only comfort is to weep with another, and they could not mingle their tears. Stricken by the same blow, the embrace which would have brought them comfort, which so many friends can exchange, was forbidden to them. Thus Albert had a keener realization of his solitude.

"Nobody," he said to himself to arouse himself from his suffering, "can know what I have lost. I alone shall carry away the memory and knowledge of the will power which sustained her little body, so fragile beneath the sheet, the fire which animated those closed eyes. Anne could not come with me. She pities me from a distance, but she did not know her. She only knew of her unfriendliness toward her, and her rigid uprightness. Our love is disarmed before this dear, dead woman who belongs solely to me. And she who is here is nothing more to me than a stranger."

"The Stranger," shielded by the beloved presence of the dead, commenced to tell him in a low voice of the beginning of the illness and its successive phases. She told of the invalid's composure, her spirit of calm, her preparation, her desire to see her son again, the good-by she had sent him. She omitted everything that had reference to their separation and to her own devotion. She spoke with so much tact and filial love, that, as he listened, Albert was getting comfort in grief, which can come to us only by deepening our suffering. Overcome by his injustice, he murmured:

"You have taken my place. I know you have been a daughter to her. She said so in all her letters to me. Now I believe it. I thank you."

At these first words expressed with less indifference, inspired by gratitude and decorum, Elizabeth felt she could no longer play her part. Tears and her weakness overcame her, but she gazed mechanically on the pillow, at the face so peaceful and serene, and took sudden comfort from it.

"I have caused her a great deal of sorrow," added Albert, making this confession almost in spite of himself, in response to what he had just heard.

Elizabeth had the strength to reply.

"She had confidence in you."

What did she mean by that? As he tried to interpret it, realizing that this tête-à-tête could not last much longer, she added:

"Come with me."

He followed her out of the room. She led him into the dining-room where Fanchette had laid a place for him.

"You must have some breakfast and warm yourself. It is very cold to-day. I am going back to the children. My friend Blanche Vernier has taken them to her house. I dare not bring them here. They are so little!"

"Marie Louise, Philippe," he said slowly, with a tenderness which made him tremble.

"But you can see them there, or at the home of my parents, or at Philippe Lagier's, as you like."

"At Philippe's."

"Very well. He is coming back. You can arrange with him."

She alone spoke, her mouth drawn, her face tense with the effort. He could only answer her. Philippe Lagier, faithful to his promise, came to relieve their embarrassment. As soon as he arrived, while he was trying, not without a painful acknowledgment, to understand their reciprocal emotions, and while Albert, suffering from hunger, could not make up his mind to eat, Elizabeth dressed herself to go out.

"Our friend," she said, turning towards her husband, "wishes to make all the arrangements. The funeral is the day after to-morrow. I shall be here. Au revoir."

The two men watched her as she was leaving, but did not mention her then. She went back into the death chamber, before she left the flat.

"Mother," she entreated, on her knees.

This cry expressed all the emotion she had felt, but had suppressed, on seeing her husband again; all the torture of love renewed by his actual presence. For the second time, the peace of death calmed her heart.

In the afternoon Albert saw his children at Philippe Lagier's. At first, in kissing them, in comparing them with the past--(on the road at Saint Martin d'Uriage he had held them for only a moment in his arms) he experienced a sad joy which in his sorrowful condition pained him exceedingly, making him almost feverish. They surprised him by telling him the story of Mélusine and that of Lesdiguières.

"Who has told you these stories?"

"Mamma."

He had expected to find a carelessness, a feminine indulgence in the education of the two children, and he discovered instead an unexpected development and liveliness of intelligence and body to which he had contributed nothing. His desertion had not brought with it any loss to them. Instead of giving to Elizabeth the credit for it, he was irritated by it, because it seems cruel to us to discover how unimportant our influence may be.

The little boy was the first to tire of these effusions and put questions which referred to unimportant events in his life, which were insolvable to anyone who had not been directly concerned in them. Marie Louise herself even discontinued her playfulness and fancies, in order to explain to her brother that Papa could not know, that after all Papa was only an amateur father, who was very little in touch with their doings and movements. This was the meaning of her remarks which she uttered in her little decided authoritative voice. Mamma,--she never left them, except to look after Grandmamma.

"It is I who am the stranger here," thought Albert, suffering from such frankness.

The conquest of children, even of his own, could not be undertaken in an hour. He left Marie Louise and Philippe, his heart sick with disappointment, his nerves wrung. As soon as he no longer saw their dear little heads, he was filled with an immediate wish to bring them back, to keep them with him, without saying anything to her who had separated them. And when he came back to his mother's house he took with him an added regret, a deep melancholy which Anne's love could no more satisfy than it could his grief for his mother. He remained in the death chamber until evening, filled with despair in relinquishing one by one the ties which had exalted his life. The next day, spent in the same way, was even more cruel to him. He had a letter and a telegram from Anne who was awaiting him at Lyons. He read them absently and in a spirit of injustice! What could she know of his thoughts?

When on the morning of the funeral he again saw Elizabeth, who came to do the honors of the house, he wished he had been mistaken the evening before in finding that her expression was changed, that she was more awakened and bearing alone a sorrow as great as his own. She asked him complacently how he was, but pitied him with her looks, with her entire uneasy attitude, friendly and dismayed at one and the same time. The Molay-Norrois arrived in their turn, and manifested an attitude of discreet sympathy toward their son-in-law. Then came other relations and friends. He was accepted once more by the family connections, relatives and the social circle with which he had believed all ties were broken. And in his great pride he endured it with bitterness.

The report was circulated in Grenoble that the death of Mme. Derize had reconciled the separated couple. Each one in the large crowd determined to watch for indications of it: to our utmost pity we add so much curiosity and such sudden indifference. The funeral procession was the object of attentive inspection to everyone, from Mme. Passerat, who, having loaned her motor to the invalid, prided herself upon a personal interest, to the little clerk Malaunay, who was concerned in it because of his bet. Elizabeth wished to take her place with the relations who were the chief mourners, behind her husband and her father who followed the hearse. By her presence, she showed besides her affection for the dead woman, her unwavering faithfulness to the name she bore.

The cemetery is only a short distance from the Cathedral, which is the parish church of the Boulevard des Adieux. They had only to go through a gate in the old ramparts and along the avenue L'Ile Verte, all covered with dead leaves, which were crushed beneath the horses' hoofs and the feet of the mourners. The moment when the coffin is lowered into the ground, is one of the most anguish-filled that a loving heart has to bear. Albert instinctively lifted his hand to his eyes. A vision interposed between himself and his sorrow--that of Elizabeth overwhelmed. Did he remember that sentence in his diary: "She does not know my mother--she will never know her. If I were to have the misfortune of losing her, I should mourn for her alone."

On the return, although crushed, she received the procession of guests who came to pay their condolence calls, then went upstairs to give some orders to the old servant. Albert came back, accompanied by Philippe Lagier. Having completed her self-imposed duty, she greeted Philippe with an "Au revoir" and turning to her husband, said:

"Now good-by, keep up your courage."

Not understanding that that was final, but ill at ease, he asked:

"Are you going away?"

"Yes."

"Where are you going?"

"I am going home. Should I send the children to you?"

He hesitated--then in a dull voice, answered:

"No."

She bowed. The door closed behind her. They would never see each other again.

As soon as she had gone, Albert made a few steps forward to call her back. What would he have said to her? Agitated, he walked up and down the room without speaking. In a few hours what emotions, what sorrow had he not experienced! His friend, motionless and silent, read with ease the succession of his thoughts, but by natural inclination had greater pity for the woman.

Fanchette came in to announce luncheon. Albert looked at her, seemed to be reflecting, and his decision made, declared in his clear voice:

"I am going to take you back to Paris."

This statement caused a shock at which she gave way as an old piece of furniture when its wood cracks. She crossed herself at once at the idea of going to that doomed city to wait upon a wicked woman, no doubt, and shaking her head from right to left, she stammered:

"No, no, M. Albert."

"Why will you not accept? Where will you go?

"To Madame Elizabeth."

He frowned.

"You will leave me?"

"Oh, no, Monsieur Albert. Only there are the little ones, and then, Madame Elizabeth has been so kind. You don't know how she took care of madame. Day and night she was always here."

He cut these praises short.

"I know," he said.

Luncheon was hurried and silent. In the drawing-room to which the two men returned together, Albert more and more absorbed and bitter, at last giving full vent to the torrent of his impressions, admitted as if to himself.

"Yes, she has changed a great deal."

He added:

"Does she still refuse the allowance that I have sent to my solicitor every month?"

"Yes."

"I ought to have demanded a promise of acceptance from her. She is depriving me of helping to support my own children and without right. It is unfair."

Philippe, whose passion had purified itself in following the brave efforts of Elizabeth, and who was still under the spell of Madame Derize's last wishes, generously desired to bring about a reconciliation and continued the praises which Fanchette had begun. He told of the lives of the two women at Grenoble and Saint Martin, their intimacy, the sacred devotion of the younger, who had changed the last year of the dead woman's life. In vain he was interrupted sharply with "I know, I know."

"No, you cannot know," he concluded, out of patience.

Albert, who had begun his walk again, stopped suddenly. His face wore that expression which it took on in anger, as his former violence overcame him again in the face of unbearable contradiction. However, he tried to master himself, and the insinuation which followed conveyed only wounding insolence:

"Then it was true what they wrote from Grenoble."

"What then?"

"That you were in love with my wife."

Philippe faced Albert's look, which was hard and imperious.

"Yes," he said calmly. "I have a worshipful admiration for Elizabeth. You may call it what you like."

"Take care, I shall know how to defend her."

"Against what and by what right?"

And influenced by his own unselfishness which inclined him to greatness of soul, desiring to expiate his former deception, he rose and held out his hand to his friend who did not refuse it:

"Come, Albert, how can we talk in this way--here."

Albert returned his handshake with that gratitude we feel toward those who have saved us from our own pettiness:

"I am unjust. They were infamous anonymous letters that I scarcely read. And then, her death has recalled so many memories that I believed to be remote, utterly silenced. A little flame has burst from the embers of my fireside."

"Can you not rebuild it?"

"No. But I could not see my mother on that bed, my wife, my children, without yearning for the right life which might have been mine. Do you understand? Elizabeth closed my mother's eyes; it is she who is bringing up Marie Louise and little Philippe alone. Yesterday she spoke to me with so much emotion and consideration. I was not alone in my grief. She has changed very much. She is more beautiful. And by a strange reaction, now that we are only strangers, the one to the other, it seems as though she had acquired all the characteristics which I formerly wished her to have."

"Strangers? It is not final. There is nothing final."

"Yes, death. Yesterday, I assure you, I envied my mother. Her face was so peaceful, so calm, so pure. One no longer suffers. And, above all, one does not make anyone else suffer. Yes, it is a solution. I have thought of it."

"Albert!"

"The day before yesterday, this morning again. It is a thought which will return to me. Elizabeth would be free. She deserves to be free, to be happy. I can do nothing now to make her so, and do not even wish that she should be: I am so selfish, so illogical."

"You are jealous of her--you still love her."

"I have loved her. The past overwhelms me here. I inhale it with every breath."

The conversation lagged. Philippe sought a word to turn it.

"When are you going away?" he asked, to change the subject.

"This evening."

"So soon. To Paris?"

"No. Anne is waiting for me at Lyons."

"Ah. When will you be back?"

"I don't know. Perhaps never. Like most men I have not ordered my life. I can change nothing, and when I cross this threshold, I feel like a miserable brute. It is odious."

He was exalted by these last words.

"And your children," said Philippe.

"Their mother is not so indifferent to me that I dare to take them from her. They have become her aim in life. How could I tear them away from her?"

And tortured by this question which repeated itself over and over again in his mind, he spoke of it again.

"I am an outsider to my own family. How can I crush my wife by demanding this from her? And then her shortcomings are no longer anything compared with mine."

For the first time he condemned himself.

"Will you answer me?" asked Philippe brusquely. "Are you happy?"

Albert looked at him with an expression of bitter irony.

"I have lost my mother without seeing her again. I have lost my children, my home, my peace--A little while ago I spoke of dying. And you ask me if I am happy."

"I did not mean to offend you, Albert. There is such power in love that it longs to subordinate our greatest misfortunes--or it can give us strength to bear them. You have never known that love--or you no longer feel it."

"You are wrong: I still feel it. But love has never fulfilled a man's entire life."

"One last word. If you gave up ... that love...."

"It is useless to go on. I shall give it up only with my life. Just now, when I was speaking of dying, it was with her. She would follow me, no matter where, even to death."

"I understand. You are all in all to her, but the contrary is not true. How you will both suffer, both of you!"

Albert took his friend's arm.

"Listen, I am not a coward," he said. "The choice of my life is not entirely in my own hands. Circumstances have brought it about that I am everything to Anne. I shall not give her up--no matter what happens."

"You prefer to sacrifice your children?"

"They have their mother."

"And their mother?"

No answer following the question, Philippe added:

"Shall you see her again before your departure?"

"No, what should I say to her? That she should break our legal ties, that she should try to remake her own happiness--she is so young, so lovely, so fascinating--and that I can never be anything to her again?"

"And that you are not happy?"

"What matter."

And those words fell like a stone into a dry well.

All afternoon Elizabeth waited at home for the uncertain event which would bring her husband to her. She could not believe that he would go away without seeing her again. Had she not helped his mother, shared his sorrow with him even that morning? How could he be so cruel as to go away in this manner?

Night came, and she still held the hope, which was sustaining her, as she sat, ardent and motionless, in the same armchair, her ear strained to catch the slightest sound, her eyes vainly fixed on the door. She knew that he must take the 10:40 express. She knew where Anne de Sézery was. Finally she went into her children's room, saw that they were asleep, left them in their nurse's charge, and hastily putting on her hat and cloak, she hurried toward the station.

"If I went to look for him?" Mme. Derize had said one day.

Without pride, humiliated, conquered, here she was hastening to offer to the ungrateful faithless one, the heart which he had broken. She did not find him in the entrance hall. Not daring to cross the station to reach the platform, trembling with the emotion of her sudden impulse, she went out into the darkness and watched for the arrival of the carriages. At last she saw Albert and Philippe get out and she drew back, so as not to be seen. By the light of the lantern she distinguished Albert's set expression, as he paid the coachman. Ashamed of her weakness as soon as they had passed, she fled.

An individual, very smartly dressed--(one of those rich glove merchants of Grenoble who make their large fortunes in Paris or Lyons and who, as a result, have acquired at a high price the right of treating women with familiarity)--after noticing her uneasy manner and her figure, followed her and dared to speak to her in the Rue Lesdiguières,--which is not well illuminated. He did not belong to the society she moved in and did not know her.

"Well, Madame, one must be guided by reason. The king is dead--long live the king!"

He laughed, he stared insolently at her, a little disturbed by the type of beauty he saw, which impressed him in spite of himself. Speechless, she was obliged to stop, and her mouth twisted itself without making a sound. At last she recovered herself and cried:

"Go away!"

Her frightened face, her terrified eyes more than her words, put the blackguard to flight. She dragged herself to her staircase, her limbs giving way under her. This last insult completed her humiliation. She fell into the deepest despair. She, in turn, envied the dead.

"It is over," she said to herself, "all over forever."

Reaching her room like an animal forced to its lair, crushed by so many nights of watching and fatigue, by the uselessness of so many efforts, rebelling against God's forgetfulness, she slid to the floor at the foot of her bed, and there, collapsing, huddled up, through her sobs, she mechanically repeated the words which alone kept her from wishing for death, which, in spite of herself, linked her with life.

"Marie Louise, Philippe--my little ones ..."