It seemed to me as though I were looking into her
soul, just as I had into Monsieur Chantal’s;
that I was looking right from one end to the other
of this humble life, so simple and devoted. I
felt an irresistible longing to question her, to find
out whether she, too, had loved him; whether she also
had suffered, as he had, from this long, secret, poignant
grief, which one cannot see, know, or guess, but which
breaks forth at night in the loneliness of the dark
room. I was watching her, and I could observe
her heart beating under her waist, and I wondered
whether this sweet, candid face had wept on the soft
pillow and she had sobbed, her whole body shaken by
the violence of her anguish.
I said to her in a low voice, like a child who is
breaking a toy to see what is inside: “If
you could have seen Monsieur Chantal crying a while
ago it would have moved you.”
She started, asking: “What? He was
weeping?”
“Ah, yes, he was indeed weeping!”
“Why?”
She seemed deeply moved. I answered:
“On your account.”
“On my account?”
“Yes. He was telling me how much he had
loved you in the days gone by; and what a pang it
had given him to marry his cousin instead of you.”
Her pale face seemed to grow a little longer; her
calm eyes, which always remained open, suddenly closed
so quickly that they seemed shut forever. She
slipped from her chair to the floor, and slowly, gently
sank down as would a fallen garment.
I cried: “Help! help! Mademoiselle
Pearl is ill.”
Madame Chantal and her daughters rushed forward, and
while they were looking for towels, water and vinegar,
I grabbed my hat and ran away.
I walked away with rapid strides, my heart heavy,
my mind full of remorse and regret. And yet sometimes
I felt pleased; I felt as though I had done a praiseworthy
and necessary act. I was asking myself: “Did
I do wrong or right?” They had that shut up
in their hearts, just as some people carry a bullet
in a closed wound. Will they not be happier now?
It was too late for their torture to begin over again
and early enough for them to remember it with tenderness.
And perhaps some evening next spring, moved by a beam
of moonlight falling through the branches on the grass
at their feet, they will join and press their hands
in memory of all this cruel and suppressed suffering;
and, perhaps, also this short embrace may infuse in
their veins a little of this thrill which they would
not have known without it, and will give to those
two dead souls, brought to life in a second, the rapid
and divine sensation of this intoxication, of this
madness which gives to lovers more happiness in an
instant than other men can gather during a whole lifetime!
