She had fallen to her knees on the damp, cold ground, her hands joined as if in prayer, in an outburst of frantic grief.  The word friend, the only name by which it occurred to her to address him, told the story of the tender affection she had lost in that man, so good, so loving, who had forgiven her, had meant to make her his wife, despite the ugly past.  And now all hope was dead within her bosom, there was nothing left to make life desirable.  She had never loved another; she would put away her love for him at the bottom of her heart and hold it sacred there.  The rain had ceased; a flock of crows that circled above the three trees, croaking dismally, affected her like a menace of evil.  Was he to be taken from her again, her cherished dead, whom she had recovered with such difficulty?  She dragged herself along upon her knees, and with a trembling hand brushed away the hungry flies that were buzzing about her friend’s wide-open eyes.

She caught sight of a bit of blood-stained paper between Honore’s stiffened fingers.  It troubled her; she tried to gain possession of the paper, pulling at it gently, but the dead man would not surrender it, seemingly tightening his hold on it, guarding it so jealously that it could not have been taken from him without tearing it in bits.  It was the letter she had written him, that he had always carried next his heart, and that he had taken from its hiding place in the moment of his supreme agony, as if to bid her a last farewell.  It seemed so strange, was such a revelation, that he should have died thinking of her; when she saw what it was a profound delight filled her soul in the midst of her affliction.  Yes, surely, she would leave it with him, the letter that was so dear to him! she would not take it from him, since he was so bent on carrying it with him to the grave.  Her tears flowed afresh, but they were beneficent tears this time, and brought healing and comfort with them.  She arose and kissed his hands, kissed him on the forehead, uttering meanwhile but that one word, which was in itself a prolonged caress: 

“My friend! my friend—­”

Meantime the sun was declining; Prosper had gone and taken the counterpane from the cart, and between them they raised Honore’s body, slowly, reverently, and laid it on the bed-covering, which they had stretched upon the ground; then, first wrapping him in its folds, they bore him to the cart.  It was threatening to rain again, and they had started on their return, forming, with the donkey, a sorrowful little cortege on the broad bosom of the accursed plain, when a deep rumbling as of thunder was heard in the distance.  Prosper turned his head and had only time to shout: 

“The horses! the horses!”