She trembled lest René might have had recourse to the proceeding counselled by Napoleon, who, with his imperial good sense, said, 'In love the only victory is flight.' In behaving as she had done she had staked all. Would she win? What she had foreseen had come to pass with a precision that both delighted and frightened her. The third letter bore the imprint of such deep despair that, on reading it a second time, this subtle actress, with all her experience, was seized by a fresh fear more terrible than the first--the fear that René might really have destroyed himself. In vain did she argue with herself that if the poet had had real intentions of going away he would have mentioned it in the letter, and that a handsome young man of twenty-five does not kill himself on account of the silence of a woman he believes to be in love with him--her anguish was none the less real and intense when she reached the Rue Coëtlogon a few hours after having received the letter. It was two o'clock. She stopped for a moment at the corner of the street, gazing in wonderment at this provincial corner of Paris, whose picturesqueness had so charmed Claude Larcher on the evening our story opens. The grey clouds hung low in the wintry sky, and the bare branches of the trees stood out drearily against them. The cries of a few children playing at soldiers amongst the ruins at the back alone broke the silence. The strange appearance of the peaceful little street, the perils attending the step she was about to take, and the uncertainty of the result, all combined to bring Suzanne's excitement to its highest pitch, though she smiled as she thought to herself that there was no reason for believing René to be at home unless he were hopelessly waiting for a reply to his last letter. But when the _concierge_ had told her that M. René was in, and had pointed out the door, her wits at once came back to her. Like all strong-minded women, she possessed the characteristics of a man of action. A plain and circumscribed course of events inspired her with determination and courage to carry out her plans. She rang the bell. Heavy footsteps were heard approaching, and the face of Françoise appeared in the doorway. At any other time she would have smiled at the look of amazement which the simple maid did not even try to conceal. Colette Rigaud had once called upon the poet to get him to make some slight alteration in her part, and Françoise, recovering somewhat from her surprise, no doubt thought that this was a similar visit, for Suzanne could hear her say, as she opened the last door on the right: 'Monsieur René, there's a lady asking for you. . . . A very pretty woman--probably some actress.'