He had therefore passed the night meditating upon all the details, significant and unimportant, that he had observed in the afternoon and evening, from the moment he had remarked the unexpected intimacy of Pierre with Corancez until the instant he had entered his friend's chamber hoping for an explanation, and had found it empty. Toward five o'clock he fell asleep, slumbering brokenly and heavily as one does in a railway train in the morning. He dreamed upon the lines of thought that had kept him awake, as was to be expected. But it heightened his uneasiness by an appearance of presentiment. He thought he was again in the little salon of the palace at Rome, where Ely de Carlsberg used to receive him. Suddenly his wife arrived, leading Pierre Hautefeuille by the hand. Pierre stopped, as though smitten with terror, and tried to scream. Suddenly paralysis struck him down, turning his leg rigid, forcing out his left eye, drawing down the corner of his mouth, whence not a sound issued! The suffering caused by this nightmare was so intense that Olivier felt its influence even after he was awake. He felt so ill that he could not even wait to see his wife before going out. He scribbled a line telling her that he was suffering from a slight headache, and that he had gone out to try and seek relief. He added that he had not liked to disturb her so early in the morning, and that he would be back about nine o'clock. He told her, however, that she was not to await his return should he happen to be late. He felt that he must steady his nerves by means of a long walk so as to be prepared to cope with the events of the day, which he was convinced would be decisive. Prolonged walks were his invariable remedy in his nervous crises, and he might have been successful this time if, after having walked straight before him for some time, he had not come, about ten o'clock, to the corner of the Rue d'Antibes, the most animated and interesting part of Cannes. At this hour the long corridor-like street was one mass of sharply outlined shadow, swept and freshened by one of those brisk breezes that impart a touch of crispness to the burning air of morning in Provence. The carriage wheels seemed to roll more rapidly, the horses' hoofs seemed to ring more resonantly upon the white roadway. Young people were passing to and fro, English for the most part, attending with characteristic thoroughness to their after-breakfast constitutional or their before-lunch exercise. They walked along, overtaking or meeting young girls with whom they chatted gayly, having doubtless arranged the meeting upon the preceding evening. Others were hastening to the station to catch the train for Nice or Monte Carlo. Their manner, bearing, and costume bore that indescribable imprint of a frivolous life of amusement. Olivier was all the more deeply impressed by this from the mere fact that he had formerly been a leader in such an aimless mode of life.