Pâquerette placed two candles upon a little table near the corpse; then she resumed her doze, curled up in her arm-chair. Jacques had not stirred; all my words, all those of Laurence, had passed over him without making him start. On his knees, his face buried in the sheet, he was absorbed in some harsh and terrible thought which overwhelmed him and deprived him of speech. The chamber was now silent. The two candles sent forth a pale light, which whitened the bed clothes and Marie's uncovered face. Beyond this narrow circle of brightness, all was but uncertain gloom. Amid this gloom, I vaguely perceived Pâquerette asleep and Jacques kneeling. I went to the window. I passed the night standing there, with a narrow bit of sky above me. I looked at Marie and I looked within myself; I towered above Jacques, I distinguished Laurence far off, very far off, in my memory. My mind was healthy, I explained everything to myself, I comprehended my being and the creatures who surrounded me. It was thus that I was enabled to see the truth. Yes, Jacques had not been deceived. I was ill. I had fever, delirium. I feel to-day, from the fatigue of my heart, what must have been the violence of my disease. I am proud of my sufferings, I understand that I have not been infamous, that my despair was but the rebellion of my heart incensed at the society into which I had unwittingly brought it. I am awkward before shame, I cannot accept common love; I have not the tranquil indifference necessary to live in this corner of Paris, where beautiful youth wallows in the midst of the mud. I need the pure mountain summits, the broad country. If I had encountered a spotless girl, I would have knelt before her and given myself entirely to her; I would have been as pure as she, and, without struggle, without effort, we would have united our fortunes, we would have become husband and wife. Life has its fatalities. One night, I met Laurence with her throat uncovered; I was imprudent enough to shelter this woman, and at length I loved her, loved her as if she had been a spotless angel, with all my heart, all my purity. She repayed my affection with suffering and despair; she had had the baseness to allow herself to be loved without ever having once loved on her side. I tore myself, before this dead soul, in a vain attempt to make myself understood. I wept like a child who wishes to kiss his mother, standing on the tips of his little feet, but unable to reach the visage of her in whom all his hope is centred.