They had now reached the end of the bridge. The passers-by were jostling them. Rougon tried to console Madame Correur, thinking of all the kind things that he could say. 'It's extremely annoying. But, you'll see, your brother will make it up with you by-and-bye. Time puts everything straight.' Then, as she still detained him at the corner of the footway, amidst the uproar of the passing vehicles, he slowly walked up the bridge again, she following and saying: 'When Martineau dies, his wife is quite capable of burning any will he may leave behind him. The poor, dear fellow is nothing more than skin and bones. Herminie says that he looks dreadfully ill. I am terribly bothered about it all.' 'Well, you can do nothing now,' said Rougon, with a vague gesture; 'you must wait.' However, she stopped him again when he was half-way across the bridge, and, lowering her voice, continued: 'Herminie told me a strange thing. It seems that Martineau has gone in for politics now. He is a Republican. At the last elections he threw the whole neighbourhood into excitement. That news gave me quite a shock. He might get into trouble, eh?' There was a short pause, during which Madame Correur looked searchingly at Rougon. He had glanced at a passing carriage as though he wished to avoid her gaze. Then, with an innocent air, he responded: 'Oh, don't make yourself uneasy. You have friends, haven't you? Well, rely on them.' 'You are the only person I rely on, Eugène,' she replied in a low, tender voice. At this Rougon seemed moved. He glanced at her, and was stirred by the sight of her plump neck and painted face, which she struggled to keep beautiful. She personified his youth. 'Yes, rely on me,' he said, pressing her hands. 'You know very well that I am always on your side.' He again accompanied her as far as the Quai Voltaire. And when she had left him he at last made his way across the bridge, slackening his steps as he went in order to watch the landing of the sugar-loaves at the Port Saint-Nicholas. For a moment even he halted and let his elbows rest on the parapet. But the sugar-loaves rolling down the gangway, the greenish water flowing beneath the arches of the bridge, the crowd of idlers and the houses all soon grew hazy and disappeared, and he fell into a reverie. He became absorbed in dim, strange thoughts; it seemed to him as if he were descending with Madame Correur into some black abyss of human iniquity. However, he felt no regrets, no qualms; he dreamt of becoming very great and very powerful, so that he might satisfy the desires of those about him to an extent unnatural--even, as it were, impossible.