Where did he go? She never knew. He did not appear in society: the damp, cold weather precluded the idea that he went on the water for pleasure. However, he often said that he had been on a boat, and his clothes smelt of tar. He was learning to row, taking lessons of a fisherman in the harbor. He pretended that the fatigue calmed the excitement of his nerves, and put him in good condition for the next day's labor. Thérèse no longer dared to go to his studio. He seemed annoyed when she expressed a wish to see his work. He did not want her reflections when he was working out his own idea, nor did he wish to have her come there and say nothing, which would make him feel as if she were inclined to find fault. She was not to see his work until he deemed it worthy to be seen. Formerly, he never began anything without explaining his idea to her; now, he treated her like _the public_. Two or three times he passed the whole night abroad. Thérèse did not become accustomed to the anxiety these prolonged absences caused her. She would have exasperated him by giving any sign that she noticed them; but, as may be imagined, she watched him and tried to learn the truth. It was impossible for her to follow him herself at night in a city full of sailors and adventurers of all nations. Not for anything in the world would she have stooped to have him followed by any one. She stole noiselessly into his room and looked at him as he lay asleep. He seemed utterly exhausted. Perhaps he had, in reality, undertaken a desperate struggle against himself, to deaden by physical exercise the excessive activity of his thought. One night she noticed that his clothes were muddy and torn, as if he had actually been in a fight, or as if he had had a fall. Alarmed beyond measure, she approached him, and discovered blood on his pillow; he had a slight wound on the forehead. He was sleeping so soundly that she thought that she could, without rousing him, partly uncover his breast to see if there was any other wound; but he woke, and flew into a rage which was the _coup de grâce_ to her. She tried to fly, but he detained her by force, put on a dressing-gown, locked the door, and then, striding excitedly up and down the room which was dimly lighted by a small night-lamp, he poured forth at last all the suffering that was heaped up in his heart.