After shaking hands with her, Philippe expressed his intention of withdrawing, but she detained him for a moment, almost begging for his protection. "You will come back soon, will you not? In an hour?" "Yes, Madame." They were left alone, facing each other, he confused, motionless, finding not a word to say; she, carrying on, with amazing ease, this interview which she had so dreaded. "I had wired to Paris," she explained. "We did not know where to reach you. At last your letter came from Aosta." With dry lips, his face drawn by the sorrow to which he would not give way, he murmured: "I had left her so well only a few days ago! I had no presentiment, I thought I should keep her for a long time to come." "Yes, we never think we can lose those we love. You must be tired. You have not eaten nor slept. Will you have something? Later we can speak of her." "I want to see her." "She is there. Come." She led him into the death chamber, knelt for a moment at the foot of the bed, motioning to the nun who was watching the body to follow her. She had divined Albert's desire. When he was sure of being alone, his sorrow carried him beyond all bounds, as a river its dam. She who lay there, emaciated and white, her eyes closed, her hands crossed over a crucifix--and what withered hands!--she whose forehead and cheeks, like marble, cold, but not hard, froze his mouth, as he kissed them in vain, she who would never again hear him, never see him or speak to him, she had twice given him life. After giving him birth, she nourished, developed and strengthened him without help or fortune. He owed to her his intellectual power, the moral force of his judgment, the courage to undertake those lengthy works, which demand a continued effort, of which so few are capable. In what intimacy they had spent so many years, the busiest and the happiest of years! He remembered them now with a sorrow that only one word could express, which re-echoed in the silence, like a groan. "Mother!" From afar he always felt her protection. She was a witness in his behalf. Now that witness was no more, and parts of his life lost their meaning, their value. With her he would bury his childhood and his youth, a whole period of days, clear as the expression of her eyes in life; a whole period of bright days that he had never found since and could never find again. And it was not he who had closed her eyes.