His words were cut short by a burst of sobbing. His terror and his disgust of life broke out in spite of all the efforts he had made to restrain himself since Louise's terrible delivery. When he had touched his baby's brow with his lips, he hastily stepped back, for he had fancied that he could feel the infant's skull giving way beneath his touch. He was filled with remorseful despondency at the sight of the poor, frail little thing. 'Don't distress yourself!' said Pauline, by way of cheering him. 'We'll make a fine young fellow of him. It doesn't at all matter that he is small now.' He looked at her, and, utterly upset as he was, a full confession escaped from his heart: 'It is again to you that we owe his life! Am I destined, then, to be always under obligations to you?' 'To me!' she exclaimed. 'I have done nothing more than Madame Bouland would have done if I hadn't happened to be here.' He silenced her with a wave of his hand. 'Do you think,' he said, 'that I am so base that I cannot understand that I owe everything to you? Ever since you first came into this house you have never ceased to sacrifice yourself. I will say nothing now about your money, but you still loved me yourself when you gave me to Louise. I know it now quite well. Ah! if you only knew the shame I feel when I look at you and recollect! You would have given your very life-blood, you were always kind and cheerful, even at the very time when I was crushing down your heart. Ah, yes! you were right; cheerfulness and kindliness are everything; all else is mere delusion!' She tried to interrupt him, but he continued in a louder voice: 'What a fool I made of myself with all my disbelief and boasting, and all the pessimism which I paraded out of vanity and fear! It was I who spoilt our lives--yours and my own, and those of the whole family. Yes! you were the only sensible one amongst us! Life becomes so easy when everyone in a family is cheerful and affectionate, and each lives for the others. If the world is to die of misery, at any rate let it die cheerfully, and in sympathy with itself!' Pauline smiled at the violence of his language, and caught hold of his hands. 'Come! come!' she said, 'don't excite yourself! Now that you see I was right, you are cured, and all will go well.' 'Ah! I don't know that! I am talking like this just now, because there are times when the truth will force itself out, even in spite of one's self. But to-morrow I shall slip back into all my old torment. One can't change one's nature! No, no! Things will go no better. On the contrary, they will gradually get worse and worse. You know that as well as I do. It is my own stupidity that enrages me.' She drew him gently towards her, and said to him in her grave way: 'You are neither foolish nor base; you are unfortunate. Kiss me, Lazare.'