At the last second, in spite of herself, it was the recollection of what had passed the night before at Havre, that came to her lips, instead of the confession. "Oh! Do you think so?" he murmured incredulous. "He seems so nice. He gave me his hand again this morning." "I assure you he knows," she replied. "I have the proof." Séverine paused. Then, after a quivering meditation, she exclaimed: "Oh! I hate him! I hate him!" Jacques was surprised. He had no ill-feeling against Roubaud. "Indeed! Why is that?" he inquired "He does not interfere with us!" Without replying, she repeated: "I hate him! The mere idea of his being beside me is a torture. Ah! If I could, I would run away, I would remain with you!" Jacques pressed her to him. Then, after another pause, she resumed: "But you do not know, darling----" The confession was on her lips again, fatally, inevitably. And this time he felt certain that nothing in the world would delay it. Not a sound could be heard in the house. The newsvendor even must have been in deep slumber. Outside, Paris covered with snow was wrapped in silence. Not a rumble of a vehicle could be heard in the streets. The last train for Havre, which had left at twenty minutes after midnight, seemed to have borne away the final vestige of life in the station. The stove had ceased roaring. The fire burning to ashes, gave fresh vigour to the red spot circling on the ceiling like a terrified eye. It was so warm that a heavy, stifling mist seemed to weigh down on them. "Darling, you do not know----" she repeated. Then he also spoke, unable to restrain himself any longer: "Yes, yes, I know," said he. "No; you may think you do, but you cannot know," she answered. "I know that he did it for the legacy," he retorted. She made a movement, and gave an involuntary little nervous laugh. "Ah! bosh; the legacy!" she remarked. And, in a very low voice, so low that a moth grazing the window panes, would have made a louder sound, she related her childhood at the house of the sister of President Grandmorin. Gaining courage as she proceeded, she continued in her low tone: "Just fancy, it was here in this room, last February. You recollect, at the time when he had his quarrel with the sub-prefect. We had lunched very nicely--just as we have supped now--there, on that table. Naturally, he knew nothing, I had not gone out of my way to relate the story. But all of a sudden, about a ring, an old present, about nothing, I know not how it occurred, he understood everything. Ah! my darling! No, no; you cannot imagine how he treated me!" After a shudder, she resumed: