A strange, dim, cold light filled the room; a light he did not recognize for anything he had known before, and at the foot of his bed stood a figure in dark garments with a dark shawl over its head, with a fleshless predatory face and dark hollows for its eyes, silent, expectant, implacable.... “Is this death?” he asked himself, staring at it terrified. It resembled Catherine. It said again: “Ecoutez.” He took away his eyes from it, and glancing down noticed that his clothes were torn open on his chest. He would not look up at that thing, whatever it was, spectre or old woman, and said: “Yes, I hear you.” “You are an honest man.” It was Catherine’s unemotional voice. “The day has broken. You will go away.” “Yes,” he said without raising his head. “She is asleep,” went on Catherine or whoever it was, “exhausted, and you would have to shake her hard before she would wake. You will go. You know,” the voice continued inflexibly, “she is my niece, and you know that there is death in the folds of her skirt and blood about her feet. She is for no man.” Réal felt all the anguish of an unearthly experience. This thing that looked like Catherine and spoke like a cruel fate had to be faced. He raised his head in this light that seemed to him appalling and not of this world. “Listen well to me, you too,” he said. “If she had all the madness of the world and the sin of all the murders of the Revolution on her shoulders I would still hug her to my breast. Do you understand?” The apparition which resembled Catherine lowered and raised its hooded head slowly. “There was a time when I could have hugged l’enfer même to my breast. He went away. He had his vow. You have only your honesty. You will go.” “I have my duty,” said Lieutenant Réal in measured tones, as if calmed by the excess of horror that old woman inspired him with. “Go without disturbing her, without looking at her.” “I will carry my shoes in my hand,” he said. He sighed deeply and felt as if sleepy. “It is very early,” he muttered. “Peyrol is already down at the well,” announced Catherine. “What can he be doing there all this time?” she added in a troubled voice. Réal, with his feet now on the ground, gave her a side glance; but she was already gliding away, and when he looked again she had vanished from the room and the door was shut. XV Catherine, going downstairs, found Peyrol still at the well. He seemed to be looking into it with extreme interest. “Your coffee is ready, Peyrol,” she shouted to him from the doorway. He turned very sharply like a man surprised and came along smiling. “That’s pleasant news, Mademoiselle Catherine,” he said. “You are down early.” “Yes,” she admitted, “but you too, Peyrol. Is Michel about? Let him come and have some coffee too.”