After his recent humiliation his first thought now was pride. In his reassurance, however, he noticed the black border on the letter and his heart beat fast again. There had been some sorrow, then, a great sorrow, during his absence. In one’s extreme youth, and even later on in life sometimes, one does not take in the possibility of losing those one loves: one goes away from them with no sorrow, feeling sure of seeing them again when one comes back. Only with our first grief is the future’s credit injured. Maurice, separated from his own people, deprived of news, preserved by the heedlessness of his age and the egotism of his love, had not been conscious of the inquietude that wrung his heart brutally when memory intervened. Often, more and more often, he found himself calling up the memory of his family, picturing the empty place that he had left among them. Edith’s presence was not always enough to chase away these phantoms. But he had never had any presentiments of death. And yet for several days of late, ever since the season and his happiness had begun to wane together, the vision of his mother’s pale face had risen before him; he had felt her last caress on his cheek, the caress of that cool hand, the touch of which he could feel again now after a whole year. The blow which struck him found him unprepared. Why was the letter in Margaret’s handwriting? For whom could she be in deep mourning, unless it were--? He dared not answer this question to himself: it was already answered. He took his hat and went out, holding the letter in his hand. How could he have read it there in the hotel office? He could not read it on the terrace, nor in the avenue, nor in the woods. Edith would come upon him in a few moments and surprise him, and this sorrow was for him alone. He would not share it with anybody. To share it would be to make it less, when he wanted to extract its essence to the full. Outside the hotel he read the first lines, and fled down the path like some creature wounded and pursued. As long as he was in the neighbourhood of houses he kept on his way. He wanted a solitude in which to weep without being seen, and his feet turned again in the direction of the Buccione tower. He did not stop once till he had reached the summit of the hill. At the foot of the tower, all out of breath, he threw himself down on a patch of grass which grew between the fallen walls. He had been running, as if one could run away from fate. As he regained his breath, fear seized hold on him and tortured him still further. The letter, several pages long, which he had held crumpled in his hand all the time, he did not dare to read at once in its entirety. He had to make a great effort to go on with the reading of it, to interrupt himself more than once. It brought him news of more sorrows even than he had foreseen. CHAMBÉRY, _November 2d_. MY DEAR MAURICE: