Odette smiled, not only at the thought of what people were thinking of her, but at the solicitude which they expressed for her, and that sort of obsession for heroic acts which every one seemed to cherish. Odette had not the slightest intention of performing a heroic act. Nothing in her character had ever inclined her in that direction. Her heart was made for loving. She loved, she was sure that she loved. The one whom she loved was her husband--her Jean. She could ill analyze the character of the tenderness which at the same time she felt for every suffering creature on earth. And that was all. What would they have of her? XXXVI Nevertheless she continued to be disturbed by the strange rumor which had been set afloat, which was still afloat, and she promised herself to speak about it to Clotilde, who without doubt had been the cause of its diffusion. On drawing near to the house in which Clotilde lived, she met Lieutenant Avvogade guiding his blinded man by the arm. She had not so much as thought of avoiding such an encounter. When the blind man recognized Odette's voice his whole face was transfigured. He turned pale; he hardly had courage to speak. But she felt the effort with which his closed eyelids were directed toward the point in space from which her voice had come; her perfume had been wafted to him. This blinded man was looking at her, was seeing her in his imagination; perhaps he was seeing her much more beautiful, more alluring, than he had dreamed! He had been disturbed because opportunities to be with her had no longer been afforded him, and he did not know that it was not she herself who had prevented them. But an inward instinct, stronger than he had yet known, filled him with ecstasy in that moment of the young woman's presence. He inhaled her like a flower, he listened to her, was saturated with her. Believing himself to be behind the veil which hid the daylight from him, as behind a screen, he neglected to keep a watch on himself, to impose constraint upon himself. His emotion was evident to those who saw him, and the agitation of a man so much to be pitied impressed her profoundly. Odette told him that she had learned that he had two little children. Then the blinded man extended his hand to her; his throat contracted; he could not utter a word. Without hesitation Odette took the hand of this man, so good-hearted and so wretched, and let her own be enfolded in his. Not a word had been added to those alluding to the children, yet she felt that she had never heard from human lips such an expression of gratitude. * * * They were there, under the trees of the Square of the United States, one of the beauty spots of opulent, worldly Paris, where so many conventional words and actions must have been exchanged; and this agitated silence, those clasped hands, result of the universal woe, seemed to embody as in marble the symbol of a new beauty which effaced all that had before been known.