Constance was alone.  The dull rattle of the rain on the glass above her continued, but a little livid light was appearing as a gust of wind carried off the clouds.  And in that pale light Blaise suddenly appeared at the end of the gallery.  He had just returned to the factory with Denis and Beauchene, and had left his companions together for a moment, in order to go to the workshops to procure some information they required.  Preoccupied, absorbed once more in his work, he came along with an easy step, his head somewhat bent.  And when Constance saw him thus appear, all that she felt in her heart was the smart of rancor, a renewal of her anger at what she had learnt of that agreement which was to be signed on the morrow and which would despoil her.  That enemy who was in her home and worked against her, a revolt of her whole being urged her to exterminate him, and thrust him out like some usurper, all craft and falsehood.

He drew nearer.  She was in the dense shadow near the wall, so that he could not see her.  But on her side, as he softly approached steeped in a grayish light, she could see him with singular distinctness.  Never before had she so plainly divined the power of his lofty brow, the intelligence of his eyes, the firm will of his mouth.  And all at once she was struck with fulgural certainty; he was coming towards the cavity without seeing it and he would assuredly plunge into the depths unless she should stop him as he passed.  But a little while before, she, like himself, had come from yonder, and would have fallen unless a friendly hand had restrained her; and the frightful shudder of that moment yet palpitated in her veins; she could still and ever see the damp black pit with the little lantern far below.  The whole horror of it flashed before her eyes—­the ground failing one, the sudden drop with a great shriek, and the smash a moment afterwards.

Blaise drew yet nearer.  But certainly such a thing was impossible; she would prevent it, since a little motion of her hand would suffice.  Would she not always have time to stretch out her arms when he was there before her?  And yet from the recesses of her being a very clear and frigid voice seemed to ascend, articulating brief words which rang in her ears as if repeated by a trumpet blast.  If he should die it would be all over, the factory would never belong to him.  She who had bitterly lamented that she could devise no obstacle had merely to let this helpful chance take its own course.  And this, indeed, was what the voice said, what it repeated with keen insistence, never adding another syllable.  After that there would be nothing.  After that there would merely remain the shattered remnants of a suppressed man, and a pit of darkness splashed with blood, in which she discerned, foresaw nothing more.  What would happen on the morrow?  She did not wish to know; indeed there would be no morrow.  It was solely the brutal immediate fact which the imperious voice demanded.  He dead, it would be all over, he would never possess the works.