In his terror he peered into her eyes.  Assuredly she was lying.  Calm as she might appear, he could detect her voice trembling.  Besides, it was evident she must still have been there, since he had not even had time to get below before it happened.  And all at once he recalled their conversation, the questions she had asked him and her cry of hatred against the unfortunate young fellow who had now been picked up, covered with blood, in the depths of that abyss.  Beneath the gust of horror which chilled him, Morange could only find these words:  “Well, madame, poor Blaise came just behind you and broke his skull.”

Her demeanor was perfect; her hands quivered as she raised them, and it was in a halting voice that she exclaimed:  “Good Lord! good Lord, what a frightful misfortune.”

But at that moment an uproar arose through the house.  The drawing-room door had remained open, and the voices and footsteps of a number of people drew nearer, became each moment more distinct.  Orders were being given on the stairs, men were straining and drawing breath, there were all the signs of the approach of some cumbrous burden, carried as gently as possible.

“What! is he being brought up here to me?” exclaimed Constance turning pale, and her involuntary cry would have sufficed to enlighten the accountant had he needed it.  “He is being brought to me here!”

It was not Morange who answered; he was stupefied by the blow.  But Beauchene abruptly appeared preceding the body, and he likewise was livid and beside himself, to such a degree did this sudden visit of death thrill him with fear, in his need of happy life.

“Morange will have told you of the frightful catastrophe, my dear,” said he.  “Fortunately Denis was there, for the question of responsibility towards his family.  And it was Denis, too, who, just as we were about to carry the poor fellow home to the pavilion, opposed it, saying that, given his wife’s condition, we should kill her if we carried him to her in this dying state.  And so the only course was to bring him here, was it not?”

Then he quitted his wife with a gesture of bewilderment, and returned to the landing, where one could hear him repeating in a quivering voice:  “Gently, gently, take care of the balusters.”

The lugubrious train entered the drawing-room.  Blaise had been laid on a stretcher provided with a mattress.  Denis, as pale as linen, followed, supporting the pillow on which rested his brother’s head.  A little streamlet of blood coursed over the dying man’s brow, his eyes were closed.  And four factory hands held the shafts of the stretcher.  Their heavy shoes crushed down the carpet, and fragile articles of furniture were thrust aside anyhow to open a passage for this invasion of horror and of fright.

Amid his bewilderment, an idea occurred to Beauchene, who continued to direct the operation.

“No, no, don’t leave him there.  There is a bed in the next room.  We will take him up very gently with the mattress, and lay him with it on the bed.”