Claes sought out this noble soul.  He found her inexpressibly beautiful, and the malformation of one of her shoulders appeared as nothing in his eyes.  He lost his heart to Josephine, and made passionate love to her.  Distracted by such adoration, the beautiful cripple was now lifted to dizzy heights of joy and now plunged into abysmal depths of despair.  She had deemed herself irreparably plain; in the eyes of a charming young man, she found herself beautiful.  But, could such love endure through life?  To be loved was delicious, but to be deceived after so surprising a release from solitude would be terrible.

Conscious of her deformity, intimidated by the future, she became in the purity of her soul a coquette.  She dissimulated her feelings, became exacting, and hid from her lover the passion of joy which was consuming her; indeed, she only revealed her true self after marriage had shown her the steadfast nobility of her husband’s character, when she could no longer doubt of his affection.  He loved her with fidelity and ardour.  She realised all his ideals, and no consideration of duty entered into their passionate affection.  She was Spanish, and had the secret of charm in her variety of attraction; ill-educated though she was, like most daughters of Spanish noblemen, she was engaging and bewildering in the force of her own nature and the religion of her absorbing love.  In society she was dull; for her husband alone she was enchanting.  No couple could have been happier.

They had four children, two boys and two girls; the eldest a girl named Marguerite.

Fourteen years after their marriage, in the year 1809, a change appeared in Balthazar, but so gradually that Mme. Claes did not at first question it.  He became thoughtful, reflective, silent, preoccupied.  When Josephine Claes noticed this change, it was too late for her to ask questions; she waited for Balthazar to speak.  She began to fear.  Balthazar, whose whole heaven had lain in the happiness of the family life, who had loved to play with his children, to attend to his tulips, to sun himself in the dark eyes of Josephine, seemed now to forget the existence of them all.  He was indifferent to everything.

People who questioned her were put off with the brave story that Balthazar had a great work in hand, which would bring fame one day to his native town.  Josephine’s hazard was founded on truth.  Workmen had been engaged for some time in the garret of the house, and there Claes spent the greater part of his time.  But the poor lady was to learn the full truth from the neighbours she had attempted to hoodwink.  They asked her if she meant to see herself and her children ruined, adding that her husband was spending a fortune on scientific instruments, machinery, books, and materials in a search for the Philosopher’s Stone.

Humiliated that the neighbours should know more than she did, and terrified by the prospect in front of her, Josephine at last spoke to her husband.