“Poor fool!” he cried, “I shall never be but a common imbecile!  Is not my way all traced out?  I must continue my career, and let myself go with the current of life.  Is it then so hard?  Why delude myself with phantoms?  I will try to slay the muttering passions, to drive away the fits of ambition which rise to my brain; and perhaps by dint of subduing all that is rebellious in me, I shall come to follow piously the line marked out by my superiors.  I will watch patiently amidst my flock, by the corner of my fire, among the Fathers and my weariness.

“Weariness, that cold demon with the gloomy eye, but I will remain chaste ... and after a life filled with little nothingnesses and little works I shall pass away in peace in the bosom of the Lord.  And there is my life.  Nothing else to choose.  No turning aside to the right or to the left.  I must remain a martyr, a martyr to my duty, or an apostate, and infamous renegade.  The triumph or the shame!”

And, as he just uttered these words with bitterness, a soft voice answered like an echo: 

—­The shame?

The Cure started and raised his head.  His lamp was out, and the dying embers on the hearth cast only a feeble light into the room.

He distinguished, however, a few steps from him the outline of a woman’s form.

—­Who is there? he cried with a sort of terror.

The shadowy outline stood forth more clearly.

He recognized his servant.

—­Why the shame? she said.

XXII.

THE SERVANT.

“I have already said that dame Jacinthe although little superannuated, had still kept her bloom.  It is true that she spared nothing to preserve it:  besides taking a clyster every day, she swallowed some excellent jelly during the day and on going to bed.”

  LE SAGE (Gil-Blas).

She looked at him fixedly with burning, feverish eyes.

She was a lusty lass, already arrived at the age of discretion, as Le Sage says, that is to say, she had passed her fortieth year, the canonical period for the servants of Cures, but was fair and fresh still, in spite of some wrinkles and her hair growing gray.  She possessed that modest and appetizing plumpness, somewhat rare among mature virgins, the sign of a quiet conscience, a good digestion and feelings satisfied.

What pious souls call holiness exuded from every pore:  cast-down eyes, chaste deportment, gentle movements.  She did not walk, she glided over the ground as if she already felt the wings of seraphim hanging on her shoulders; she did not speak, she murmured unctuous words with a soft, low, mysterious voice like a prayer.  When she said:  “Would Monsieur le Cure he pleased to come to breakfast?  Perhaps Monsieur le Cure could eat a boiled egg?” or “Ah! the sermon which Monsieur le Cure has been pleased to give has gone to my heart!” it was in the same tone as she would say:  “Lamb of God which takest away the sins of the world....” and one was tempted to answer:  Kyrie eleison.