Where was she?  He had no other thought.  Her father had prevented her from coming to church, without any doubt; but why had he not seen her as before upon the roads, which they both liked?  He made a thousand conjectures, and with his thoughts completely absorbed in Suzanne, he forgot aught else.  He saw no longer those attractive members of his congregation, who admired him in secret as they accompanied him with their fresh voices, and were astonished at the mysterious trouble which agitated their sweet pastor; he forgot even the odious spy who watched him in some corner of the church, and whom he would meet again at his house.

Ashamed of himself, he recalled with a blush the hand he had kissed in a moment of frenzy, which must have let Suzanne suspect what was the plague which consumed his heart, and he would have sacrificed ten years of his life to become again what he was in the eyes of this young girl, hardly a month ago; only a stranger.

Unaccustomed to the world, he did not yet know women well enough to be aware that they are full of indulgence for follies committed for their sake, and more ready to excuse an insult than to pardon indifference.  Under these circumstances vanity takes the place of courage, and gives to the commonest girl the instincts of a patrician.  There is no ill-made woman but wishes to see the world at her feet.

And the espionage which laid so heavy on him, became every day more irritating and more insupportable.

In vain he fled from the house, and walked on straight before him; far, very far, as far as possible, he felt his servant’s gaze following him, and weighing upon him with all the burden of her furious and clear-sighted jealousy.

He felt that lynx eye pierce the walls and watch him everywhere, even when he had put between himself and the parsonage, the streets, the gardens, the width of the village and the depth of the woods.

She received him on his return with a smile on her lips, but her eager eye searched him from head to foot, studied his looks, his gestures, the folds of his cassock and even the dust on his shoes; as though she wished to strip him and bare his heart in order to feast upon his secret conflicts.

XLIV.

THE GARRET WINDOW.

  “Do I direct my love?  It directs me. 
  And I could abide it if I would!... 
  And I would, after all, that I could not.”

  V. SARDOU (Nos Intimes).

Other days passed, and then others.

From a garret-window in the loft of the parsonage, the eye commanded a view of the whole village.  Over the roofs could be seen the house of Captain Durand, quite at the bottom of the hill.  Marcel went up there several times, and with his gaze fixed on that white wall which concealed the sweet object which had torn from him his tranquillity and his peaceful toil, he forgot himself and was lost in his thoughts.