Oh, if he had been able, if he had dared, he would have cast himself at this maiden’s feet, he would have kissed her knees, he would have grovelled on the ground and cried with tears:  “Pardon! pardon!  Fate has caused it all.  Almighty God will never pardon me, but it is thou whom I implore, and what matters it, if thou, thou dost pardon me.”

The feeling of the reality recalled him to himself.  Who was aware of his fault, and what was there, besides, in common between this young girl and himself?  One evening when alone with her, he had acted imprudently, that was all, and it was now long ago.  Then, through desperation and also to show that he attached no importance to that act of imprudence which he had almost forgotten, he assumed an icy demeanour.

She advanced with a smile, but she felt it congeal on her lips before this insolent coldness, while he, gravely bowing to her as before, a stranger, passed on.

LVI.

DOUBLE REMORSE.

  “Ah, how much better are the love-tales
  which we spelt in our eyes with
  our hearts.”

  CAMILLE LEMONNIER (Croquis d’automne).

His Mass said, Marcel did not want to return to the parsonage.  He made his way slowly to the wood, absorbed by a world of thoughts.  All was quite changed since the day before, and what a revolution had been wrought in his soul in one day.

The day before there was still time to stop, there was time to cast far away temptations and impure desires, to avoid the infernal snares and ambushes, to take refuge, according to the Apostle’s advice, in the bosom of God; now it was too late, it was no longer in his power; he found himself hemmed in within the circle of abominations, and he did not see how he could get forth.

A double remorse tormented him, and wrung his conscience with fierce fingers.

On the one hand, there was his servant, become his accomplice and his mistress, an odious thing; his servant defiling his couch, hitherto immaculate; his couch of a virtuous priest.

Then, on the other, there was the fair pale face of Suzanne, full of reproaches, surprised and sad.  Why had he not stopped?  What fury had urged him forward, cold and scornful, when he burned to hear once again the sound of that voice which stirred his heart!

And the memory of that meeting, at the very moment of the consummation of his infamy, was the blow of the lash which laid bare the open wound of his remorse.  He did not curse his crime more than the inopportuneness and the awkwardness of that crime.

What! be had given himself up to a despicable old woman, he had slaked the thirst of that ghoul with his generous blood, he had abandoned to that hell-hag the promises of his young body and his virgin soul, while a young girl whose like he had never seen but in fairy tales and dreams, came to him and seemed to say to him:  “You may love me.”