I cannot tell how long it was till I perceived a change in the air, in the darkness round me.  It was like the movement of some one unseen.  I have felt such a sensation in the night, when all was still, before now.  I saw nothing.  I heard nothing.  Yet I was aware, I cannot tell how, that there was a great coming and going, and the sensation as of a multitude in the air.  I then rose and went into my house, where Leocadie, my old housekeeper, had shut all the doors so carefully when she went to bed.  They were now all open, even the door of my wife’s room of which I kept always the key, and where no one entered but myself; the windows also were open.  I looked out upon the Grande Rue, and all the other houses were like mine.  Everything was open, doors and windows, and the streets were full.  There was in them a flow and movement of the unseen, without a sound, sensible only to the soul.  I cannot describe it, for I neither heard nor saw, but felt.  I have often been in crowds; I have lived in Paris, and once passed into England, and walked about the London streets.  But never, it seemed to me, never was I aware of so many, of so great a multitude.  I stood at my open window, and watched as in a dream.  M. le Maire is aware that his house is visible from mine.  Towards that a stream seemed to be always going, and at the windows and in the doorways was a sensation of multitudes like that which I have already described.  Gazing out thus upon the revolution which was happening before my eyes, I did not think of my own house or what was passing there, till suddenly, in a moment, I was aware that some one had come in to me.  Not a crowd as elsewhere; one.  My heart leaped up like a bird let loose; it grew faint within me with joy and fear.  I was giddy so that I could not stand.  I called out her name, but low, for I was too happy, I had no voice.  Besides was it needed, when heart already spoke to heart?

I had no answer, but I needed none.  I laid myself down on the floor where her feet would be.  Her presence wrapped me round and round.  It was beyond speech.  Neither did I need to see her face, nor to touch her hand.  She was more near to me, more near, than when I held her in my arms.  How long it was so, I cannot tell; it was long as love, yet short as the drawing of a breath.  I knew nothing, felt nothing but Her, alone; all my wonder and desire to know departed from me.  We said to each other everything without words—­heart overflowing into heart.  It was beyond knowledge or speech.

But this is not of public signification that I should occupy with it the time of M. le Maire.

After a while my happiness came to an end.  I can no more tell how, than I can tell how it came.  One moment, I was warm in her presence; the next, I was alone.  I rose up staggering with blindness and woe—­could it be that already, already it was over?  I went out blindly following after her.  My God, I shall follow, I shall follow, till life is over.  She loved me; but she was gone.