Hortense, it appeared, had taken two such journeys before, and had, on both occasions, started apparently at a moment’s notice, and with every indication of anxiety and haste.  From the first she returned after an interval of more than three weeks; from the second after about four or five days.  Each absence had been followed by a long season of despondency and lassitude, during which, said the concierge, Mademoiselle scarcely spoke, or ate, or slept, but, silent and pale as a ghost, sat up later than ever with her books and papers.  As for this last journey, all she knew about it was that Mam’selle had had her passport regulated for foreign parts the afternoon of the day before she started.

“But can you not remember in what direction the diligence was going?” I asked, again and again.

“No, M’sieur—­not in the least,”

“Nor the name of the town to which her place was taken?”

“I don’t know that I ever heard it, M’sieur.”

“But at least you must have seen the address on the portmanteau?”

“Not I, M’sieur—­I never thought of looking at it.”

“Did she say nothing to account for the suddenness of her departure?”

“Nothing at all.”

“Nor about her return either.  Madame Bouisse?  Just think a moment—­surely she said something about when you might expect her back again?”

“Nothing, M’sieur, except, by the way—­”

“Except what?”

“Dame! only this—­as she was just going to step into the diligence, she turned back and shook hands with me—­Mam’selle Hortense, proud as she is, is never above shaking hands with me, I can tell you, M’sieur.”

“No, no—­I can well believe it.  Pray, go on!”

“Well, M’sieur,” she shakes hands with me, and she says, “Thank you, good Madame Bouisse, for all your kindness to me....  Hear that, M’sieur, ’good Madame Bouisse,’—­the dear child!”

“And then—?”

“Bah! how impatient you are!  Well, then, she says (after thanking me, you observe)—­’I have paid you my rent, Madame Bouisse, up to the end of the present month, and if, when the time has expired, I have neither written nor returned, consider me still as your tenant.  If, however, I do not come back at all, I will let you know further respecting the care of my books and other property.”

If she did not come back at all!  Oh, Heaven!  I had never contemplated such a possibility.  I left Madame Bouisse without another word, and going up to my own rooms, flung myself upon my bed, as if I were stupefied.

All that night, all the next day, those words haunted me.  They seemed to have burned themselves into my brain in letters of fire.  Dreaming, I woke up with them upon my lips; reading, they started out upon me from the page.  “If I never come back at all!”

At last, when the fifth day came round—­the fifth day of the third week of her absence—­I became so languid and desponding that I lost all power of application.