soul can bend no longer; you answer without thinking; and you see what happens....  They look like motionless dolls, and, oh, the events that take place in their souls!...  They do not know themselves what they are....  She would have lived as the rest live....  She would have said up to her death:  “Monsieur, Madame, we shall have rain this morning,” or else, “We are going to breakfast; we shall be thirteen at table,” or else:  “The fruits are not yet ripe.”  They speak with a smile of the flowers that have fallen, and weep in the dark....  An angel even would not see what should be seen; and man only understands when it is too late....  Yesterday evening she was there, under the lamp like her sisters, and you would not see them as they should be seen, if this had not occurred....  I seem to see her now for the first time....  Something must be added to common life before we can understand it....  They are beside you day and night, and you perceive them only at the moment when they depart forever....  And yet the strange little soul she must have had; the poor, naive, exhaustless little soul she had, my son, if she said what she must have said, if she did what she mast have done!...

THE STRANGER.

Just now they are smiling in silence in the room....

THE OLD MAN.

They are at peace....  They did not expect her to-night....

THE STRANGER.

They smile without stirring;... and see, the father is putting his finger on his lips....

THE OLD MAN.

He is calling attention to the child asleep on its mother’s heart....

THE STRANGER.

She dares not raise her eyes lest she disturb its sleep....

THE OLD MAN.

They are no longer working....  A great silence reigns....

THE STRANGER.

They have let fell the skein of white silk....

THE OLD MAN.

They are watching the child....

THE STRANGER.

They do not know that others are watching them....

THE OLD MAN.

We are watched too....

THE STRANGER.

They have lifted their eyes....

THE OLD MAN.

And yet they can see nothing....

THE STRANGER.

They seem happy; and yet nobody knows what may be—....

THE OLD MAN.

They think themselves in safety....  They have shut the doors; and the windows have iron bars....  They have mended the walls of the old house; they have put bolts upon the oaken doors....  They have foreseen all that could be foreseen....

THE STRANGER.

We must end by telling them....  Some one might come and let them know abruptly....  There was a crowd of peasants in the meadow where the dead girl was found....  If one of them knocked at the door...

THE OLD MAN.

Martha and Mary are beside the poor dead child.  The peasants were to make a litter of leaves; and I told the elder to come warn us in all haste, the moment they began their march.  Let us wait till she comes; she will go in with me....  We should not have looked on them so....  I thought it would be only to knock upon the door; to go in simply, find a phrase or two, and tell....  But I have seen them live too long under their lamp....