He assured himself that, in default of a really conventual life, he might perhaps achieve an illusory imitation of it by avoiding the turmoil of Paris and burying himself in a hole.  And he now saw that he had completely cheated himself when, on discussing the question as to whether he should leave Paris and go to settle at Chartres, he had believed that he was yielding to the Abbe Gevresin’s arguments and Madame Bavoil’s urgency.

Certainly, without admitting it, without accounting for it, he had really acted on the prompting of this cherished dream.  Would not Chartres be a sort of monastic haven, of open cloister, where he could enjoy his liberty and not have to give up his comforts?  Would it not, at any rate, for lack of an unattainable hermitage, be a sop thrown to his desires; and supposing he could succeed in reducing his too exorbitant demands, give him the final repose and peace for which he had yearned ever since his return from La Trappe?

And nothing of all this had been realized.  The unsettled feeling he had experienced in Paris had pursued him to Chartres.  He was, as it were, on the march, or perched on a bough; he could not feel at home, but as a man lingering on in furnished rooms, whence he must presently depart.

In short, he had deluded himself when he had fancied that a man might make a cell of a solitary room in silent surroundings; the religious jog-trot in a provincial atmosphere had no resemblance to the life of a monastery.  There was no illusion or suggestion of the convent.

This check, when he recognized it, added to the ardour or his regrets; and the distress which in Paris had lurked latent and ill-defined, developed at Chartres clear and unmistakable.

Then began an unremitting struggle with himself.

The Abbe Gevresin, whom he consulted, would only smile and treat him as in a novices’ school or a seminary a youthful postulant is treated who confesses to deep melancholy and persistent weariness.  His malady is not taken seriously; he is told that all his companions suffer the same temptations, the same qualms; he is sent away comforted, while his superiors seem to be laughing at him.

But at the end of a little time this method no longer succeeded.  Then the Abbe was firm with Durtal, and one day, when his penitent was bemoaning himself, he replied,—­

“It is an attack you must get over,” and then he added lightly after a silence, “And it will not be the last or the worst.”

At this Durtal turned restive; the Abbe, however, drove him to bay, wanting to make him confess how senseless his struggles were.

“The idea of the cloister haunts you,” said he.  “Well, then, what is there to hinder you?  Why do you not retire to a Trappist convent?”

“You know very well that I am not strong enough to endure the rule.”

“Then become an oblate; go to join Monsieur Bruno at Notre Dame de l’Atre.”