to leave this fatal spot without further delay.  Nothing could have induced me to remain a moment longer.  Your letter, which had been handed to me on our return, served me as a likely pretext for my sudden departure.  The friendship that binds us is well-known here.  I said you needed me within twenty-four hours.  I had taken care, at all hazards, to send three days before to the nearest town for a carriage and horses.  In a few minutes my preparations were made; I gave orders to the driver to start ahead and wait for me at the extremity of the avenue while I was taking my leave.  Monsieur de Malouet seemed to have no suspicion of the truth; the worthy old gentleman appeared quite moved as he received my thanks, and really manifested for me a singular affection out of all proportion to the brief duration of our acquaintance.  I had to be scarcely less thankful to M. de Breuilly.  I regret now the caricature I once gave you as the portrait of that noble heart.

Madame de Malouet insisted upon accompanying me down the avenue a few steps farther than her husband.  I felt her arm trembling under mine while she was intrusting me with a few trifling errands for Paris.  At the moment of parting, and as I was pressing her hand with effusion, she detained me gently: 

“Well! sir,” she said in a feeble voice, “God did not bless our wisdom.”

“Our hearts are open to Him, madam; He must have read our sincerity; He sees how much I am suffering, and I humbly hope He may forgive me!”

“Do not doubt it—­do not doubt it,” she replied in a broken voice; “but she? she!—­ah! poor child!”

“Have pity on her, madam.  Do not forsake her.  Farewell!”

I left her hastily, and I started, but instead of going direct to the town, I had myself driven along the abbey road as far as the top of the hills; I requested the coachman to go alone to the town, and to return for me to-morrow morning early at the same place.  I cannot explain to you, my dear friend, the singular and irresistible fancy that I took to spend one last night in that solitude where I spent such quick and happy days, and so recently, mon Dieu!

Here I am, then, back in my cell.  How cold, dark, and gloomy it seems!  The sky also has gone into mourning.  Since my arrival in this neighborhood, and in spite of the season, I had seen none but summer days and nights.  To-night a cold autumnal storm has burst over the valley; the wind howls among the ruins, blowing off fragments that fall heavily upon the ground.  A driving rain is pattering against my window-panes.  It seems to me as if it were raining tears!

Tears! my heart is overflowing with them—­and not a single one will rise to my eyes.  And yet, I have prayed, I have long prayed to God—­not, my friend to that untangible God whom we pursue in vain beyond the stars and the worlds, but the only true God, truly kind and helpful to suffering humanity, the God of my childhood, the God of that poor woman!