He said this quite simply, like a man who knows he is not long for this world.  He has smiles on his face to meet Louise’s, and it is only I whom he does not deceive.  He is a mate for her in courage.

Louise has expressed a wish to see her godson, but I am not sorry he should be in Provence; she might want to remember him generously, and I should be in a great difficulty.

Good-bye, my love.

August 25th (her birthday).

Yesterday evening Louise was delirious for a short time; but her delirium was the prettiest babbling, which shows that even the madness of gifted people is not that of fools or nobodies.  In a mere thread of a voice she sang some Italian airs from I Puritani, La Sonnambula, Moise, while we stood round the bed in silence.  Not one of us, not even the Duc de Rhetore, had dry eyes, so clear was it to us all that her soul was in this fashion passing from us.  She could no longer see us!  Yet she was there still in the charm of the faint melody, with its sweetness not of this earth.

During the night the death agony began.  It is now seven in the morning, and I have just myself raised her from bed.  Some flicker of strength revived; she wished to sit by her window, and asked for Gaston’s hand.  And then, my love, the sweetest spirit whom we shall ever see on this earth departed, leaving us the empty shell.

The last sacrament had been administered the evening before, unknown to Gaston, who was taking a snatch of sleep during this agonizing ceremony; and after she was moved to the window, she asked me to read her the De Profundis in French, while she was thus face to face with the lovely scene, which was her handiwork.  She repeated the words after me to herself, and pressed the hands of her husband, who knelt on the other side of the chair.

August 26th.

My heart is broken.  I have just seen her in her winding-sheet; her face is quite pale now with purple shadows.  Oh!  I want my children! my children!  Bring me my children!

THE END

ADDENDUM

The following personages appear in other stories of the Human Comedy.

Arthez, Daniel d’
  A Distinguished Provincial at Paris
  The Member for Arcis
  The Secrets of a Princess

Beauseant, Marquise de
  The Deserted Woman

Bianchon, Horace
  Father Goriot
  The Atheist’s Mass
  Cesar Birotteau
  The Commission in Lunacy
  Lost Illusions
  A Distinguished Provincial at Paris
  A Bachelor’s Establishment
  The Secrets of a Princess
  The Government Clerks
  Pierrette
  A Study of Woman
  Scenes from a Courtesan’s Life
  Honorine
  The Seamy Side of History
  The Magic Skin
  A Second Home
  A Prince of Bohemia
  The Muse of the Department
  The Imaginary Mistress
  The Middle Classes
  Cousin Betty
  The Country Parson
In addition, M. Bianchon narrated the following: 
  Another Study of Woman
  La Grande Breteche