He stopped for propriety’s sake because the servant came in.  She put back into the basket the apricots scattered on the sideboard.  Charles, without noticing his wife’s colour, had them brought to him, took one, and bit into it.

“Ah! perfect!” said he; “just taste!”

And he handed her the basket, which she put away from her gently.

“Do just smell!  What an odour!” he remarked, passing it under her nose several times.

“I am choking,” she cried, leaping up.  But by an effort of will the spasm passed; then—­

“It is nothing,” she said, “it is nothing!  It is nervousness.  Sit down and go on eating.”  For she dreaded lest he should begin questioning her, attending to her, that she should not be left alone.

Charles, to obey her, sat down again, and he spat the stones of the apricots into his hands, afterwards putting them on his plate.

Suddenly a blue tilbury passed across the square at a rapid trot.  Emma uttered a cry and fell back rigid to the ground.

In fact, Rodolphe, after many reflections, had decided to set out for Rouen.  Now, as from La Huchette to Buchy there is no other way than by Yonville, he had to go through the village, and Emma had recognised him by the rays of the lanterns, which like lightning flashed through the twilight.

The chemist, at the tumult which broke out in the house ran thither.  The table with all the plates was upset; sauce, meat, knives, the salt, and cruet-stand were strewn over the room; Charles was calling for help; Berthe, scared, was crying; and Felicite, whose hands trembled, was unlacing her mistress, whose whole body shivered convulsively.

“I’ll run to my laboratory for some aromatic vinegar,” said the druggist.

Then as she opened her eyes on smelling the bottle—­

“I was sure of it,” he remarked; “that would wake any dead person for you!”

“Speak to us,” said Charles; “collect yourself; it is your Charles, who loves you.  Do you know me?  See! here is your little girl!  Oh, kiss her!”

The child stretched out her arms to her mother to cling to her neck.  But turning away her head, Emma said in a broken voice “No, no! no one!”

She fainted again.  They carried her to her bed.  She lay there stretched at full length, her lips apart, her eyelids closed, her hands open, motionless, and white as a waxen image.  Two streams of tears flowed from her eyes and fell slowly upon the pillow.

Charles, standing up, was at the back of the alcove, and the chemist, near him, maintained that meditative silence that is becoming on the serious occasions of life.

“Do not be uneasy,” he said, touching his elbow; “I think the paroxysm is past.”

“Yes, she is resting a little now,” answered Charles, watching her sleep.  “Poor girl! poor girl!  She had gone off now!”

Then Homais asked how the accident had come about.  Charles answered that she had been taken ill suddenly while she was eating some apricots.