But it was not without a struggle that she permitted herself to judge him in this way.  One does not judge those whom one loves, and she loved him.  Was it not failing in respect to her love that she did not admire him in every way?  When these ideas oppressed her she left her easel and went to him.  Close to him they disappeared.  At first, in order not to disturb him, she entered on tiptoe, walking softly and leaning over his shoulder, embraced him before he saw or heard her; but he betrayed such horror, such fear, that she gave up this way of greeting him.

She continued to go to his room, but in a different way.  Instead of surprising him she announced her presence by rattling the handle of the door, and walking noisily, and instead of receiving her with uneasy manner he welcomed her joyfully.

“You have finished painting?”

“I have come to see you for a little while.”

“Very well, stay with me, do not go away immediately; I am never so happy, I never work so well, as when I have you near me.”

She felt that this was true.  When she was with him, whether she spoke or not, her presence made him happy.

And still she must appear not to look at him too attentively, as if with the manifest intention of studying him; for she did this during the first days of their marriage, and angered him so much that he exclaimed: 

“Why do you examine me thus?  What do you look for in me?”

She learned to watch herself carefully, and when with him to preserve a discreet attitude that should not offend him.  No curious looks, and no questions.  But this was not always easy, so she asked leave to assist him in his work, and sometimes drew in larger size the designs that he made for his microscopical studies.  In this way the time passed rapidly.  If he were but willing to pass the evening hours in this sweet intimacy, without a word about going out, how happy she would be!  But he never forgot the hour.

“Allons,” he said, interrupting himself, “we must go.”

She had never dared to ask the true reason for this “must.”

CHAPTER XLI

A TROUBLED SOUL

If she dared not frankly ask him this question:  Why must we go out? any more than the others:  Why is it proper that I should go to mass to be seen?  Why should I wear gowns that ruin us?  Why do you accept decorations that are valueless in your eyes?  Why do you seek the society of men who have no merit but what they derive from their official position or from their fortune?  Why do we take upon ourselves social duties that weary both of us, instead of remaining together in a tender and intelligent intimacy that is sweet to us both? she could not ask herself.

They all appertained to this order of ideas, that she, without doubt, found explained them:  disposition of character; the exactions of an ambition in haste to realize its desires; susceptibility or overshadowing pride; but there were others founded on observation or memory, having no connection with those, or so it seemed to her.