Chilled, she returned to her bed.  She thought, “He is jealous, he is madly jealous.  It is a question of nerves and of blood.  But his love, too, is an affair of blood and of nerves.  His love and his jealousy are one and the same thing.  Another would understand.  It would be sufficient to please his self-love.”  But he was jealous from the depth of his soul.  She knew this; she knew that in him jealousy was a physical torture, a wound enlarged by imagination.  She knew how profound the evil was.  She had seen him grow pale before the bronze St. Mark when she had thrown the letter in the box on the wall of the old Florentine house at a time when she was his only in dreams.

She recalled his smothered complaints, his sudden fits of sadness, and the painful mystery of the words which he repeated frequently:  “I can forget you only when I am with you.”  She saw again the Dinard letter and his furious despair at a word overheard at a wine-shop table.  She felt that the blow had been struck accidentally at the most sensitive point, at the bleeding wound.  But she did not lose courage.  She would tell everything, she would confess everything, and all her avowals would say to him:  “I love you.  I have never loved any one except you!” She had not betrayed him.  She would tell him nothing that he had not guessed.  She had lied so little, as little as possible, and then only not to give him pain.  How could he not understand?  It was better he should know everything, since everything meant nothing.  She represented to herself incessantly the same ideas, repeated to herself the same words.

Her lamp gave only a smoky light.  She lighted candles.  It was six o’clock.  She realized that she had slept.  She ran to the window.  The sky was black, and mingled with the earth in a chaos of thick darkness.  Then she was curious to know exactly at what hour the sun would rise.  She had had no idea of this.  She thought only that nights were long in December.  She did not think of looking at the calendar.  The heavy step of workmen walking in squads, the noise of wagons of milkmen and marketmen, came to her ear like sounds of good augury.  She shuddered at this first awakening of the city.

CHAPTER XXXIV

“I see the other with you always!”

At nine o’clock, in the yard of the little house, she observed M. Fusellier sweeping, in the rain, while smoking his pipe.  Madame Fusellier came out of her box.  Both looked embarrassed.  Madame Fusellier was the first to speak: 

“Monsieur Jacques is not at home.”  And, as Therese remained silent, immovable, Fusellier came near her with his broom, hiding with his left hand his pipe behind his back—­

“Monsieur Jacques has not yet come home.”

“I will wait for him,” said Therese.

Madame Fusellier led her to the parlor, where she lighted the fire.  As the wood smoked and would not flame, she remained bent, with her hands on her knees.