What was the use of remaining at Sainte-Adresse, when the memories he sought to flee came to find him there, and since Marsa’s presence haunted it as if she had lived there by his side?

He quitted Havre, and returned to Paris; but the very evening of his return, in the bustle and movement of the Champs-Elysees, the long avenue dotted with lights, the flaming gas-jets of the cafe concerts, the bursts of music, he found again, as if the Tzigana were continually pursuing him, the same phantom; despite the noise of people and carriages upon the asphalt, the echoes of the “Song of Plevna,” played quite near him by some Hungarian orchestra, reached him as upon the seashore at Havre; and he hastened back to his hotel, to shut himself up, to hear nothing, see nothing, and escape from the fantastic, haunting pursuit of this inevitable vision.

He could not sleep; fever burned in his blood.  He rose, and tried to read; but before the printed page he saw continually Marsa Laszlo, like the spectre of his happiness.

“How cowardly human nature is!” he exclaimed, hurling away the book.  “Is it possible that I love her still?  Shall I love her forever?”

And he felt intense self-contempt at the temptation which took possession of him to see once more Maisons-Lafitte, where he had experienced the most terrible grief of his life.  What was the use of struggling?  He had not forgotten, and he never could forget.

If he had been sincere with himself, he would have confessed that he was impelled by his ever-living, ever-present love toward everything which would recall Marsa to him, and that a violent, almost superhuman effort was necessary not to yield to the temptation.

About a week after the Prince’s return to Paris, his valet appeared one day with the card of General Vogotzine.  It was on Andras’s lips to refuse to see him; but, in reality, the General’s visit caused him a delight which he would not acknowledge to himself.  He was about to hear of hey.  He told the valet to admit Vogotzine, hypocritically saying to himself that it was impossible, discourteous, not to receive him.

The old Russian entered, timid and embarrassed, and was not much reassured by Zilah’s polite but cold greeting.

The General, who for some extraordinary reason had not had recourse to alcohol to give him courage, took the chair offered him by the Prince.  He was a little flushed, not knowing exactly how to begin what he had to say; and, being sober, he was terribly afraid of appearing, like an idiot.

“This is what is the matter,” he said, plunging at once in medias res.  “Doctor Fargeas, who sent me, might have come himself; but he thought that I, being her uncle, should—­”

“You have come to consult me about Marsa,” said Andras, unconsciously glad to pronounce her name.

“Yes,” began the General, becoming suddenly intimidated, “of—­of Marsa.  She is very ill-Marsa is.  Very ill.  Stupor, Fargeas says.  She does not say a word-nothing.  A regular automaton!  It is terrible to see her—­terrible—­terrible.”