“It would have happened just the same, some day or another,” he replied with conviction.

They still gazed at each other, seeking to read each other’s inmost thoughts.

“I do not believe that I shall recover,” he said at last.  “I suffer too much.”

“Do you suffer very much?” she murmured.

“Oh, yes!”

Bending a little lower, she brushed his forehead, then his eyes, then his cheeks with slow kisses, light, delicate as her care for him.  She barely touched him with her lips, with that soft little breath that children give when they kiss.  This lasted a long time, a very long time.  He let that sweet rain of caresses fall on him, and they seemed to soothe and refresh him, for his drawn face twitched less than before.

“Any!” he said finally.

She ceased her kissing to listen to him.

“What, my friend?”

“You must make me a promise.”

“I will promise anything you wish.”

“If I am not dead before morning, swear to me that you will bring Annette to me, just once, only once!  I cannot bear to die without seeing her again. . . .  Think that . . . to-morrow . . . at this time perhaps I shall have . . . shall surely have closed my eyes forever and that I never shall see you again.  I . . . nor you . . . nor her!”

She stopped him; her heart was breaking.

“Oh, hush . . . hush!  Yes, I promise you to bring her!”

“You swear it?”

“I swear it, my friend.  But hush, do not talk any more.  You hurt me frightfully—­hush!”

A quick convulsion passed over his face; when it had passed he said: 

“Since we have only a few minutes more to remain together, do not let us lose them; let us seize them to bid each other good-by.  I have loved you so much——­”

“And I,” she sighed, “how I still love you!”

He spoke again: 

“I never have had real happiness except through you.  Only these last days have been hard. . . .  It was not your fault. . . .  Ah, my poor Any, how sad life is! . . . and how hard it is to die!”

“Hush, Olivier, I implore you!”

He continued, without listening to her:  “I should have been a happy man if you had not had your daughter. . . .”

“Hush!  My God!  Hush! . . .”

He seemed to dream rather than speak.

“Ah, he that invented this existence and made men was either blind or very wicked. . . .”

“Olivier, I entreat you . . . if you ever have loved me, be quiet, do not talk like that any more!”

He looked at her, leaning over him, she herself so pale that she looked as if she were dying, too; and he was silent.

Then she seated herself in the armchair, close to the bed, and again took the hand on the coverlet.

“Now I forbid you to speak,” said she.  “Do not stir, and think of me as I think of you.”