fair-haired young girl with the innocent look. And he suspected strongly some maneuver of the father: a cunning plan to obtain possession of the inheritance of the sick man, whose vices, so precocious formerly, gained new force as his last hour approached. But in spite of his uneasiness he gave Clotilde very good advice, telling her that she must make allowance for Maxime's sufferings, that he had undoubtedly a great deal of affection and gratitude for her, in short that it was her duty to devote herself to him to the end. When he signed the letter tears dimmed his sight. It was his death warrant-a death like that of an old and solitary brute, a death without a kiss, without the touch of a friendly hand-that he was signing. Never again would he embrace her. Then doubts assailed him; was he doing right in leaving her amid such evil surroundings, where he felt that she was in continual contact with every species of wickedness?
The postman brought the letters and newspapers to La Souleiade every morning at about nine o'clock; and Pascal, when he wrote to Clotilde, was accustomed to watch for him, to give him his letter, so as to be certain that his correspondence was not intercepted. But on this morning, when he went downstairs to give him the letter he had just written, he was surprised to receive one from him from Clotilde, although it was not the usual day for her letters. He allowed his own to go, however. Then he went upstairs, resumed his seat at his table, and tore open the envelope.
The letter was short, but its contents filled Pascal with a great joy.
* * * * *
But the sound of footsteps made him control himself. He turned round and saw Martine, who was saying:
'Dr. Ramond is downstairs.'
'Ah! let him come up, let him come up,' he said.
It was another piece of good fortune that had come to him. Ramond cried gaily from the door:
'Victory, master! I have brought you your money-not all, but a good sum.'
And he told the story-an unexpected piece of good luck which his father-in-law, M. Leveque, had brought to light. The receipts for the hundred and twenty thousand francs, which constituted Pascal the personal creditor of Grandguillot, were valueless, since the latter was insolvent. Salvation was to come from the power of attorney which the doctor had sent him years before, at his request, that he might invest all or part of his money in mortgages. As the name of the proxy was in blank in the document, the notary, as is sometimes done, had made use of the name of one of his clerks, and eighty thousand francs, which had been invested in good mortgages, had thus been recovered through the agency of a worthy man who was not in the secrets of his employer. If Pascal had taken action in the matter, if he had gone to the public prosecutor's office and the chamber of notaries, he would have disentangled the matter long before. However, he had recovered a sure income of four thousand francs.
He seized the young man's hands and pressed them, smiling, his eyes still moist with tears.
'Ah! my friend, if you knew how happy I am! This letter of Clotilde's has brought me a great happiness. Yes, I was going to send for her; but the thought of my poverty, of the privations she would have to endure here, spoiled for me the joy of her return. And now fortune has come back, at least enough to set up my little establishment again!'
In the expansion of his feelings he held out the letter to Ramond, and forced him to read it. Then when the young man gave it back to him, smiling, comprehending the doctor's emotion, and profoundly touched by it, yielding to an overpowering need of affection, he caught him in his arms, like a comrade, a brother. The two men kissed each other vigorously on either cheek.
'Come, since good fortune has sent you, I am going to ask another service from you. You know I distrust every one around me, even my old housekeeper. Will you take my despatch to the telegraph office!'
He sat down again at the table, and wrote simply, 'I await you; start to-night.'
'Let me see,' he said, 'to-day is the 6th of November, is it not? It is now near ten o'clock; she will have my despatch at noon. That will give her time enough to pack her trunks and to take the eight o'clock express this evening, which will bring her to Marseilles in time for breakfast. But as there is no train which connects with it, she cannot be here until to-morrow, the 7th, at five o'clock.'
After folding the despatch he rose:
'My God, at five o'clock to-morrow! How long to wait still! What shall I do with myself until then?'
Then a sudden recollection filled him with anxiety, and he became grave.
'Ramond, my comrade, will you give me a great proof of your friendship by being perfectly frank with me?'
'How so, master?'
'Ah, you understand me very well. The other day you examined me. Do you think I can live another year?'
He fixed his eyes on the young man as he spoke, compelling him to look at him. Ramond evaded a direct answer, however, with a jest-was it really a physician who put such a question?
'Let us be serious, Ramond, I beg of you.'
Then Ramond answered in all sincerity that, in his opinion, the doctor might very justly entertain the hope of living another year. He gave his reasons-the comparatively slight progress which the sclerosis had made, and the absolute soundness of the other organs. Of course they must make allowance for what they did not and could not know, for a sudden accident was always possible. And the two men discussed the case as if they been in consultation at the bedside of a patient, weighing the pros and cons, each stating his views and prognosticating a fatal termination, in accordance with the symptoms as defined by the best authorities.
Pascal, as if it were some one else who was in question, had recovered all his composure and his heroic self- forgetfulness.
'Yes,' he murmured at last, 'you are right; a year of life is still possible. Ah, my friend, how I wish I might live two years; a mad wish, no doubt, an eternity of joy. And yet, two years, that would not be impossible. I had a very curious case once, a wheelwright of the faubourg, who lived for four years, giving the lie to all my prognostications. Two years, two years, I will live two years! I must live two years!'
Ramond sat with bent head, without answering. He was beginning to be uneasy, fearing that he had shown himself too optimistic; and the doctor's joy disquieted and grieved him, as if this very exaltation, this disturbance of a once strong brain, warned him of a secret and imminent danger.
'Did you not wish to send that despatch at once?' he said.
'Yes, yes, go quickly, my good Ramond, and come back again to see us the day after to-morrow. She will be here then, and I want you to come and embrace us.'
The day was long, and the following morning, at about four o'clock, shortly after Pascal had fallen asleep, after a happy vigil filled with hopes and dreams, he was wakened by a dreadful attack. He felt as if an enormous weight, as if the whole house, had fallen down upon his chest, so that the thorax, flattened down, touched the back. He could not breathe; the pain reached the shoulders, then the neck, and paralyzed the left arm. But he was perfectly conscious; he had the feeling that his heart was about to stop, that life was about to leave him, in the dreadful oppression, like that of a vise, which was suffocating him. Before the attack reached its height he had the strength to rise and to knock on the floor with a stick for Martine. Then he fell back on his bed, unable to speak or to move, and covered with a cold sweat.
Martine, fortunately, in the profound silence of the empty house, heard the knock. She dressed herself, wrapped a shawl about her, and went upstairs, carrying her candle. The darkness was still profound; dawn was about to break. And when she perceived her master, whose eyes alone seemed living, looking at her with locked jaws, speechless, his face distorted by pain, she was awed and terrified, and she could only rush toward the bed crying:
'My God! My God! what is the matter, monsieur? Answer me, monsieur, you frighten me!'
For a full minute Pascal struggled in vain to recover his breath. Then, the viselike pressure on his chest relaxing slowly, he murmured in a faint voice:
'The five thousand francs in the desk are Clotilde's. Tell her that the affair of the notary is settled, that she will recover from it enough to live upon.'
Then Martine, who had listened to him in open-mouthed wonder, confessed the falsehood she had told him, ignorant of the good news that had been brought by Ramond.
'Monsieur, you must forgive me; I told you an untruth. But it would be wrong to deceive you longer. When I saw you alone and so unhappy, I took some of my own money.'
'My poor girl, you did that!'
'Oh, I had some hope that monsieur would return it to me one day.'
