"Dead! Who?"
Marco opened her eyes. She saw me with the letter in my hand.
"It is my mother," she said, "who is dead. You are not coming?"
As she spoke she extended her hand.
"Silence!" I said; "sleep and leave me to myself."
She turned over and went to sleep. I looked at her for some time to
assure myself that she would not hear me, and then quietly left the
house.
CHAPTER V
ONE evening I was seated by the fire with Desgenais. The window was open;
it was one of the early days in March, a harbinger of spring. It had been
raining and a sweet odor came from the garden.
"What shall we do this spring?" I asked. "I do not care to travel."
"I shall do what I did last year," replied Desgenais. "I shall go to the
country when the time comes."
"What!" I replied. "Do you do the same thing every year? Are you going to
begin life over again this year?"
"What would you expect me to do?"
"What would I expect you to do?" I cried, jumping to my feet. "That is
just like you. Ah! Desgenais, how all this wearies me! Do you never tire
of this sort of life?"
"No," he replied.
I was standing before an engraving of the Madeleine. Involuntarily I
joined my hands.
"What are you doing?" asked Desgenais.
"If I were an artist," I replied, "and wished to represent Melancholy, I
would not paint a dreamy girl with a book in her hands."
"What is the matter with you this evening?" he asked, smiling.
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