have fallen to the ground to the left or right had I not been holding her. Meanwhile Gardeil rose up brusquely, and, pacing his apartment, said with an impatient and moody tone: `I could do without this dismal scene. I do hope this will be the last. Who the devil does she bear a grudge against? I loved her; I will smash my head into a brick wall if that is the least bit false. I do not love her anymore, she knows that now, or she will never know it. Everything has been said…´ `No, monsieur, everything has not been said. What? You believe that a good man has only to strip a woman of everything she has and leave her?´ `What do you want me to do? I am begging as much as she is.´ `What do I want you to do? To associate your misery with the one that you have reduced her to.´ `You enjoyed saying that. She would be no better for it, and I would be much worse.´ `You would act like this to a friend that has sacrificed everything for you?´ `A friend! A friend! I do not have much faith in friends, and this experience has taught me to have no passion for them. I am frustrated that I did not realize this sooner.´ `And it is right that this unfortunate woman should be the victim of your heart´s errors.´ `And what is to say that one month, a day later, I would not have been just as cruelly the error of hers.´ `What is to say? Everything that she has done for you, and the state that you see her in.´ `What she did for me?… By God! He is fully acquitted by the loss of my time.´ `Oh, monsieur Gardeil, what a comparison between your time and all the priceless things that you have taken from her!´ `I have done nothing, I am nothing, I am thirty years old, it is time to think of myself, now or never, and to treat all this nonsense like it is worth.´

Meanwhile the poor woman was coming to a little bit. At these last words she regained enough energy: `what did he say about the loss of his time? I learned four languages to ease his workload, I read a thousand volumes, I wrote, translated, copied day and night, I exhausted myself, wore out my eyes, boiled my blood, I came down with an awful illness from which I may never recover. He does not dare tell you the cause of his displeasure, but you will see.´ At that instant she pulled out her handkerchief, withdrew one of her arms from her dress, bared one of her shoulders, and, showing me an erysipelatus mark, `The reason for his transformation, there it is,´ she said to me, `there it is, there is the effect of those sleepless nights. It came one morning with these rolls of parchment. M. d´Hérouville, he told me, is very anxious to know what is in these, this work has to be done by tomorrow, and it was…´ At that moment we heard someone´s steps coming towards the door. It was a servant announcing M. d´Hérouville´s arrival. Gardeil´s face went pale. I invited Mademoiselle de La Chaux to withdraw and tidy herself up… `No,´ she said. `No. I am staying. I want this disgrace uncovered. I will wait for M. d´Hérouville. I will speak to him.´ `And what good will that do?´ `None,´ she answered me, `you are right.´ `Tomorrow you will regret it. Leave him his evil deeds; it is a revenge worthy of you.´ `But is it worthy of him? Do you not see that this man here is not… Let´s go, monsieur, let us leave now, for I can neither answer for what I would do, nor for what I would say…´ In the blink of an eye Mademoiselle de La Chaux had repaired the disorder this scene had made of her clothes and raced from of Gardeil´s office. I followed and heard the door slam shut behind her. I later learned that someone had given notice to the porter.

I conducted myself to her quarters, where I found Doctor Le Camus waiting for us. The passion that he felt for this young woman differed little from hers for Gardeil. I recounted our visit to him, and while I spoke the signs of his anger, pain, indignation…

—It was not too difficult to see from his face that your failure did not displease him all that much.

—It is true.

—There is man for you. He is no better than that.

—This rupture was followed by a violent sickness, during which time the good, honest, tender and kind doctor gave her such a treatment he would not have reserved for the noblest woman in France. He came three, four times a day. In spite of the peril he slept in her room on a canvas-strap bed. It is fortunate that this was only a disease of the heart.

—In returning to us she drifts away from her memories of others. And then she has a pretext to be troubled without indiscretion or constraint.

—That thought, otherwise just, does not apply to Mademoiselle de La Chaux.

During her recovery we sorted out her schedule. She had more than enough spirit, imagination, taste and knowledge to be admitted into the Académie des Inscriptions. She had listened to us wax metaphysical for so long that the most abstract matters had become familiar to her. Her first literary endeavor was the translation of Hume´s Essays on Human Understanding. I proofread it, and to tell you the truth she had left me with very little to rectify. This translation was printed in Holland and was well received by the public.

My Letter on the Blind and the Dumb appeared at almost the same time. She raised some very perceptive objections which gave rise to an addition dedicated to her[6]. I have done worse things than make this addition.

Mademoiselle de La Chaux´s happiness had been somewhat restored. The doctor cooked for us occasionally and these dinners were not too sorrowful. Since Gardeil´s estrangement, Le Camus´ passion had made marvelous strides. One day, at the table during dessert, as he was expressing it with all the honesty, sensitivity and naïveté of a child, she said to him, with a sincerity that pleased me greatly but which will perhaps displease others: `Doctor, it would be impossible to heighten the respect I have for you. Your kindnesses fulfill me, and I would be as gloomy as the monster of Hyacinthe Street were I not steeped in the fiercest gratitude. You tell me of your passion with such grace and sensitivity that I would be, I think, angry if you were to stop. Just the idea of losing your company or of being deprived of your friendship is enough to make me miserable. You are a good man, if there ever was one. Your goodness and sweetness of character is incomparable. I do not believe that a heart can fall into better hands. I appeal to my own from morning till night in your favor, but appeal in vain to that which does not desire it. I am not making any more progress. Meanwhile you will suffer, and so I feel a vicious pain. I do not know anyone more worthy of the happiness that you seek, and I do not know what I would not do to make you happy. Anything is possible, without exception. I mean, doctor, I would… yes, I would go so far as to sleep… so far as to include that. Do you want to sleep with me? You only have to say so. That is all I can do for you. But you want to be loved, and I do not know a way.´

The doctor listened to her, took her by the hand and kissed it, wet it with tears. And I, I did not know whether I should laugh or cry. Mademoiselle de La Chaux knew the doctor well. The next day I said to her, `But Mademoiselle, if the doctor had said the word?´ She answered, `I would have kept my promise, but that would never have happened; my offers were not of the sort that would be accepted by a man like him…´ `Why not? It seems to me that if I were in his position I would have simply hoped that the rest would follow.´ `Yes, but if you were in his position, Mademoiselle de La Chaux would not have made you the same proposition.´

The Hume translation had not made her very much money. The Dutch will print anything provided they do not pay for it.

—Lucky for us. Given all the restrictions we place on thought in our country, if they even once