“That’s right,” said Hortense, in a lively way, and smiling at her big sister: “Just a minute, will you?—I will call you again.”
Rosalie thought it was a visit from the priest bringing his parochial Latin and his terrifying consolations, so she went down into the garden, which was a truly Southern enclosure without any flowers, but with alleys of box sheltered by high cypresses that withstood the wind. Ever since she had been sick-nurse she had gone thither to get a breath of air and to conceal her tears and to slacken a little all the nervous contractions of her sorrow. Oh, how well she understood that speech made by her mother:
“There is no sorrow which is irreparable but one, and that is the loss of the person we love.”
Her other sorrow, her happiness as a woman all destroyed, was quite in the background; she thought of nothing except that horrible and inevitable thing which was approaching day by day. Was it the evening hour, that red and deepening sun which left all the garden in shadow and yet lingered on the panes of the house, or that mournful wind blowing high up which she could hear without feeling it? At that moment she felt a melancholy, an anguish which could not be expressed in words. Hortense! her Hortense! more than a sister for her, almost a daughter ... she had in Hortense the first happiness of a premature mother’s love.
Sobs oppressed her, sobs without tears; she would have liked to cry aloud and call for help, but on whom? The sky, toward which the despairing raise their eyes, was so high, so far, so cold; it was as if polished off by the hurricane. Through that sky a flight of migrating birds was hurrying, but neither their cries nor their wings which made as much noise as flapping sails could be heard below. How then could a single voice from earth reach and attain those silent and indifferent abysses?
Nevertheless she made a trial and with her face turned toward the light which moved ever upward and was passing from the roof of the old house, she made her prayer to Him who has thought fit to conceal Himself and protect Himself from our sorrows and lamentations—Him whom some adore confidentially with their brows against the earth, but others forlornly search for with their arms wide apart, while others finally threaten Him with their fists and revolt against Him, denying Him in order to be able to forgive His cruelties.
And denial of this sort, blasphemy of this kind—that also is prayer.
She was called to the house and ran in trembling with fear because she had reached that nervous terror when the slightest noise re-echoes from the very depth of one’s being. The sick girl drew her near to her bed with her smile, for she had neither strength nor voice, as if she had just been talking a long time.
“I have a favor to ask of you, my darling—you know what I mean, that final favor which people grant to one who is condemned to die—forgive your husband! He has been very wicked and unworthy of you, but be indulgent and return to his side. Do this for me, dear sister, and for our parents, whom your separation grieves to death and who will soon need greatly that all should close round about them and surround them with tender care. Numa is so lively, there is no one like him for putting a little spirit into them.... It is all over, is it not? You forgive?”
Rosalie answered, “Yes, I give you my promise.”