All was discovered! She saw in imagination, standing out with the distinctness of a charcoal drawing on a white ground, the fury of Jorge, the horror of her friends, the indignation of some, the contempt of others. These thoughts burned into her soul as redhot coals burn into the flesh.
What remained? To fly with Bazilio.
This thought, the first and only one that presented itself to her mind, swallowed up every other, as water that has burst its bounds submerges the surrounding country. He had pictured to her so often the happiness they might enjoy in his apartment in the Rue St. Florentin, in Paris! Be it so, then; she would go. She would take no luggage with her. She could put some linen and her mother’s jewels into her morocco satchel. But the house and the servants? She would leave a letter for Sebastião, that he might go and shut up everything. On the journey she would wear her blue gown or her black one. She would take nothing more. Whatever else she needed she could buy in some other city, far from here.
“If the senhora would like to dine,” said Joanna, making her appearance at the door in a clean white apron. “The Senhora Juliana has gone to bed sick,” she added, “and says she cannot wait at table.”
“I will go presently,” responded Luiza.
She hardly tasted the soup. She drank a glass of water, and rising, said,—
“What is the matter with Juliana?”
“She says she has a severe pain in the heart.”
If Juliana were to die she would be saved! In that case there would be no necessity for her to fly, and she said with a gleam of wicked hope,—
“Go see how she is, Joanna.”