'No! no! I cannot.'

'Yes, you will resign yourself; you are too good, too intelligent to do otherwise. Some day you will forget.'

'No! Never!'

'I did wrong to say that; I will not ask you to forget. Keep the memory of it in your heart. But I do ask you to be resigned, because I well know that you are capable of resignation, even to the point of sacrifice. Think of all the disasters which would follow if you were to rebel—to speak out! Our life would be broken up, our enterprises shattered, and you would suffer a thousand times more than you do now.'

She interrupted him, quivering: 'Well, let our life be broken up! let our enterprises be shattered! At least I shall have satisfied myself. It is cruel of you, brother, to speak to me like that. You are an egotist!'

'An egotist!' replied Jordan. 'When I am only thinking of you, my dear little sister. At this moment grief is turning your wonted kindliness to exasperation. But how bitter would be your remorse if I were to allow you to destroy everything! You would no longer be able to live in presence of the ruins that you would have piled up. Poor, dear girl! you will resign yourself, and find happiness in abnegation and pure affection.'

Tears were choking him, and their sobs mingled. That battle between brother and sister, both so artless and so loving, was fraught with the most exquisite fraternal affection. In a tone of intense compassion, blended with boundless kindliness, Jordan repeated: 'You will resign yourself; you will resign yourself.'

She still protested, but like one who is surrendering. Her moan now was that of a poor, stricken creature whose hurt one strives to soothe: 'Oh, no! I cannot, I do not resign myself.'

As it happened, Luc that very day was to take déjeuner with the Jordans, and when at half-past eleven he joined the brother and sister in the laboratory, he found them still agitated, with red, blurred eyes. But he himself was so distressed, so downcast, that he noticed nothing. Josine's farewell, the necessity of that separation, filled him with despair. The severance of the love which he deemed essential for his mission seemed to deprive him of his last strength. If he did not save Josine he would never save the unhappy multitude to whom he had given his heart. And that day, from the moment of rising, all the obstacles which hindered his advance had risen up before him like insurmountable impediments. A black vision of La Crêcherie had appeared to him. La Crêcherie on the path to ruin, wrecked already, to such a point indeed that it was madness to hope to save it. Men devoured one another there; it had been impossible to establish brotherly accord between them; every human fatality weighed upon the enterprise. And thus, bowed down by the most frightful discouragement he had ever known, Luc lost his faith. The heroism within him wavered; he was almost on the point of renouncing his task, fearing as he did that defeat was near at hand.