During the mysterious coming and going, Marie was alone in her chamber with David.
The young woman clothed in mourning, half recumbent on a sick-chair, with silent happiness contemplated David, seated at a work-table and occupied in correcting one of Frederick's exercises.
Suddenly David, pursuing his reading, said, in a low voice:
"It is incomprehensible!"
"What is incomprehensible, M. David?"
"The really remarkable progress of this child, madame. We have been studying geometry only three weeks, and his aptitude for the exact sciences develops with the same rapidity as his other faculties."
"If I must tell you, M. David, this aptitude in Frederick astonishes me; it seems to me that those studies which require imagination and sentiment are what he would prefer."
"And that, madame, is what surprises and charms me. In this dear child everything obeys the same impulse, everything develops visibly, and nothing is injured. I read to you yesterday his last efforts, which were really eloquent, really beautiful."
"The fact is, M. David, that there is a striking difference between this last production and the best things he wrote before this terrible malady, which, thanks to you will lead to Frederick's regeneration. All that I now dread for him is excess of work."
"And for that reason, I moderate, as much as I can, his eagerness to learn, his impatient and jealous enthusiasm, his passionate longing for the future which he wishes to make illustrious and glorious, and that future will be his."