“This is good. She is a little better. Have you given her the medicine?”
The woman pointed behind him and said,—
“She has,” and M. Deshoulières turned round and saw Thérèse.
She trembled violently, fearing lest after all she had done wrong, and then she looked in his face and saw a sudden agony in it, and recovered herself at once.
He crossed the room and stood before her in the dim corner, at first speechless. When he did at last speak, his voice was so changed, so rough and broken, that she hardly recognised it.
“Child, child!” he said, “what madness have you done?”
“Do not send me away,” she said, gently. “I could not help it, I could not sleep at night for thinking of all this misery. And what was there to keep me? I am free if any one in the world is free. You must let me remain. I am not afraid.” He answered her sharply, like a person in keen pain.
“What you ask is impossible, ridiculous! I insist upon your returning at once.”
Thérèse shook her head.
“I cannot go back to the Roulleaus from this house. You see that, do you not, monsieur? It would be simply wicked.”