“Maurice—you must—speak to your mother—”
He rises with an impatient gesture and Maria seats herself—her strength is leaving her—while he walks up and down the room.
“My poor Maria,” he begins in a hesitating manner, “I dared not tell you, but my mother will not consent to our marriage—now, at least.”
He lies! He has not spoken to his mother; she knows it. Ah! unhappy creature! he does not love her! and, discouraged, with a rumbling noise in her ears, she listens to Maurice as he speaks in his soft voice.
“Oh! be tranquil. I shall not abandon you, my poor child. If what you say is true-if you are sure of it, then the best thing that you can do, you see, is to leave your family and come and live with me. At first we will go away from Paris; you can be confined in the country. We can put the child out to nurse; they will take care of the little brat, of course. And later, perhaps, my mother will soften and will understand that we must marry. No, truly, the more I think of it, the more I believe that that is the best way to do. Yes! I know very well it will be hard to leave your home, but what can you do, my darling? You can write your mother a very affectionate letter.”
And going to her he takes her, inert and heartbroken, into his arms, and tries to show himself loving.
“You are my wife, my dear little wife, I repeat it. Are you not glad, eh! that we can live together?”
This is what he proposes to do. He thinks to take her publicly to his house and to blazon her shame before the eyes of everybody! Maria feels that she is lost. She rises abruptly and says to him in the tone of a somnambulist: “That will do. We will talk of it again.”
She goes away and returns to Montmartre at a crazy woman’s pace, and finds her mother knitting and her sister ready to lay the table-yes! as if nothing at all was the matter. She takes their hands and falls at their feet!
Ah, poor women!