In fact, though I wished to be regenerated by my suffering, I was afraid to suffer, I had an atrocious fear of facing actual pain. My soul was already exhausted; although it had caught a glimpse of the true road and had been agitated by Christian aspirations, it stole away by an oblique path that led straight to the inevitable abyss.
While speaking with the doctor, when showing a slight incredulity at his reassuring predictions, by manifesting anxiety, I found the means of conveying my thoughts to him. I made him understand that I desired him, at any cost, to free Juliana from all danger, and that, if it were necessary, I would renounce this new offspring without regret. I begged him to speak to me frankly.
He reassured me a second time. He declared to me that, even in a hopeless case, he would not have recourse to extremes because, in the state that Juliana was in, a hemorrhage would be very dangerous. He repeated again that, above all, we must aid and stimulate the regeneration of the blood, reconstitute the debilitated organism, contrive, by every means in our power, that the mother should arrive at the natural term of gestation with her strength restored, with a confident and tranquil mind. He concluded:
"I believe that your wife requires moral consolation more than anything else. I am an old friend. I know that she has suffered much. It depends on you to pacify her mind."
XX.
My mother redoubled her tenderness for Juliana. She let her know her cherished dream and her presentiment. It was a grandson whom she awaited, a little Raymond. She was sure, this time.
My brother, too, expected Raymond.
Maria and Natalia often asked their mother, and grandmother, and me, artless questions concerning their future companion.
Thus the domestic love, expressed by presages, wishes, and hopes, began to surround the invisible fruit, the being that was yet without form.
One day we were seated, Juliana and I, beneath the elms. My mother had just left us. During her affectionate chat, she had named Raymond; she had even brought again into use a pet name that called up distant memories of my dead father. Juliana and I answered her by a smile. She believed that we shared her dream, and she had left in order that we might go on dreaming undisturbed.