Towards the end of March, 1867, just as it was getting dark, one evening, he was sitting all alone in his study, when a woman suddenly came in.
"Madame Arnoux!"
She caught hold of his hands, and drew him gently towards the window, and, as she gazed into his face, she kept repeating:
"'Tis he! Yes, indeed—'tis he!"
In the growing shadows of the twilight, he could see only her eyes under the black lace veil that hid her face.
When she had laid down on the edge of the mantelpiece a little pocket-book bound in garnet velvet, she seated herself in front of him, and they both remained silent, unable to utter a word, smiling at one another.
At last he asked her a number of questions about herself and her husband.
They had gone to live in a remote part of Brittany for the sake of economy, so as to be able to pay their debts. Arnoux, now almost a chronic invalid, seemed to have become quite an old man. Her daughter had been married and was living at Bordeaux, and her son was in garrison at Mostaganem.
Then she raised her head to look at him again: