He went without a backward glance; but I saw his throat heave, and I knew what the parting meant to him. The feudal loyalty of the past was all his faith.
I flung myself down on my blanket. I was utterly exhausted, and with that dead weariness which precludes sleep. The candle was burning low and was guttering down upon one side, and a pool of hardening grease was spreading over the table-top.
I walked over to the table and blew it out. We must husband it; the darkness in the cave would become unbearable without a candle to light.
I lay down again. The silence was loneliness itself, and not rendered less lonely by the occasional cries of the old man and the drip, drip of water. I could not see anything, and Jacqueline might have been a woman of stone, for she made not the least movement.
But I felt her presence; I seemed to feel her thoughts, to live in her.
At last I spoke to her.
"Jacqueline!"
I heard her start, and knew that she had raised her head and was looking after me. I crawled toward her, dragging my blanket after me. I felt in the darkness for the place where I knew her hand must be and took it in mine.
"Jacqueline," I said, "you know I did not steal your money, don't you?"
"Forgive me, monsieur," I heard her whisper.