“I have come to see you for a little while.”
“Very well, stay with me, do not go away immediately; I am never so happy, I never work so well, as when I have you near me.”
She felt that this was true. When she was with him, whether she spoke or not, her presence made him happy.
And still she must appear not to look at him too attentively, as if with the manifest intention of studying him; for she did this during the first days of their marriage, and angered him so much that he exclaimed:
“Why do you examine me thus? What do you look for in me?”
She learned to watch herself carefully, and when with him to preserve a discreet attitude that should not offend him. No curious looks, and no questions. But this was not always easy, so she asked leave to assist him in his work, and sometimes drew in larger size the designs that he made for his microscopical studies. In this way the time passed rapidly. If he were but willing to pass the evening hours in this sweet intimacy, without a word about going out, how happy she would be! But he never forgot the hour.
“Allons,” he said, interrupting himself, “we must go.”
She had never dared to ask the true reason for this “must.”