The park seemed numbed with the cold. Behind the houses, the young elms and plane trees reared their light branches and twigs against the delicate winter sky, so clear and pale. The water in the pond was frozen, and the ice had been broken in one small place to give a little black swan room to swim; but the poor bird, feeling imprisoned, scarcely moved his feet. Near Elizabeth, Philippe remembered the day last summer in this same garden, when before Counselor Prémereux, he had pleaded the cause of passion, against the Molay-Norrois majority.
They scarcely spoke a word, as they walked along the crowded streets which led from there to the Place de la Constitution, out of which branches the Rue Haxo. This square, symmetrical and even, surrounded by office buildings, was almost deserted, and the Rue Haxo was still more so.
"There it is," she said, as they stopped in front of a tall house of modest appearance near the Boulevard des Alpes, bordered by the grassy slopes of the old ramparts.
They walked up four flights. She preceded him going into her apartment.
"There is no fire in the drawing-room. Excuse my receiving you in this room, Monsieur. It is our school-room."
It was a work-room simply furnished, with a large ink-spotted table; and its one window overlooking the trees of the Botanical Gardens.
"My children write their exercises here—at least, Marie Louise does, because your godson can only amuse himself as yet."
She appeared constrained, embarrassed by what she wished to say to him and could not. Philippe Lagier was conscious of it, but could not help her. Remembering the path at Uriage where he had known humiliation and shame, he could not realize that he was again face to face with her. She had tried to smile in saying "Your godson," which was a bond between them. It was a smile of such distress that he finally concluded to aid her by giving to this conversation the motive it required.
"I have had a letter from your husband, Madame,—from Albert. That was my reason for visiting your lawyer, just now when I met you. His solicitor at Grenoble, Maître Randon, tells him that you refuse every month to accept the allowance which he sends you regularly."
"That is so."