"He went away this morning," continued the old lady.
"He was here just now."
"Here. You have seen him?"
Albert's mother bent toward her daughter-in-law, her cheekbones suddenly flushed with a rush of color, contrasting with the pallor of her face, her eyes fixed and shining with fever, in a state of unaccustomed exaltation foreign to her nature.
"Not I. But the children."
Elizabeth told the short story of the meeting of Marie Louise and Philippe with their father. Mme. Derize, resting against her chair, lost her abnormal excitement as she listened.
"Just now," she said, "I thought he was here, that you were reconciled, that he had been unable to go away. I was so happy—so happy."
"Oh, Mother, could you hope that?"
"I always hope it. And you do, too, do you not?"
"I no longer know. I am so weary of suffering! And then how can I forgive him, how can I forget him? He has gone back to her."