As he was stepping out she remembered the laws of rural hospitality and added:
“Tell Marie to give you something to drink, please.”
But the policeman rushed through the kitchen and fled as if he had murdered someone.
“Oh, my God!” cried Paule when no one could hear her. She dragged herself towards the fireplace, held on to it for a minute with her two hands, tried to stand, but had to drop into an armchair. Her body shook from head to foot. She held her hand before her dry, staring eyes to keep away the horrible vision before them. She saw there before her on the carpet her brother lying dead, his shattered forehead with the lifeblood flowing from it. That grave face of his, so melancholy and so proud, which had been the more so ever since Alice’s refusal,—she saw it now, sightless, motionless and icy-cold, still in death and beautiful! “Marcel, Marcel,” she called softly, and hid her face in her hands. The tears refused to come to her relief. Her adored brother, the pride of her life, was dead. Dead, she repeated ten, twenty times before she could understand the horror of it. Dead, the hero of Andriba, the conqueror of Rabah and the desert! At thirty-two, this life of courage, of gallantry and self-sacrifice, had been cut off. Oh, how little he had cared for life. For a long time he had despised it. Had not the meeting with a shy little girl taken away his joy in it? And Paule distractedly racked her memory for the pictures in which she had read the signs of coming fate. There was that hesitating smile which she had surprised on his lips the first night that he confessed his secret to her. There was that movement of indifference as he listened to the mournful warnings of the owls after his last interview with Alice. And there was again that strange, quiet, almost disinterested discussion of his future, as they sat there on the tree-trunk at the edge of the Montcharvin wood, on the day of his departure from France. For years, since that evening at La Chênaie, he had carried death in his eyes. He had never again mentioned Alice’s name, never spoken of his love. But he had lived on without any faith in life.... And in that dear face that her ardent love called up in her memory, Paule saw a deep serenity, unchangeable, eternal. Then she gave a great cry and knelt down, weeping.
“Yes,” she thought, “you are at peace at last. Our love was not sufficient for you. We loved you too much, Marcel. You do not know how I loved you. I cannot speak: but my heart was full of you. Why was I not chosen in your place? Of what use am I?”
A new fear, which she would not admit to herself in this terrible hour, completed the distraction of her mind. Marcel was not alone at Timmimun....
All at once she started up.
“And Mother! Mother is coming home!” She had forgotten her. And, thanking God who had allowed her to break to her mother this supreme sorrow, she mourned no longer for him who was sleeping his last sleep, dead on the day of victory, in a conquered land; but instead for her who was quietly coming home along the dark roads, travelling all unsuspicious towards the precipice. Might not this last blow crush the frail old life, overwhelmed already with its many trials?
Paule vainly searched her mind for help. She felt the sadness of a cemetery round her. What deaths and separations there had been— Her sister Thérèse dead at twelve; her father struck down in his vigor; her sister Marguerite in a convent; Étienne and François in the Colonies. She was left alone—and how very much alone—to help her mother to bear this too heavy cross. But as she must do it, she would be brave and uphold the poor tottering woman with all her strength.
She dried her eyes and bathed her face.