I thought I had spoken aloud, but he could not have heard me, for he did not turn toward me. I could hear his low voice—that voice that I remembered so ringing—whispering as if he were, reciting a litany.
“What is he saying?” I asked softly of my mother, who drew near.
“Your names,” she murmured. “Listen!”
Yes, one after another he was naming us all. Those of the three elder had already passed his lips: he pronounced that of Louise. It was my turn, but he passed it and named Nicola, then James. The omission hurt me cruelly, but I had hardly had time to feel it when I heard my name, last of all, detached and set apart. Suddenly I remembered Martinod’s odious insinuations as to his preference for one of my brothers; and I understood that no one of us was the favourite, but that just because of the anxiety I had given I had been the object of a special solicitude. The irresistible desire swept over me to reveal to him, in a word, the change that had suddenly taken place in me. He used to dwell with such interest and even such respect upon our vocation—believing that it would be the basis of our whole life—I had systematically put aside mine, to make sure of my liberty. Now, with full conviction, I had recovered it. Taking a step forward I said firmly:
“Father, I am here. It is I. Upon the mountain I reflected. Don’t you know? I want to be a doctor, like you.”
On the mountain? That was not true, but did not piety command me to conceal the cause of my change of mind? He did not show the joy that I expected—perhaps he could no longer show joy over anything. Perhaps another work, the last, that of detachment, was going on in him. He lifted to me his almost terrifying eyes.
“Francis,” he repeated.
He tried to raise his hand to lay it upon my head. Though I leaned low over him he could not do it, and his arm fell back. I kneeled, that he might do it with less effort. He did not even try, as I had hoped, but in that low voice in which he had named us one by one, he said distinctly:
“Your turn has come.”
My mother, who was a little behind, drew near to ask me the same question that I had asked her: