Newman went back to Valentin’s room, which he found lighted by a taper on the hearth. Valentin begged him to light a candle. “I want to see your face,” he said. “They say you excite me,” he went on, as Newman complied with this request, “and I confess I do feel excited. But it isn’t you—it’s my own thoughts. I have been thinking—thinking. Sit down there and let me look at you again.” Newman seated himself, folded his arms, and bent a heavy gaze upon his friend. He seemed to be playing a part, mechanically, in a lugubrious comedy. Valentin looked at him for some time. “Yes, this morning I was right; you have something on your mind heavier than Valentin de Bellegarde. Come, I’m a dying man and it’s indecent to deceive me. Something happened after I left Paris. It was not for nothing that my sister started off at this season of the year for Fleurières. Why was it? It sticks in my crop. I have been thinking it over, and if you don’t tell me I shall guess.”
“I had better not tell you,” said Newman. “It won’t do you any good.”
“If you think it will do me any good not to tell me, you are very much mistaken. There is trouble about your marriage.”
“Yes,” said Newman. “There is trouble about my marriage.”
“Good!” And Valentin was silent again. “They have stopped it.”
“They have stopped it,” said Newman. Now that he had spoken out, he found a satisfaction in it which deepened as he went on. “Your mother and brother have broken faith. They have decided that it can’t take place. They have decided that I am not good enough, after all. They have taken back their word. Since you insist, there it is!”
Valentin gave a sort of groan, lifted his hands a moment, and then let them drop.
“I am sorry not to have anything better to tell you about them,” Newman pursued. “But it’s not my fault. I was, indeed, very unhappy when your telegram reached me; I was quite upside down. You may imagine whether I feel any better now.”
Valentin moaned gaspingly, as if his wound were throbbing. “Broken faith, broken faith!” he murmured. “And my sister—my sister?”
“Your sister is very unhappy; she has consented to give me up. I don’t know why. I don’t know what they have done to her; it must be something pretty bad. In justice to her you ought to know it. They have made her suffer. I haven’t seen her alone, but only before them! We had an interview yesterday morning. They came out flat, in so many words. They told me to go about my business. It seems to me a very bad case. I’m angry, I’m sore, I’m sick.”