He rose, with faltering steps, and with unsteady fingers fumbled about in search of the fatal letter. But he could not find it. He ransacked the whole apartment that lay before him in a mysterious twilight, with its luxurious appointments, its silken cushions and covers, its veiled mirrors and countless silver and ivory toilette articles. He wandered from one piece of furniture to another, and while he gazed in stupefied astonishment at all the glittering knickknacks, he asked himself what it was he was looking for. But a voice from the bed reminded him.
"Look in the dressing-room; it may be there."
Ah, the letter--of course, the letter. He opened the door to which she pointed, and found himself in a small room so brilliant and light that it hurt his eyes. The floor was of porcelain tiles, and he saw on the left a bath with steps leading down to it, on the right a marble table surrounded by a threefold full-length mirror, before which were strewn yet more articles of the toilette of crystal and tortoiseshell in every conceivable design.
"How he must hate all this show and luxury!" he thought. And then his glance wandered through a door standing wide open opposite him. He saw a plain camp-bedstead covered by a white crochet counterpane, with a deer-skin rug on the bare boards beside it. Photographs in dark frames were on the wall, and amongst them, staring at him with laughing eyes and plump cheeks, his own. He groaned aloud, and, putting his hands before his face, flew back into the perfumed, purple prison.
"Have you got the letter?" she asked.
"No."
"Did you look everywhere?"
"I don't know; I think so."
"Leo, what's the matter with you?"--her voice trembled with anxiety.
"The matter with me?" he cried. "Only this: I am ashamed of myself--ashamed! ashamed!" He drew himself up, and then flung himself down on his knees beside the bed. She raised herself on the pillows and laid her hand on his head, while her eyes filled with tears.