And she ran to fetch what she called her child from a corner of the room, where with two chairs laid on their backs and the cushions of the sofa, she had constructed a sort of cradle.
As she went towards la Peyrade, carrying her precious bundle with one hand, with the other she was arranging the imaginary cap of her “little darling,” having no eyes except for the sad creation of her disordered brain. Step by step, as she advanced, la Peyrade, pale, trembling, and with staring eyes, retreated backwards, until he struck against a seat, into which, losing his equilibrium, he fell.
A man of Corentin’s power and experience, and who, moreover, knew to its slightest detail the horrible drama in which Lydie had lost her reason, had already, of course, taken in the situation, but it suited his purpose and his ideas to allow the clear light of evidence to pierce this darkness.
“Look, doctor,” said Lydie, unfastening the bundle, and putting the pins in her mouth as she did so, “don’t you see that she is growing thinner every day?”
La Peyrade could not answer; he kept his handkerchief over his face, and his breath came so fast from his chest that he was totally unable to utter a word.
Then, with one of those gestures of feverish impatience, to which her mental state predisposed her, she exclaimed, hastily:—
“But look at her doctor, look!” taking his arm violently and forcing him to show his features. “My God!” she cried, when she had looked him in the face.
Letting fall the linen bundle in her arms, she threw herself hastily backwards, and her eyes grew haggard. Passing her white hands rapidly over her forehead and through her hair, tossing it into disorder, she seemed to be making an effort to obtain from her memory some dormant recollection. Then, like a frightened mare, which comes to smell an object that has given it a momentary terror, she approached la Peyrade slowly, stooping to look into his face, which he kept lowered, while, in the midst of a silence inexpressible, she examined him steadily for several seconds. Suddenly a terrible cry escaped her breast; she ran for refuge into the arms of Corentin, and pressing herself against him with all her force, she exclaimed:—
“Save me! save me! It is he! the wretch! It is he who did it!”
And, with her finger pointed at la Peyrade, she seemed to nail the miserable object of her terror to his place.