But he saw her, as a sacrificial victim, offered up for a faith which she did not share, because of his mistake in life. No, no, he could never do it, could never tell her that the Hague was killing him, that she must accommodate herself and make the best of things. It was for him, for him to make the best of things: if he wished to remain in any sense just, he must continue to sacrifice himself, though it wore him to death.
How sombre and joyless it all was! How grey it all was, far and wide around him, like the very night that hung pearl-white close by and, farther away, dug itself into abysses of threatening darkness!
As he drew nearer home, his feet lagged more heavily. And suddenly, before turning down the street in which he lived, he dropped on to a bench and remained sitting as though paralyzed, with his head in his hand.
How hard and heavy it was for him, to have to go back like that to his own house! Oh, to remain sitting, just sitting like that until he had attained certain knowledge! He closed his eyes.
He felt himself conquered, overcome.... Suddenly, as in a dream, voices struck upon his ear; and he seemed to recognize the voices. He rose mechanically and, past the houses, along the silent pavement, saw approaching the dark figures of two people walking slowly, a man and a woman. Their voices sounded clearly, though he could not catch the words; he recognized the leisurely forms. It was Johan Erzeele and Mathilde.
They did not see him. They walked on very slowly and Addie followed behind them. Johan seemed to be persistently pleading, Mathilde seemed to be refusing something. Addie's heart beat fearfully as he followed after them; and a jealousy suddenly flared up amid his dull dejection. Was she not his wife, was she not his wife? And why, lately, was she always looking for Johan and he for her? Was it not always so: always these tennis-parties together, always meeting at friends' houses where he, Addie, never went?... Where were they coming from now? Where had they been? Was he bringing her home? How intimate their conversation sounded, how sad almost! Had they grown fond of each other, in a dangerous increasing friendship?
He followed them unobserved, almost glad to have surprised them, suspicious in his jealous grief. Did not he still love his wife, notwithstanding their deep-seated differences?... He slackened his pace and followed very slowly.... After his first access of jealousy, he seemed rather to feel a certain curiosity to observe in silence, to make a diagnosis. His nature got the upper hand of him, the nature of one who is born to heal and who, before healing, diagnoses the disease. Yes, jealousy still smouldered within him; but he felt even more distinctly the craving for knowledge. Did he not still love Mathilde?... Ah, but was she indispensable to his life?
That suddenly became clear to him: indispensable to his life she was not.... His children, yes: they belonged to all of them, to all of them yonder, in the old house, the old family-house. She, his wife, did not. His children were indispensable to his life: he felt that clearly. Mathilde, Mathilde was not. For Mathilde, as he now walked behind her and Johan, he felt only the curiosity to analyze and classify the nature of the disease, nothing but that. Even the jealousy died away in him, the child of his jealous parents.... He continued to follow them. He saw Erzeele put his arm through Mathilde's.
He now quickened his pace slightly. His heels rang on the pavement through the night air, regularly, faster than before. The two in front looked round. They gave a start. He caught them up:
"I seemed to recognize you ... in the distance," he said, calmly and naturally, while they were unable to speak and Erzeele withdrew his arm.