The storm had ceased and the sun shone brightly on the wet grass and the flowers of a day in June. One ray peeped in at the window of the studio and saw the Angel broken by hammer and chisel on the floor. Its smiling face seemed to forgive all the madness of the night.
From what strange nightmare was he awakening? At the sight of his loved and hated Angel broken at his feet, his senses were slowly returning—But with what pain they came—as if his head must break.
He could not think yet—he would later on. He had been mad—he remembered the doctor saying so—In France—shell shock.
It had come over him as he stood by the gate of the Chateau. Then a hospital. Afterward all had been darkness, a horrible groping amid a thousand broken memories, phantoms which had shrouded him. But now it was over. He was sane—life, life! Oh what joy to live again, as one risen from the tomb—he would travel out into the world—far from his studio.
The attendant entered bringing lunch to the mad artist and found him dead, his lips pressed to the marble ones of his Angel, the image of Louise.
She was only one of his many phantoms.