He stared at her with dazed eyes, as he might have stared at some vision descended from Heaven; and the circumstances were so unusual that he did not think of suppressing the eagerness of his gaze.
She repeated, utterly confused:
"Yes, this way . . . . François suggested it."
"I did not mention him," he said, "because, with you here, I felt sure that he was free."
"Not yet," she said, "but he will be in an hour."
A long pause ensued. She interrupted it to conceal her agitation:
"He will be free . . . . You shall see him . . . . But we must not frighten him: there are things which he doesn't know."
She perceived that he was listening not to the words uttered but to the voice that uttered them and that this voice seemed to plunge him into a sort of ecstasy, for he was silent and smiled. She thereupon smiled too and questioned him, thus obliging him to answer:
"You called me by my name at once. So you knew me? I also seem to . . . Yes, you remind me of a friend of mine who died."
"Madeleine Ferrand?"