The doors flew open, the bells rang, the crowds hastened; without any conscious action on her part she was pushed with the others to the wicket, paid the coins they asked her for, and found her way to a seat in the crowded waggons.
The train moved. Soon the cold country air of evening blowing through an open window revived her, and brought her a clearer sense of where she was, of what had happened. She saw always that cold, still, regal figure looking down on her with such ineffable disdain; she heard always that chill, languid, contemptuous voice, sweet as music, cruel as the knife which severs the cord of life.
'She does not believe,' she muttered again and again. 'She will never believe.'
Those who were in the carriage with her heard the broken stupid words said over and over again, while her great eyes looked out, wide opened and startled, into the shadows of the descending night.
One or two of them spoke roughly to her, being afraid of her; then she was silent, vaguely understanding that they thought her strange and odd.
She leaned in a corner and shrank from their comments and their gaze.
It was now quite dark; the flickering lamplight seemed to wane and oscillate before her eyes; she had not touched food or water for many hours; her throat was dry, her hands were hot, her head felt light; she had done all she could and had failed. The only thing she had gained was a knowledge which seemed to eat her very soul away with its shame and misery.
She was so young that she did not know that if she had patience to live through this agony it would cease in time, and grow less terrible to her with every year which should pass over her head. She did not know the solace that comes with the mere passage of the seasons; to her the shame, the torture she endured were eternal.
She had taken his money innocently, ignorantly indeed, honestly believing it to be her own; but she understood now why to his wife she seemed only a wretched paid creature of hazard; she understood now why the Princess de Laon had spoken to her as to one of whose avarice and whose vileness there was no doubt.