The ball was more agreeable perhaps, because it was more comfortable to dance. Eugénie continued to be invited, and I must needs content myself with dancing opposite her; but there were figures in which we took each other’s hands, and then how many things we said by a soft pressure! it seems that the heart, that the very soul, passes into the beloved hand which presses ours lovingly.
The ranks became thinner. My mother had gone, and Madame Dumeillan was only awaiting our departure to follow her example. It was five o’clock. The daylight was beginning to show through the windows, and to lessen the brilliancy of the candles. The number of ladies diminished every moment. I went to Eugénie’s side.
“I am tired of dancing,” she said, “and yet I am afraid to refuse.”
“Why, it seems to me that we might venture to go now.”
She lowered her eyes and made no answer. I concluded that I had done enough for others and that I might think of myself at last. I took my wife’s hand and led her from the room; Madame Dumeillan followed us; we entered a carriage and drove away. We had to take Madame Dumeillan home first. It was a short distance, but it seemed very long to me. The nearer one’s happiness approaches, the more intense one’s impatience becomes.
We spoke but little in the mother’s presence. At last we reached her house, and I alighted. Madame Dumeillan embraced her daughter; it seemed to me that their embrace was interminable. Selfish creatures that we are! it did not occur to me that that was the last embrace in which a mother would hold her daughter, still a virgin, in her arms, and that I should have all the rest of my life to enjoy my privileges as a husband.
Madame Dumeillan entered her house. I returned to the carriage, and we drove on. At last I was alone with Eugénie, with my wife. I believe that that was the sweetest moment that I have ever known; it had seemed to me that it would never arrive. I put my arms about Eugénie; she wept when she embraced her mother; but I embraced her, and she ceased to weep, for I overwhelmed her with caresses, and unfamiliar sensations made her heart beat fast.
At last we reached my apartment, our apartment. The servant who was to live with us, and who had been in her mother’s service, was waiting for us in the concierge’s room, with a light; but it was broad day; we needed no service. My wife and I entered our home. I led her by the hand, I felt that she was trembling and I believe that I trembled too. It is a strange effect of happiness that it suffocates one, that it almost makes one ill.
I closed the doors and shot the bolts. I was alone with my wife! At last there was no third person with us! We were at liberty to love each other, to tell each other of our love, and to prove it!