The Hetman of Jitomir could say no more. He had rolled over on the cushions and slept with clenched fists.
I walked unsteadily to the great window.
The sun was rising, pale yellow, behind the sharp blue mountains.
[!-- Chapter 14 --]XIV
HOURS OF WAITING
It was at night that Saint-Avit liked to tell me a little of his enthralling history. He gave it to me in short installments, exact and chronological, never anticipating the episodes of a drama whose tragic outcome I knew already. Not that he wished to obtain more effect that way—I felt that he was far removed from any calculation of that sort! Simply from the extraordinary nervousness into which he was thrown by recalling such memories.
One evening, the mail from France had just arrived. The letters that Chatelain had handed us lay upon the little table, not yet opened. By the light of the lamp, a pale halo in the midst of the great black desert, we were able to recognize the writing of the addresses. Oh! the victorious smile of Saint-Avit when, pushing aside all those letters, I said to him in a trembling voice:
"Go on."
He acquiesced without further words.