"How shall I explain this to her? I shall make her mother do it."
He continued his meditations; and sometimes he would smile at the evocation of foolish fancies, sometimes his brows contracted and he would feel a mixture of anxiety and anger.
Rose was also reading:
"... but I have been very ill since my arrival here. Some fever, due, it may be to the delicious excitement of my heart. A great depression has been the result and I now feel a most disquieting lassitude. Alas! the conclusion is sad: we must put off our marriage. It's a infinite pain to me to write this; but I ask myself when it will be possible? Will it ever be possible? No, I won't ask that. It would be terrible. I love you so much! What a happiness it is to walk again with you, in fancy, through the wood at Robinvast! If I was too audacious, you will pardon me won't you, because of the violence of my love...."
There was a lot more in this style, and a less inexperienced woman than Rose would have felt the artificiality of this amorous eloquence Not a word of it, certainly, came from the heart. M. Hervart, who was not cruel, had first laid down the principle of his illness and his intention was to draw from it, graduating deceptions, all its logical conclusions. If necessary, he had said to himself, Bouret will help me. M. Hervart, who was by nature a man of the last moment and the present sensation, thought of Rose only as one thinks of a sick friend, for whose recovery one certainly hopes, but without anguish of mind. However the fatuity inevitable in the male sex assured him that he was not forgotten: he flattered himself on having left a wound in the young girl's heart which would never altogether close, and he felt what was almost remorse. To enjoy the egoist's complete peace, he would have consented to a sacrifice; he would have allowed Rose, not forgetfulness, but melancholy resignation.
"Poor child!... But it had to happen. I hope she won't be too unhappy."
The perusal of M. Hervart's letter left Rose sad and charmed:
"Oh, how he loves me! Oh, my darling Xavier, you are ill then?"
And she thought of the fiancée's cruel fate:
"He is ill, and mayn't go and console him."