"They follow me! They pursue me!" she cried, caught in the vortex she vainly fled.
And swept away, like a leaf in the circular flight of wind, she drew near Entragues, distracted, panting, crying all the time:
"The leaves pursue me, the dead leaves pursue me!"
"What is the matter," Hubert asked, surprised by such a strange crisis.
While, still frantic and trembling, she seized his arm and leaned against it, he coldly added:
"Have you ever committed a crime in your life?"
This ironic interrogation changed the nature of the fever, like scalding water on a stone.
"Perhaps!" she answered, suddenly pale.
"Then you become altogether interesting."
It was beyond her strength to retort to this impertinence. With a trembling of all her little muscles, and without knowing why she did it, she tried to pull off her gloves. When one of her hands was free, she shook it, pulled it, cracked its joints.