Afterwards, Roger left; and Annette, regarding herself sheepishly in the mirror, found there all her indecision again. . . . How could she get out of it? She contemplated the interrupted preparations for her journey.
"Well done!" said she.
She shrugged her shoulders, laughed. . . . How charming Roger was! . . . Back into the closet went her lingerie and the things she had taken out for her trunk. . . .
"But just the same," she was thinking, "I don't want to, I don't want to! . . ."
Nervously she let fall a pile of chemisettes. . . . Thump! And toilet brushes went tumbling after. . . . Impatiently she kicked the heap. . . .
And then she gathered them up, bending down to the floor. In the midst of her tidying, she let herself go and sat down on the parquet, not very proud of her will power. . . .
"Nonsense!" she exclaimed, stretching herself out on the carpet, "I still have four months to change my mind. . . ."
And with her face thrust into a cushion, lying flat on her stomach, she counted the days. . . .
[X]
The Brissots prudently gave their approval of Annette's expressed desire to prolong the engagement: they did not wish to imperil their success by showing too much haste. But they felt it necessary to surround Annette during these months of waiting. It would not do to leave her to herself; there was always a risk of the strange girl escaping.