"On this my father turned again and saw me as I cried out, 'Oh, my God! My father!' In the uproar no one heard me. At the door on the left, it was, as they struck, he called out—oh, very loud: 'Yvonne! Yvonne! God keep thee!' Oh, mother, I saw it—I saw it." For a moment he was unable to go on.
"I got out of the place somehow. When safe amid the thousands in the square I stood still and got grip of myself. A woman beside me said, 'They threw them down into the Tour de la Glacière.'"
"Ah!" exclaimed the Vicomtesse.
"It was dusk outside when all was over. I waited long, but about nine they came out. The people scattered. I went after the man Carteaux. He was all night in cafés, never alone—never once alone. I saw him again, at morning, near by on horseback; then I lost him. Ah, my God! mother, why would you make me tell it?"
"Because, René, it is often with you, and because it is not well for a young man to keep before him unendingly a sorrow of the past. I wanted you to feel that now I share with you what I can see so often has possession of you. Do not pity me because I know all. Now you shall see how bravely I will carry it." She took his hand. "It will be hard, but wise to put it aside. Pray God, my son, this night to help you not to forget, but not hurtfully to remember."
He said nothing, but looked up at the darkened heavens under which the night-hawks were screaming in their circling flight.
"Is there more, my son?"
"As they struck, he called out 'Yvonne!'"