I lost
courage--and yet one must live! Oh, you wouldn't believe it if I
told you how we have lived for the past four years." She did not
tell him, but contented herself with adding, "When you begin to go
down hill, there is no such thing as stopping; you roll lower and
lower, until you reach the bottom, as we have done. Here we live,
no one knows how; we have to pay our rent each week, and if we are
driven from this place, I see no refuge but the river."
"If I had been in your position, I should have left my husband,"
M. Fortunat ventured to remark.
"Yes--it would have been better, no doubt. People advised me to
do so, and I tried. Three or four times I went away, and yet I
always returned--it was stronger than myself. Besides, I'm his
wife; I've paid dearly for him; he's mine--I won't yield him to
any one else. He beats me, no doubt; I despise him, I hate him,
and yet I----" She poured out part of a glass of brandy, and
swallowed it; then, with a gesture of rage, she added: "I can't
give him up! It's fate! As it is now, it will be until the end,
until he starves, or I----"
M. Fortunat's countenance wore an expression of profound
commiseration. A looker-on would have supposed him interested and
sympathetic to the last degree; but in reality, he was furious.
Time was passing, and the conversation was wandering farther and
farther from the object of his visit. "I am surprised, madame,"
said he, "that you never applied to your former employer, the
Count de Chalusse.
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