He looked
very pale, and his teeth were chattering. His eyes stared
vacantly, and his features had an almost idiotic expression.
"Pascal, what has happened to you?" she asked.
He trembled from head to foot as the sound of her voice suddenly
roused him from his stupor. "Nothing," he stammered; "nothing at
all." And as his mother pressed him with questions, he pushed her
gently aside and went on to his room.
"Poor child!" murmured Madame Ferailleur, at once grieved and
reassured; "and he is always so temperate. Some one must have
forced him to drink."
She was entirely wrong in her surmise, and yet Pascal's sensations
were exactly like those of an intoxicated man. How he had
returned home, by what road, and what had happened on the way, he
could not tell. He had found his way back mechanically, merely by
force of habit--physical memory, as it might be called. He had a
vague impression, however, that he had sat down for some time on a
bench in the Champs-Elysees, that he had felt extremely cold, and
that he had been accosted by a policeman, who threatened him with
arrest if he did not move on. The last thing he could clearly
recollect was rushing from Madame d'Argeles's house in the Rue de
Berry. He knew that he had descended the staircase slowly and
deliberately; that the servants in the vestibule had stood aside
to allow him to pass; and that, while crossing the courtyard, he
had thrown away the candelabrum with which he had defended
himself.
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