Suzanne had difficulty in hiding her palor and her distress. She pretended to have a head-ache, left the table, ran to her room and burst into tears. Why this decisive departure? Why had she not received a single warning from Marcel? No doubt, he had done it for the best, but that best was incomprehensible to her; her heart was broken, and her self-love received a cruel wound.
Soon the news arrived. The new Curé announced Marcel's change in the sermon, and said farewell for him to his parishioners. Everybody was in consternation. He might have announced the seven plagues of Egypt.
For her part Marianne received a mysterious packet which was intended for Suzanne. The priest, in cautious terms informed her of his change, and said it was necessary to wait. Wait for what? Suzanne waited.
But one morning she awoke full of dismay; she had felt something give a start in her entrails. She wrote a long letter to Marcel, and Marcel answered: Wait.
"The white ground and the gloomy sky Blended their heads sepulchral; The rough north winds of winter Breathed to the heart despair."
Weeks and then months passed away. One rainy winter's evening a young woman, in deep mourning, with her face covered with a thick veil, stopped at the Curé of St. Marie's door.
She had hesitated for a long time; several times she had passed in front of the tall gray house, casting a furtive glance on the lofty windows, slackening her walk and seeming to say: "Ought I to go in? Yes, I must go in." But each time she pursued her way again. At length, as the rain kept falling ever colder as night came on, she controlled herself by en effort, slowly retraced her step and rang gently.
The door was opened at once, and an old woman with a face the colour of leather, invited her in mysteriously, "Whom shall I announce?" she asked.--"Do not announce me. I am expected."
The old woman smiled discreetly and showed her into a large parlour, the door of which she closed upon her.
It was a bare wainscoted room, gloomy, lighted by two candle-ends.
A _prie-Dieu_, a table, some straw chairs, a few rows of old books on shelves painted black, composed all the furniture.
A large crucifix of wood which stretched its thin arms from one window to the other, contributed no little to give a sorrowful and monastic look to the room.