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Why did not Weiss return? He had pledged himself so faithfully not to outstay the first attack! And Henriette began to be seriously alarmed, depicting to herself the various obstacles that might have detained him: perhaps he had not been able to leave the village, perhaps the roads were blocked or rendered impassable by the projectiles. It might even be that something had happened him, but she put the thought aside and would not dwell on it, preferring to view things on their brighter side and finding in hope her safest mainstay and reliance. For an instant she harbored the design of starting out and trying to find her husband, but there were considerations that seemed to render that course inadvisable: supposing him to have started on his return, what would become of her should she miss him on the way? and what would be his anxiety should he come in and find her absent? Her guiding principle in all her thoughts and actions was her gentle, affectionate devotedness, and she saw nothing strange or out of the way in a visit to Bazeilles under such extraordinary circumstances, accustomed as she was, like an affectionate little woman, to perform her duty in silence and do the thing that she deemed best for their common interest. Where her husband was, there was her place; that was all there was about it.

She gave a sudden start and left the window, saying:

“Monsieur Delaherche, how could I forget–”

It had just come to her recollection that the cloth manufacturer had also passed the night at Bazeilles, and if he had returned would be able to give her the intelligence she wanted. She ran swiftly down the stairs again. In place of taking the more roundabout way by the Rue des Voyards, she crossed the little courtyard of her house and entered the passage that conducted to the huge structure that fronted on the Rue Maqua. As she came out into the great central garden, paved with flagstones now and retaining of its pristine glories only a few venerable trees, magnificent century-old elms, she was astonished to see a sentry mounting guard at the door of a carriage-house; then it occurred to her that she had been told the day before that the camp chests of the 7th corps had been deposited there for safe keeping, and it produced a strange impression on her mind that all the gold, millions, it was said to amount to, should be lying in that shed while the men for whom it was destined were being killed not far away. As she was about to ascend the private staircase, however, that conducted to the apartment of Gilberte, young Madame Delaherche, she experienced another surprise in an encounter that startled her so that she retraced her steps a little way, doubtful whether it would not be better to abandon her intention, and go home again. An officer, a captain, had crossed her path, as noiselessly as a phantom and vanishing as swiftly, and yet she had had time to recognize him, having seen him in the past at Gilberte’s house in Charleville, in the days when she was still Madame Maginot. She stepped back a few steps in the courtyard and raised her eyes to the two tall windows of the bedroom, the blinds of which were closed, then dismissed her scruples and entered.

Upon reaching the first floor, availing herself of that privilege of old acquaintanceship by virtue of which one woman often drops in upon another for an unceremonious early morning chat, she was about to knock at the door of the dressing-room, but apparently someone had left the room hastily and failed to secure the door, so that it was standing ajar, and all she had to do was give it a push to find herself in the dressing room, whence she passed into the bedroom. From the lofty ceiling of the latter apartment depended voluminous curtains of red velvet, protecting the large double bed. The warm, moist air was fragrant with a faint perfume of Persian lilac, and there was no sound to break the silence save a gentle, regular respiration, scarcely audible.