pose he were to resemble Limousin, ...
after all!"
There was something strange working within him, a fierce feeling, a
poignant and violent sensation of cold in his whole body, in all his
limbs, as if his bones had suddenly been turned to ice. Oh! if he were
to resemble Limousin and he continued to look at George, who was
laughing now. He looked at him with haggard, troubled eyes, and he tried
to discover whether there was any likeness in his forehead, in his nose,
mouth or cheeks. His thoughts wandered like they do when a person is
going mad, and his child's face changed in his eyes, and assumed a
strange look, and unlikely resemblances.
Julie had said: "A blind man could not be mistaken in him." There must,
therefore, be something striking, an undeniable likeness! But what? The
forehead? Yes, perhaps, Limousin's forehead, however, was narrower. The
mouth then? But Limousin wore a beard, and how could any one verify the
likeness between the fat chin of the child, and the hairy chin of that
man?
Parent thought: "I cannot see anything now, I am too much upset;
I could not recognize anything at present ... I must wait; I must
look at him well to-morrow morning, when I am getting up." And
immediately afterwards he said to himself: "But if he is like me,
I shall be saved! saved!" And he crossed the drawing-room in two strides,
to examine the child's face by the side of his own in the looking-glass.
He had George on his arm, so that their faces might be close together,
and he spoke out loud almost without knowing it. "Yes ... we have the
same nose ... the same nose ... perhaps, but that is not sure ... and
the same look ... But no, he has blue eyes ... Then good heavens! I shall
go mad ... I cannot see anything more ... I am going mad!..."
He went away from the glass to the other end of the drawing-room, and
putting the child into an easy chair, he fell into another and began to
cry; and he sobbed so violently that George, who was frightened at
hearing him, immediately began to scream.
The hall bell rang, and Parent gave a bound as if a bullet had gone
through him. "There she is," he said ... "What shall I do? ..." And he
ran and locked himself up in his room, so at any rate to have time to
bathe his eyes. But in a few moments another ring at the bell made him
jump again, and he remembered that Julie had left, without the housemaid
knowing it, and so nobody would go to open the door. What was he to do?
He went him
|