ne anything. She went to her table
and wrote, under the spur of a tender, and plaintive violence, a letter
wherein she repeated like a groan: "I love you, I love you! I never have
loved any one but you. You are alone, alone--do you hear?--in my mind,
in me. Do not think of what that wretched man said. Listen to me! I
never loved any one, I swear, any one, before you."

As she was writing, the soft sigh of the sea accompanied her own sigh.
She wished to say, she believed she was saying, real things; and all
that she was saying was true of the truth of her love. She heard the
heavy step of her father on the stairway. She hid her letter and opened
the door. Montessuy asked her whether she felt better.

"I came," he said, "to say good-night to you, and to ask you something.
It is probable that I shall meet Le Menil at the races. He goes there
every year. If I meet him, darling, would you have any objection to my
inviting him to come here for a few days? Your husband thinks he would
be agreeable company for you. We might give him the blue room."

"As you wish. But I should prefer that you keep the blue room for Paul
Vence, who wishes to come. It is possible, too, that Choulette may come
without warning. It is his habit. We shall see him some morning ringing
like a beggar at the gate. You know my husband is mistaken when he
thinks Le Menil pleases me. And then I must go to Paris next week for
two or three days."

CHAPTER XXIX. JEALOUSY

Twenty-four hours after writing her letter, Therese went from Dinard
to the little house in the Ternes. It had not been difficult for her to
find a pretext to go to Paris. She had made the trip with her husband,
who wanted to see his electors whom the Socialists were working over.
She surprised Jacques in the morning, at the studio, while he was
sketching a tall figure of Florence weeping on the shore of the Arno.

The model, seated on a very high stool, kept her pose. She was a long,
dark girl. The harsh light which fell from the skylight gave precision
to the pure lines of her hip and thighs, accentuated her harsh visage,
her dark neck, her marble chest, the lines of her knees and feet,
the toes of which were set one over the other. Therese looked at her
curiously, divining her exquisite form under the miseries of her flesh,
poorly fed and badly cared for.

Dechartre came toward Therese with an air of painful tenderness which
moved her. Then, placing his clay and the instrument