I have a hundred and forty _louis_ laid by. When you know
where Madame de Rochefide is, come and get them and follow her."

Calyste thanked the old man, whose existence he envied. But now, from
day to day, he grew morose; he seemed to love no one; all things hurt
him; he was gentle and kind to his mother only. The baroness watched
with ever increasing anxiety the progress of his madness; she alone was
able, by force of prayer and entreaty, to make him swallow food. Toward
the end of October the sick lad ceased to go even to the mall in search
of the chevalier, who now came vainly to the house to tempt him out with
the coaxing wisdom of an old man.

"We can talk of Madame de Rochefide," he would say. "I'll tell you my
first adventure."

"Your son is ill," he said privately to the baroness, on the day he
became convinced that all such efforts were useless.

Calyste replied to questions about his health that he was perfectly
well; but like all young victims of melancholy, he took pleasure in the
thought of death. He no longer left the house, but sat in the garden on
a bench, warming himself in the pale and tepid sunshine, alone with his
one thought, and avoiding all companionship.

Soon after the day when Calyste ceased to go even to Les Touches,
Felicite requested the rector of Guerande to come and see her. The
assiduity with which the Abbe Grimont called every morning at Les
Touches, and sometimes dined there, became the great topic of the
town; it was talked of all over the region, and even reached Nantes.
Nevertheless, the rector never missed a single evening at the hotel
du Guenic, where desolation reigned. Masters and servants were all
afflicted at Calyste's increasing weakness, though none of them thought
him in danger; how could it ever enter the minds of these good people
that youth might die of love? Even the chevalier had no example of such
a death among his memories of life and travel. They attributed Calyste's
thinness to want of food. His mother implored him to eat. Calyste
endeavored to conquer his repugnance in order to comfort her; but
nourishment taken against his will served only to increase the slow
fever which was now consuming the beautiful young life.

During the last days of October the cherished child of the house could
no longer mount the stairs to his chamber, and his bed was placed in
the lower hall, where he was surrounded at all hours by his family.
They sent at last for the Guerande ph