same
instinctive perception of evil, that magnetic terror which slumbering
misers experience when a thief prowls around their hidden treasure; it
seemed as if some one wished to rob me of my happiness.

We were embarrassed in each other's presence; some one acted as a
restraint upon us. Who was it? No one was there but Raymond, one of my
best friends, who had arrived the evening before and was soon to depart
in order to marry his cousin, young, pretty and rich! It is singular
that he, so gentle, so confiding, so unreserved, so chivalrous, should
have appeared to me sharp, taciturn, rough, almost dull,--and my
feelings towards him were full of bitterness and spite. Can friendship
be but lukewarm hate? I fear so, for I often felt a savage desire to
quarrel with Raymond and seize him by the throat. He talked of a blade
of grass, a fly, of the most indifferent object, and I felt wounded as
if by a personality. Everything he did offended me; if he stood up I was
indignant, if he sat down I became furious; every movement of his seemed
a provocation; why did I not perceive this sooner? How does it happen
that the man for whom I entertain such a strong natural aversion should
have been my friend for ten years? How strange that I should not have
been aware of this antipathy sooner!

And you, ordinarily so natural, so easy in your manners, became
constrained; you scarcely answered me when he was present. The simplest
expression agitated you; it seemed as if you had to give an account to
some one of every word, and that you were afraid of a scolding, like a
young girl who is brought by her mother into the drawing-room for the
first time.

One evening, I was sitting by you on the sofa, reading to you that
sublime elegy of the great poet, La Tristesse d'Olympio; Raymond
entered. You rose abruptly, like a guilty child, assumed an humble and
repentant attitude, asking forgiveness with your eyes. In what secret
compact, what hidden covenant, had you failed?

The look with which Raymond answered yours doubtless contained your
pardon, for you resumed your seat, but moved away from me so as not to
abuse the accorded grace; I continued to read, but you no longer
listened--you were absorbed in a delicious revery through which floated
vaguely the lines of the poet. I was at your feet, and never have I felt
so far away from you. The space between us, too narrow for another to
occupy, was an abyss.

What invisible hand dashed me down fro