hall never forget the great laceration of life.

The night lamp was placed so that the bed was plunged in shadow. I
could no longer see the mother. I no longer knew her. I believed in
her.

CHAPTER XI

The woman who had been confined was moved with exquisite care into the
next room, which she had occupied previously. It was larger and more
comfortable.

They cleaned the room from top to bottom, and I saw Anna and Philip
seated in the room again.

"Take care, Philip," Anna was saying, "you do not understand the
Christian religion. You really do not know /exactly/ what it is. You
speak of it," she added, with a smile, "as women speak of men, or as
men when they try to explain women. Its fundamental element is love.
It is a covenant of love between human beings who instinctively detest
one another. It is also a wealth of love in our hearts to which we
respond naturally when we are little children. Later all our
tenderness is added to it bit by bit, like treasure to treasure. It is
a law of outpouring to which we give ourselves up, and it is the source
of that outpouring. It is life, it is almost a work, it is almost a
human being."

"But, my dear Anna, that is not the Christian religion. That is you."

. . . . .

In the middle of the night, I heard talking through the partition. I
struggled with my sleepiness and got up.

The man was alone, in bed. A lamp was burning dimly. He was asleep
and talking in his sleep.

He smiled and said "No!" three times with growing ecstasy. Then his
smile at the vision he saw faded away. For a moment his face remained
set, as if he were waiting, then he looked terrified, and his mouth
opened. "Anna! Ah, ah!--Ah, ah!" he cried through gaping lips. At this
he awoke and rolled his eyes. He sighed and quieted down. He sat up
in bed, still struck and terrified by what had passed through his mind
a few seconds before.

He looked round at everything to calm himself and banish his nightmare
completely. The familiar sight of the room, with the lamp, so wise and
motionless, enthroned in the middle, reassured him. It was balm to
this man who had just seen what does not exist, who had just smiled at
phantoms and touched them, who had just been mad.

. . . . .

I rose the next morning, all broken up. I was restless. I had a
severe headache. My eyes were bloodshot. When I looked at them in the
mirror, it was as if I saw them through a veil of blood.