not realize what I was doing until the town had disappeared
and the solitude of the road recalled to me the emptiness of my heart.
Then my tears again began to flow.

My father had realized that words, even from him, would do nothing to
console me, and he let me weep without saying a word, only sometimes
pressing my hand, as if to remind me that I had a friend at my side.

At night I slept a little. I dreamed of Marguerite.

I woke with a start, not recalling why I was in the carriage. Then the
truth came back upon me, and I let my head sink on my breast. I dared
not say anything to my father. I was afraid he would say, "You see I was
right when I declared that this woman did not love you." But he did not
use his advantage, and we reached C. without his having said anything
to me except to speak of matters quite apart from the event which had
occasioned my leaving Paris.

When I embraced my sister, I remembered what Marguerite had said about
her in her letter, and I saw at once how little my sister, good as she
was, would be able to make me forget my mistress.

Shooting had begun, and my father thought that it would be a distraction
for me. He got up shooting parties with friends and neighbours. I went
without either reluctance or enthusiasm, with that sort of apathy into
which I had sunk since my departure.

We were beating about for game and I was given my post. I put down my
unloaded gun at my side, and meditated. I watched the clouds pass. I
let my thought wander over the solitary plains, and from time to time I
heard some one call to me and point to a hare not ten paces off. None of
these details escaped my father, and he was not deceived by my exterior
calm. He was well aware that, broken as I now was, I should some day
experience a terrible reaction, which might be dangerous, and, without
seeming to make any effort to console me, he did his utmost to distract
my thoughts.

My sister, naturally, knew nothing of what had happened, and she could
not understand how it was that I, who had formerly been so lighthearted,
had suddenly become so sad and dreamy.

Sometimes, surprising in the midst of my sadness my father's anxious
scrutiny, I pressed his hand as if to ask him tacitly to forgive me for
the pain which, in spite of myself, I was giving him.

Thus a month passed, but at the end of that time I could endure it no
longer. The memory of Marguerite pursued me unceasingly. I had loved,
I still loved this