there enrages me. And you, mademoiselle, do you approve of that
cookery?"

At last Clotilde raised her head quickly, yielding to the flood of
passion that swept over her.

"Listen; I wish to know no more about it than you do, but I think that
he is on a very dangerous path. He no longer loves us."

"Oh, yes, mademoiselle; he loves us."

"No, no; not as we love him. If he loved us, he would be here with us,
instead of endangering his soul and his happiness and ours, up there,
in his desire to save everybody."

And the two women looked at each other for a moment with eyes burning
with affection, in their jealous anger. Then they resumed their work
in silence, enveloped in shadow.

Above, in his room, Dr. Pascal was working with the serenity of
perfect joy. He had practised his profession for only about a dozen
years, from his return to Paris up to the time when he had retired to
La Souleiade. Satisfied with the hundred and odd thousand francs which
he had earned and which he had invested prudently, he devoted himself
almost exclusively to his favorite studies, retaining only a practise
among friends, never refusing to go to the bedside of a patient but
never sending in his account. When he was paid he threw the money into
a drawer in his writing desk, regarding this as pocket-money for his
experiments and caprices, apart from his income which sufficed for his
wants. And he laughed at the bad reputation for eccentricity which his