mount to her face. I saw her heart beaming.

They discussed the phenomena of occultism and the Beyond. "Who knows?"
some one said. Then they discussed death. Two diners, at opposite
ends of the table, a man and a woman who had not spoken to each other
and seemed not to be acquainted, exchanged a glance that I caught. And
seeing that glance leap from their eyes at the same time, under the
shock of the idea of death, I understood that these two loved each
other.

. . . . .

The meal was over. The young people went into the parlour. A lawyer
was telling some people around him about a murder case that had been
decided that day. The nature of the subject was such that he expressed
himself very cautiously, as though confiding a secret. A man had
injured and then murdered a little girl and had kept singing at the top
of his voice to prevent the cries of his little victim from being
heard. One by one the people stopped talking and listened with the air
of really not listening, while those not so close to the speaker felt
like drawing up right next to him. About this image risen in their
midst, this paroxysm so frightful to our timid instincts, the silence
spread in a circle in their souls like a terrific noise.

Then I heard the laugh of a woman, of an honest woman, a dry crackling
laugh, which she thought innocent perhaps, but which caressed her whole
being, a burst of laughter, which, made up of formless instinctive
cries, was almost fleshy. She stopped and turned, silent again. And
the speaker, sure of his effect, continued in a calm voice to hurl upon
these people the story of the monster's confession.