"'Here the lover gave an impatient growl, as a man annoyed by so much
delay.

"'The woman said no more, I heard a door open, I felt the warm air of
the house, and we stole in like thieves. Presently the girl's light
hand removed the bandage. I found myself in a lofty and spacious room,
badly lighted by a smoky lamp. The window was open, but the jealous
husband had fitted it with iron bars. I was in the bottom of a sack,
as it were.

"'On the ground a woman was lying on a mat; her head was covered with
a muslin veil, but I could see her eyes through it full of tears and
flashing with the brightness of stars; she held a handkerchief in her
mouth, biting it so hard that her teeth were set in it: I never saw
finer limbs, but her body was writhing with pain like a harp-string
thrown on the fire. The poor creature had made a sort of struts of her
legs by setting her feet against a chest of drawers, and with both
hands she held on to the bar of a chair, her arms outstretched, with
every vein painfully swelled. She might have been a criminal
undergoing torture. But she did not utter a cry; there was not a
sound, all three speechless and motionless. The husband snored with
reassuring regularity. I wanted to study the waiting-woman's face, but
she had put on a mask, which she had removed, no doubt, during our
drive, and I could see nothing but a pair of black eyes and a
pleasingly rounded figure.

"'The lover threw some towels over his mistress' legs and folded the
muslin veil double over her face. As soon as I had examined the lady
with care, I perceived from certain symptoms which I had noted once
before on a very sad occasion in my life, that the infant was dead. I