state fit for travelling."

Days passed; he made no further allusion to the voyage. He was serious,
silent, and cold. The active ardor, almost feverish, which had animated
until then his life, his speech, his eyes, was suddenly quenched. One
symptom which disquieted the Marquise above all was the absolute idleness
to which he now abandoned himself.

He left her in the evening at an early hour. Daniel told the Marquise
that the Count worked no longer; that he heard him pacing up and down the
greater part of the night. At the same time his health failed visibly.
The Marquise ventured once to interrogate him. As they were both walking
one day in the park, she said:

"You are hiding something from me. You suffer, my friend. What is the
cause?"

"There is nothing."

"I pray you tell me!"

"Nothing is the matter with me," he replied, petulantly.

"Is it your son that you regret?"

"I regret nothing." After a few steps taken in silence--" When I think,"
he said, quickly, "that there is one person in the world who considers me
a coward--for I hear always that word in my ear--and who treated me like
a coward, and who believed it when it was said, and believes it still!
If it had been a man, it would be easy, but it was a woman."