business to sacrifice himself like that. What was done was done. Mathilde must accommodate herself somehow. He would tell her that it wouldn't do, that the Hague was killing him, that he must go back to the house out there, to the village, to the district where he was of use and able to work. She would have to go with him.
But he saw her, as a sacrificial victim, offered up for a faith which she did not share, because of his mistake in life. No, no, he could never do it, could never tell her that the Hague was killing him, that she must accommodate herself and make the best of things. It was for him, for him to make the best of things: if he wished to remain in any sense just, he must continue to sacrifice himself, though it wore him to death.
How sombre and joyless it all was! How grey it all was, far and wide around him, like the very night that hung pearl-white close by and, farther away, dug itself into abysses of threatening darkness!
As he drew nearer home, his feet lagged more heavily. And suddenly, before turning down the street in which he lived, he dropped on to a bench and remained sitting as though paralyzed, with his head in his hand.
How hard and heavy it was for him, to have to go back like that to his own house! Oh, to remain sitting, just sitting like that until he had attained certain knowledge! He closed his eyes.
He felt himself conquered, overcome. . . . Suddenly, as in a dream, voices struck upon his ear; and he seemed to recognize the voices. He rose mechanically and, past the houses, along the silent pavement, saw approaching the dark figures of two people walking slowly, a man and a woman. Their voices sounded clearly, though he could not catch
