Chapter 54 - Page 2

the same spot. Roland, with dry eyes but a breaking heart--he would have given much for tears in which to drown his sorrow--kissed his sister as his mother and little brother had done. She seemed as insensible to this kiss as to the preceding ones.

Edouard left the room, followed by Madame de Montrevel and Roland. Just as they reached the door they stopped, quivering. They had heard the name of Roland, uttered in a low but distinct tone.

Roland turned. Amélie called him a second time.

"Did you call me, Amélie?" he asked.

"Yes," replied the dying girl.

"Alone, or with my mother?"

"Alone."

That voice, devoid of emphasis, yet perfectly intelligible, had something glacial about it; it was like an echo from another world.

"Go, mother," said Roland. "You see that she wishes to be alone with me."

"O my God!" murmured Madame de Montrevel, "can there still be hope?"

Low as these words were, the dying girl heard them.

"No, mother," she said. "God has permitted me to see my brother again; but to-night I go to Him."

Madame de Montrevel groaned.

"Roland, Roland!" she said, "she is there already."

Roland signed to her to leave them alone, and she went away with little Edouard. Roland closed the door, and returned to his sister's bedside with unutterable emotion.

Her body was already stiffening in death; the breath from her lips would scarcely have dimmed a mirror; the eyes only, wide-open, were fixed and brilliant, as though the whole remaining life of the body, dead before its time, were centred, there. Roland had heard of this strange state called ecstasy, which is nothing else than catalepsy. He saw that Amélie was a victim of that preliminary death.

"I am here, sister," he said. "What can I do for you?"

"I knew you would come," she replied, still without moving, "and I waited for you."

"How did you know that I was coming?" asked Roland.

"I saw you coming."

Roland shuddered.

"Did you know why I was coming?" he asked.

"Yes; I prayed God so earnestly in my heart that He gave me strength to rise and write to you."

"When was that?"

"Last night."

"Where is the letter?"

"Under my pillow. Take it, and read it."

Roland hesitated an instant. Was his sister delirious?

"Poor Amélie!" he murmured.

"Do not pity me," she said, "I go to join him."

"Whom?" asked Roland.

"Him whom I loved, and whom you killed."