" How late you are today, friend Mintie ! I have prepared some nice sea-crab for you ! "

" Leave me alone, you drivelling woman ! " I shouted. " I don't want your sea-crab, I don't want anything, do you hear me?"

And sputtering angry words, I brutally made her step aside to let me pass. The poor kindly woman, stupefied by my action, lifted her arms to heaven and moaned.

" Ah ! My Lord ! Ah, Jesus ! "

I went to my room and locked myself in. At first I rolled on the bed, smashed two chairs, beat my head against the wall. Then, I suddenly sat down to write a letter to Juliette, exalted, raging, full of terrible threats and humble entreaties; a letter in which I spoke of killing her, of forgiving her, in which I begged her to come to see me before I died, describing to her in tragic detail the cliff from which I was going to throw myself into the sea. I compared her to the lowest women in the brothel and two lines further I compared her to the Holy Virgin. More than twenty times I started this letter over again, excited, weeping, in turn delirious with rage and swooning with tenderness. Presently I heard a noise behind the door like the scratching of a mouse. I opened it. Mother Le Gannec was standing there, trembling and pale; she looked at me with her kind, bewildered eyes.

"What are you doing here?" I shouted. "Why do you spy on me ? Go away ! "

" Friend Mintie," muttered the sainted woman, "don't be angry. I can see that you are unhappy and I came to know if I can help you ! "

" Well, suppose I am unhappy ! Does that concern you? Here, take this letter to the post office and leave me in peace."

For four days I did not leave my roo