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recounted many a charming anecdote, many a particular, still glowing with

the flame of ardent friendship. Little by little, amidst the weak languor

of convalescence, the son had thus beheld an embodiment of charming

simplicity, affection, and good nature rising up before him. It was his

father such as he had really been, not the man of stern science whom he

had pictured whilst listening to his mother. Certainly she had never

taught him aught but respect for that dear memory; but had not her

husband been the unbeliever, the man who denied, and made the angels

weep, the artisan of impiety who sought to change the world that God had

made? And so he had long remained a gloomy vision, a spectre of damnation

prowling about the house, whereas now he became the house's very light,

clear and gay, a worker consumed by a longing for truth, who had never

desired anything but the love and happiness of all. For his part, Doctor

Chassaigne, a Pyrenean by birth, born in a far-off secluded village where

folks still believed in sorceresses, inclined rather towards religion,

although he had not set his foot inside a church during the forty years

he had been living in Paris. However, his conviction was absolute: if

there were a heaven somewhere, Michel Froment was assuredly there, and

not merely there, but seated upon a throne on the Divinity's right hand.

Then Pierre, in a few minutes, again lived through the frightful torment

which, during two long months, had ravaged him. It was not that he had

found controversial works of an anti-religious character in the bookcase,

or that his father, whose papers he sorted, had ever gone beyond his

technical studies as a _savant_. But little by little, despite himself,

the light of science dawned upon him, an _ensemble_ of proven phenomena,

which demolished dogmas and left within him nothing of the things which

as a priest he should have believed. It seemed, in fact, as though

illness had renewed him, as though he were again beginning to live and

learn amidst the physical pleasantness of convalescence, that still

subsisting weakness which lent penetrating lucidity to his brain. At the

seminary, by the advice of his masters, he had always kept the spirit of

inquiry, his thirst for knowledge, in check. Much of that which was

taught him there had surprised him; however, he had succeeded in making

the sacrifice of his mind required of his piety. But now, all the

laboriously raised scaffolding of dogmas was swept away in a revolt of

that sovereign mind which clamoured for its rights, and which he could no

longer silence. Truth was bubbling up and overflowing in such an

irresistible stream that he realised he would never succeed in lodging

error in his brain again. It was indeed the total and irreparable ruin of

faith. Although he had been able to kill his flesh by renouncing the

romance of his youth, although he felt that he had altogether mastered

carnal passion, he now knew that it would be impossible for him to make

the sacrifice of his intelligence. And he was not mistaken; it was indeed

his father again springing to life in the depths of his being, and at

last obtaining the mastery in that dual heredity in which, during so many

years, his mother had dominated. The upper part of his face, his

straight, towering brow, seemed to have risen yet higher, whilst the

lower part, the small chin, the affectionate mouth, were becoming less

distinct. However, he suffered; at certain twilight hours when his

kindliness, his need of love awoke, he felt distracted with grief at no

longer believing, distracted with desire to believe again; and it was

necessary that the lighted lamp should be brought in, that he should see

clearly around him and within him, before he could recover the energy and

calmness of reason, the strength of martyrdom, the determination to

sacrifice everything to the peace of his conscience.

Then came the crisis. He was a priest and he no longer believed. This had

suddenly dawned before him like a bottomless abyss. It was the end of his

life, the collapse of everything. What should he do? Did not simple

rectitude require that he should throw off the cassock and return to the

world? But he had seen some renegade priests and had despised them. A

married priest with whom he was acquainted filled him with disgust. All

this, no doubt, was but a survival of his long religious training. He

retained the notion that a priest cannot, must not, weaken; the idea that

when one has dedicated oneself to God one cannot take possession of

oneself again. Possibly, also, he felt that he was too plainly branded,

too different from other men already, to prove otherwise than awkward and

unwelcome among them. Since he had been cut off from them he would remain

apart in his grievous pride; And, after days of anguish, days of struggle

incessantly renewed, in which his thirst for happiness warred with the

energies of his returning health, he took the heroic resolution to remain

a priest, and an honest one. He would find the strength necessary for

such abnegation. Since he had conquered the flesh, albeit unable to

conquer the brain, he felt sure of keeping his vow of chastity, and that

would be unshakable; therein lay the pure, upright life which he was

absolutely certain of living. What mattered the rest if he alone

suffered, if nobody in the world suspected that his heart was reduced to

ashes, that nothing remained of his faith, that he was agonising amidst

fearful falsehood? His rectitude would prove a firm prop; he would follow

his priestly calling like an honest man, without breaking any of the vows

he had taken; he would, in due accordance with the rites, discharge his

duties as a minister of the Divinity, whom he would praise and glorify at

the altar, and distribute as the Bread of Life to the faithful. Who,

then, would dare to impute his loss of faith to him as a crime, even if

this great misfortune should some day become known? And what more could

be asked of him than lifelong devotion to his vow, regard for his

ministry, and the practice of every charity without the hope of any

future reward? In this wise he ended by calming himself, still upright,

still bearing his head erect, with the desolate grandeur of the priest

who himself no longer believes, but continues watching over the faith of

others. And he certainly was not alone; he felt that he had many

brothers, priests with ravaged minds, who had sunk into incredulity, and

who yet, like soldiers without a fatherland, remained at the altar, and,

despite, everything, found the courage to make the divine illusion shine

forth above the kneeling crowds.

On recovering his health Pierre had immediately resumed his service at

the little church of Neuilly. He said his mass there every morning. But

he had resolved to refuse any appointment, any preferment. Months and

years went by, and he obstinately insisted on remaining the least known

and the most humble of those priests who are tolerated in a parish, who

appear and disappear after discharging their duty. The acceptance of any

appointment would have seemed to him an aggravation of his falsehood, a

theft from those who were more deserving than himself. And he had to

resist frequent offers, for it was impossible for his merits to remain

unnoticed. Indeed, his obstinate modesty provoked astonishment at the

archbishop's palace, where there was a desire to utilise the power which

could be divined in him. Now and again, it is true, he bitterly regretted

that he was not useful, that he did not co-operate in some great work, in

furthering the purification of the world, the salvation and happiness of

all, in accordance with his own ardent, torturing desire. Fortunately his

time was nearly all his own, and to console himself he gave rein to his

passion for work by devouring every volume in his father's bookcase, and

then again resuming and considering his studies, feverishly preoccupied

with regard to the history of nations, full of a desire to explore the

depths of the social and religious crisis so that he might ascertain

whether it were really beyond remedy.

It was at this time, whilst rummaging one morning in one of the large

drawers in the lower part of the bookcase, that he discovered quite a

collection of papers respecting the apparitions of Lourdes. It was a very

complete set of documents, comprising detailed notes of the

interrogatories to which Bernadette had been subjected, copies of

numerous official documents, and police and medical reports, in addition

to many private and confidential letters of the greatest interest. This

discovery had surprised Pierre, and he had questioned, Doctor Chassaigne

concerning it. The latter thereupon remembered that his friend, Michel

Froment, had at one time passionately devoted himself to the study of

Bernadette's case; and he himself, a native of the village near Lourdes,

had procured for the chemist a portion of the documents in the

collection. Pierre, in his turn, then became impassioned, and for a whole

month continued studying the affair, powerfully attracted by the

visionary's pure, upright nature, but indignant with all that had

subsequently sprouted up--the barbarous fetishism, the painful

superstitions, and the triumphant simony. In the access of unbelief which

had come upon him, this story of Lourdes was certainly of a nature to

complete the collapse of his faith. However, it had also excited his

curiosity, and he would have liked to investigate it, to establish beyond

dispute what scientific truth might be in it, and render pure

Christianity the service of ridding it of this scoria, this fairy tale,

all touching and childish as it was. But he had been obliged to

relinquish his studies, shrinking from the necessity of making a journey

to the Grotto, and finding that it would be extremely difficult to obtain

the information which he still needed; and of it all there at last only

remained within him a tender feeling for Bernadette, of whom he could not

think without a sensation of delightful charm and infinite pity.

The days went by, and Pierre led a more and more lonely life. Doctor

Chassaigne had just left for the Pyrenees in a state of mortal anxiety.

Abandoning his patients, he had set out for Cauterets with his ailing

wife, who was sinking more and more each day, to the infinite distress of

both his charming daughter and himself. From that moment the little house

at Neuilly fell into deathlike silence and emptiness. Pierre had no other

distraction than that of occasionally going to see the Guersaints, who

had long since left the neighbouring house, but whom he had found again

in a small lodging in a wretched tenement of the district. And the memory

of his first visit to them there was yet so fresh within him, that he

felt a pang at his heart as he recalled his emotion at sight of the

hapless Marie.

That pang roused him from his reverie, and on looking round he perceived

Marie stretched on the seat, even as he had found her on the day which he

recalled, already imprisoned in that gutter-like box, that coffin to

which wheels were adapted when she was taken out-of-doors for an airing.

She, formerly so brimful of life, ever astir and laughing, was dying of

inaction and immobility in that box. Of her old-time beauty she had

retained nothing save her hair, which clad her as with a royal mantle,

and she was so emaciated that she seemed to have grown smaller again, to

have become once more a child. And what was most distressing was the

expression on her pale face, the blank, frigid stare of her eyes which

did not see, the ever haunting absent look, as of one whom suffering

overwhelmed. However, she noticed that Pierre was gazing at her, and at

once desired to smile at him; but irresistible moans escaped her, and

when she did at last smile, it was like a poor smitten creature who is

convinced that she will expire before the miracle takes place. He was

overcome by it, and, amidst all the sufferings with which the carriage

abounded, hers were now the only ones that he beheld and heard, as though

one and all were summed up in her, in the long and terrible agony of her

beauty, gaiety, and youth.

Then by degrees, without taking his eyes from Marie, he again reverted to

former days, again lived those hours, fraught with a mournful and bitter

charm, which he had often spent beside her, when he called at the sorry

lodging to keep her company. M. de Guersaint had finally ruined himself

by trying to improve the artistic quality of the religious prints so

widely sold in France, the faulty execution of which quite irritated him.

His last resources had been swallowed up in the failure of a

colour-printing firm; and, heedless as he was, deficient in foresight,

ever trusting in Providence, his childish mind continually swayed by

illusions, he did not notice the awful pecuniary embarrassment of the

household; but applied himself to the study of aerial navigation, without

even realising what prodigious activity his elder daughter, Blanche, was

forced to display, in order to earn the living of her two children, as

she was wont to call her father and her sister. It was Blanche who, by

running about Paris in the dust or the mud from morning to evening in

order to give French or music lessons, contrived to provide the money

necessary for the unremitting attentions which Marie required. And Marie

often experienced attacks of despair--bursting into tears and accusing

herself of being the primary cause of their ruin, as for years and years

now it had been necessary to pay for medical attendance and for taking

her to almost every imaginable spring--La Bourboule, Aix, Lamalou,

Amelie-les-Bains, and others. And the outcome of ten years of varied

diagnosis and treatment was that the doctors had now abandoned her. Some

thought her illness to be due to the rupture of certain ligaments, others

believed in the presence of a tumour, others again to paralysis due to

injury to the spinal cord, and as she, with maidenly revolt, refused to

undergo any examination, and they did not even dare to address precise

questions to her, they each contented themselves with their several