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go back to Paris without me. They have to go, however, for life at the

hotel is no longer bearable; and besides, if I kept them with me, and the

railway people won't listen to reason, I should have to pay three extra

fares. And to make matters worse, my wife hasn't got much brains. I'm

afraid she won't be able to manage things properly."

Then, almost breathless, he overwhelmed Madame Vigneron with the most

minute instructions--what she was to do during the journey, how she was

to get back home on arriving in Paris, and what steps she was to take if

Gustave was to have another attack. Somewhat scared, she responded, in

all docility, to each recommendation: "Yes, yes, dear--of course, dear,

of course."

But all at once her husband's rage came back to him. "After all," he

shouted, "what I want to know is whether my return ticket be good or not!

I must know for certain! They must find that station-master for me!"

He was already on the point of rushing away through the crowd, when he

noticed Gustave's crutch lying on the platform. This was disastrous, and

he raised his eyes to heaven as though to call Providence to witness that

he would never be able to extricate himself from such awful

complications. And, throwing the crutch to his wife, he hurried off,

distracted and shouting, "There, take it! You forget everything!"

The sick pilgrims were now flocking into the station, and, as on the

occasion of their arrival, there was plenty of disorderly carting along

the platform and across the lines. All the abominable ailments, all the

sores, all the deformities, went past once more, neither their gravity

nor their number seeming to have decreased; for the few cures which had

been effected were but a faint inappreciable gleam of light amidst the

general mourning. They were taken back as they had come. The little

carts, laden with helpless old women with their bags at their feet,

grated over the rails. The stretchers on which you saw inflated bodies

and pale faces with glittering eyes, swayed amidst the jostling of the

throng. There was wild and senseless haste, indescribable confusion,

questions, calls, sudden running, all the whirling of a flock which

cannot find the entrance to the pen. And the bearers ended by losing

their heads, no longer knowing which direction to take amidst the warning

cries of the porters, who at each moment were frightening people,

distracting them with anguish. "Take care, take care over there! Make

haste! No, no, don't cross! The Toulouse train, the Toulouse train!"

Retracing his steps, Pierre again perceived the ladies, Madame de

Jonquiere and the others, still gaily chatting together. Lingering near

them, he listened to Berthaud, whom Father Fourcade had stopped, to

congratulate him on the good order which had been maintained throughout

the pilgrimage. The ex-public prosecutor was now bowing his thanks,

feeling quite flattered by this praise. "Is it not a lesson for their

Republic, your reverence?" he asked. "People get killed in Paris when

such crowds as these celebrate some bloody anniversary of their hateful

history. They ought to come and take a lesson here."

He was delighted with the thought of being disagreeable to the Government

which had compelled him to resign. He was never so happy as when women

were just saved from being knocked over amidst the great concourse of

believers at Lourdes. However, he did not seem to be satisfied with the

results of the political propaganda which he came to further there,

during three days, every year. Fits of impatience came over him, things

did not move fast enough. When did Our Lady of Lourdes mean to bring back

the monarchy?

"You see, your reverence," said he, "the only means, the real triumph,

would be to bring the working classes of the towns here _en masse_. I

shall cease dreaming, I shall devote myself to that entirely. Ah! if one

could only create a Catholic democracy!"

Father Fourcade had become very grave. His fine, intelligent eyes filled

with a dreamy expression, and wandered far away. How many times already

had he himself made the creation of that new people the object of his

efforts! But was not the breath of a new Messiah needed for the

accomplishment of such a task? "Yes, yes," he murmured, "a Catholic

democracy; ah! the history of humanity would begin afresh!"

But Father Massias interrupted him in a passionate voice, saying that all

the nations of the earth would end by coming; whilst Doctor Bonamy, who

already detected a slight subsidence of fervour among the pilgrims,

wagged his head and expressed the opinion that the faithful ones of the

Grotto ought to increase their zeal. To his mind, success especially

depended on the greatest possible measure of publicity being given to the

miracles. And he assumed a radiant air and laughed complacently whilst

pointing to the tumultuous _defile_ of the sick. "Look at them!" said he.

"Don't they go off looking better? There are a great many who, although

they don't appear to be cured, are nevertheless carrying the germs of

cure away with them; of that you may be certain! Ah! the good people;

they do far more than we do all together for the glory of Our Lady of

Lourdes!"

However, he had to check himself, for Madame Dieulafay was passing before

them, in her box lined with quilted silk. She was deposited in front of

the door of the first-class carriage, in which a maid was already placing

the luggage. Pity came to all who beheld the unhappy woman, for she did

not seem to have awakened from her prostration during her three days'

sojourn at Lourdes. What she had been when they had removed her from the

carriage on the morning of her arrival, that she also was now when the

bearers were about to place her inside it again--clad in lace, covered

with jewels, still with the lifeless, imbecile face of a mummy slowly

liquefying; and, indeed, one might have thought that she had become yet

more wasted, that she was being taken back diminished, shrunken more and

more to the proportions of a child, by the march of that horrible disease

which, after destroying her bones, was now dissolving the softened fibres

of her muscles. Inconsolable, bowed down by the loss of their last hope,

her husband and sister, their eyes red, were following her with Abbe

Judaine, even as one follows a corpse to the grave.

"No, no! not yet!" said the old priest to the bearers, in order to

prevent them from placing the box in the carriage. "She will have time

enough to roll along in there. Let her have the warmth of that lovely sky

above her till the last possible moment."

Then, seeing Pierre near him, he drew him a few steps aside, and, in a

voice broken by grief, resumed: "Ah! I am indeed distressed. Again this

morning I had a hope. I had her taken to the Grotto, I said my mass for

her, and came back to pray till eleven o'clock. But nothing came of it;

the Blessed Virgin did not listen to me. Although she cured me, a poor,

useless old man like me, I could not obtain from her the cure of this

beautiful, young, and wealthy woman, whose life ought to be a continual

_fete_. Undoubtedly the Blessed Virgin knows what she ought to do better

than ourselves, and I bow and bless her name. Nevertheless, my soul is

full of frightful sadness."

He did not tell everything; he did not confess the thought which was

upsetting him, simple, childish, worthy man that he was, whose life had

never been troubled by either passion or doubt. But his thought was that

those poor weeping people, the husband and the sister, had too many

millions, that the presents they had brought were too costly, that they

had given far too much money to the Basilica. A miracle is not to be

bought. The wealth of the world is a hindrance rather than an advantage

when you address yourself to God. Assuredly, if the Blessed Virgin had

turned a deaf ear to their entreaties, had shown them but a stern, cold

countenance, it was in order that she might the more attentively listen

to the weak voices of the lowly ones who had come to her with empty

hands, with no other wealth than their love, and these she had loaded

with grace, flooded with the glowing affection of her Divine Motherhood.

And those poor wealthy ones, who had not been heard, that sister and that

husband, both so wretched beside the sorry body they were taking away

with them, they themselves felt like pariahs among the throng of the

humble who had been consoled or healed; they seemed embarrassed by their

very luxury, and recoiled, awkward and ill at ease, covered with shame at

the thought that Our Lady of Lourdes had relieved beggars whilst never

casting a glance upon that beautiful and powerful lady agonising unto

death amidst all her lace!

All at once it occurred to Pierre that he might have missed seeing M. de

Guersaint and Marie arrive, and that they were perhaps already in the

carriage. He returned thither, but there was still only his valise on the

seat. Sister Hyacinthe and Sister Claire des Anges, however, had begun to

install themselves, pending the arrival of their charges, and as Gerard

just then brought up M. Sabathier in a little handcart, Pierre helped to

place him in the carriage, a laborious task which put both the young

priest and Gerard into a perspiration. The ex-professor, who looked

disconsolate though very calm, at once settled himself in his corner.

"Thank you, gentlemen," said he. "That's over, thank goodness. And now

they'll only have to take me out at Paris."

After wrapping a rug round his legs, Madame Sabathier, who was also

there, got out of the carriage and remained standing near the open door.

She was talking to Pierre when all at once she broke off to say: "Ah!

here's Madame Maze coming to take her seat. She confided in me the other

day, you know. She's a very unhappy little woman."

Then, in an obliging spirit, she called to her and offered to watch over

her things. But Madame Maze shook her head, laughed, and gesticulated as

though she were out of her senses.

"No, no, I am not going," said she.

"What! you are not going back?"

"No, no, I am not going--that is, I am, but not with you, not with you!"

She wore such an extraordinary air, she looked so bright, that Pierre and

Madame Sabathier found it difficult to recognise her. Her fair,

prematurely faded face was radiant, she seemed to be ten years younger,

suddenly aroused from the infinite sadness into which desertion had

plunged her. And, at last, her joy overflowing, she raised a cry: "I am

going off with him! Yes, he has come to fetch me, he is taking me with

him. Yes, yes, we are going to Luchon together, together!"

Then, with a rapturous glance, she pointed out a dark, sturdy-looking

young man, with gay eyes and bright red lips, who was purchasing some

newspapers. "There! that's my husband," said she, "that handsome man

who's laughing over there with the newspaper-girl. He turned up here

early this morning, and he's carrying me off. We shall take the Toulouse

train in a couple of minutes. Ah! dear madame, I told you of all my

worries, and you can understand my happiness, can't you?"

However, she could not remain silent, but again spoke of the frightful

letter which she had received on Sunday, a letter in which he had

declared to her that if she should take advantage of her sojourn at

Lourdes to come to Luchon after him, he would not open the door to her.

And, think of it, theirs had been a love match! But for ten years he had

neglected her, profiting by his continual journeys as a commercial

traveller to take friends about with him from one to the other end of

France. Ah! that time she had thought it all over, she had asked the

Blessed Virgin to let her die, for she knew that the faithless one was at

that very moment at Luchon with two friends. What was it then that had

happened? A thunderbolt must certainly have fallen from heaven. Those two

friends must have received a warning from on high--perhaps they had

dreamt that they were already condemned to everlasting punishment. At all

events they had fled one evening without a word of explanation, and he,

unable to live alone, had suddenly been seized with a desire to fetch his

wife and keep her with him for a week. Grace must have certainly fallen

on him, though he did not say it, for he was so kind and pleasant that

she could not do otherwise than believe in a real beginning of

conversion.

"Ah! how grateful I am to the Blessed Virgin," she continued; "she alone

can have acted, and I well understood her last evening. It seemed to me

that she made me a little sign just at the very moment when my husband

was making up his mind to come here to fetch me. I asked him at what time

it was that the idea occurred to him, and the hours fit in exactly. Ah!

there has been no greater miracle. The others make me smile with their

mended legs and their vanished sores. Blessed be Our Lady of Lourdes, who

has healed my heart!"

Just then the sturdy young man turned round, and she darted away to join

him, so full of delight that she forgot to bid the others good-bye. And

it was at this moment, amidst the growing crowd of patients whom the

bearers were bringing, that the Toulouse train at last came in. The

tumult increased, the confusion became extraordinary. Bells rang and

signals worked, whilst the station-master was seen rushing up, shouting

with all the strength of his lungs: "Be careful there! Clear the line at

once!"

A railway _employe_ had to rush from the platform to push a little

vehicle, which had been forgotten on the line, with an old woman in it,

out of harm's way; however, yet another scared band of pilgrims ran

across when the steaming, growling engine was only thirty yards distant.

Others, losing their heads, would have been crushed by the wheels if

porters had not roughly caught them by the shoulders. Then, without