She did not move, but remained erect behind
Charlotte, who had resumed her work. And eagerly lending ear, she
listened, not showing herself as yet, although she had already seen
Marianne and Madame Angelin seated near the doorway, almost among the
folds of the hangings.
"Ah!" Madame Angelin was saying, "the poor mother had a presentiment of
it, as it were. I saw that she felt very anxious when I told her my own
sad story. There is no hope for me; and now death has passed by, and no
hope remains for her."
Silence ensued once more; then, prompted by some connecting train of
thought, she went on: "And your next child will be your eleventh, will it
not? Eleven is not a number; you will surely end by having twelve!"
As Constance heard those words she shuddered in another fit of that fury
which dried up her tears. By glancing sideways she could see that mother
of ten children, who was now expecting yet an eleventh child. She found
her still young, still fresh, overflowing with joy and health and hope.
And she was there, like the goddess of fruitfulness, nigh to the funeral
bier at that hour of the supreme rending, when she, Constance, was bowed
down by the irretrievable loss of her only child.
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