"Oh, my poor mother! Perhaps at this
moment she is cheerfully playing boston with the neighbors in her
little tapestry salon. If she knew that I had raised my hand to murder
a man--oh! she would die of it! And I _am_ in prison, accused of
committing that crime! If I have not killed a man, I have certainly
killed my mother!"
Saying these words he wept no longer; he was seized by that short and
rapid madness known to the men of Picardy; he sprang to the wall, and
if I had not caught him, he would have dashed out his brains against
it.
"Wait for your trial," I said. "You are innocent, you will certainly
be acquitted; think of your mother."
"My mother!" he cried frantically, "she will hear of the accusation
before she hears anything else,--it is always so in little towns; and
the shock will kill her. Besides, I am not innocent. Must I tell you
the whole truth? I feel that I have lost the virginity of my
conscience."
After that terrible avowal he sat down, crossed his arms on his
breast, bowed his head upon it, gazing gloomily on the ground. At this
instant the turnkey came to ask me to return to my room. Grieved to
leave my companion at a moment when his discouragement was so deep, I
pressed him in my arms with friendship, saying:--
"Have patience; all may yet go well.
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