He eats and drinks as well as
ever during even short cessations of the pain--nature is so queer! A
German doctor told him it was a form of gout in the head, and that
agrees with Brousson's opinion."
I left the group around the mistress of the house and went away. On
the staircase I met Mademoiselle Taillefer, whom a footman had come to
fetch.
"Oh!" she said to me, weeping, "what has my poor father ever done to
deserve such suffering?--so kind as he is!"
I accompanied her downstairs and assisted her in getting into the
carriage, and there I saw her father bent almost double.
Mademoiselle Taillefer tried to stifle his moans by putting her
handkerchief to his mouth; unhappily he saw me; his face became even
more distorted, a convulsive cry rent the air, and he gave me a
dreadful look as the carriage rolled away.
That dinner, that evening exercised a cruel influence on my life and
on my feelings. I loved Mademoiselle Taillefer, precisely, perhaps,
because honor and decency forbade me to marry the daughter of a
murderer, however good a husband and father he might be. A curious
fatality impelled me to visit those houses where I knew I could meet
Victorine; often, after giving myself my word of honor to renounce the
happiness of seeing her, I found myself that same evening beside her.
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