"He said I was--What?"
"I--I don't like to tell!"
"But if I insist on being told? Come, Gretchen, I must know what Colonel
Bernhard said."
"He said it was wrong to stay in like this week after week, and month after
month. He--he said you were killing yourself by inches, Monsieur Maurice."
Monsieur Maurice laughed a short bitter laugh.
"Killing myself!" he repeated. "Well, I hope not; for weary as I am of it,
I would sooner go on bearing the burden of life than do my enemies the
favour of dying out of their way."
The words, the look, the accent made me tremble. I never forgot them.
How could I forget that Monsieur Maurice had enemies--enemies who longed
for his death?
So the first blush of early Spring went by; and the crocuses lived their
little life and passed away, and the primroses came in their turn,
yellowing every shady nook in the scented woods; and the larches put on
their crimson tassels, and the laburnum its mantle of golden fringe, and
the almond-tree burst into a leafless bloom of pink--and still Monsieur
Maurice, adhering to his resolve, refused to stir one step beyond the
threshold of his rooms.
Sad and monotonous now to the last degree, his life dragged heavily on.
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