Page:A Virgin Heart.pdf/210

206 and this Gratienne woman. She pictured to herself this woman's body and compared it with her own. Was she more beautiful? In what is one woman's body more beautiful than another's? Xavier had loved to caress her, to crush her in his arms. And used he not to say: "How beautiful you are!" A vision, against which she struggled in vain, showed her Xavier kneeling beside Gratienne and covering her with kisses.

A heat mounted in her breast, her heart contracted; she tried to cry out, half got up, clutched at the air with her hands and fell in a faint.

When she came to herself, she felt very tired and very frightened as well. She looked about her, afraid to discover the reality of the painful vision which had overwhelmed her. Reassured, she breathed again.

"It was a dream, only a dream."

But it seemed as though a spring had suddenly been released in her heart. Throughout her whole being there was a sudden change. Under her maiden breast, grief had taken up its home. She felt it as one feels a piece of gravel in one's shoe. It was something ma-