Page:Possession (1926).pdf/419

 it everywhere in the journals, from her friends in Paris. If the great Chausson believed there was no hope. ..

"She is a good woman . . . a charming woman, Ellen. Madame Nozières is not her name. If she chooses to tell you who she is, be good to her, because I loved her."

"I will do what you wish."

He grinned again suddenly. "Think of it . . . to get it now, after three years . . . to get it now on the asphalt a block from the Trocadéro!" And then his face grew bitter. "It's a joke . . . that is!" And then, dimly, sleepily, he murmured, "We must hurry . . . we must hurry."

Ellen, still silent, found that she was praying idiotically for a thing which could never be. She knew now, sharply and cruelly, what the war, that grand parade, had been. Fergus who had loved life so passionately, who found pleasure and excitement everywhere! Fergus whom they had all loved so that they had spoiled him! Fergus lying there with his blond, curly head against the white pillows under the flying gilt swans! Those voluptuous, sensual swans! Eagles they should have been!

She could do nothing but wait. The minutes rushed past her, furiously. (We must hurry, he had said.) On the gilt dressing table one of the candles had begun to gutter and fade.

"Call them back," he said faintly. And she rose and opened the door. Outside Doctor Chausson had taken both Madame Nozières' small, exquisite hands and was talking to her, in a soft low voice, warm with a sort of understanding that moved Ellen queerly. They were so absorbed that they did not even notice her as she opened the door.

"Madame Nozières," she said softly, and the woman turned toward her. She was beautiful, more beautiful than Ellen had supposed, even with the tears swimming in her blue eyes. She was small and beautiful and exquisite like a bit of Dresden china. She understood the whole thing clearly; she understood perhaps even the profundity of the love which Madame Nozières had for Fergus. 