Page:The Novels and Tales of Henry James, Volume 2 (New York, Charles Scribner's Sons, 1907).djvu/426

THE AMERICAN wine in silence; he must have been wondering what the deuce Bellegarde found so exciting in the American.

Newman, after dinner, went up to his room, where, flinging himself too on his bed at his grim length, he lay staring, for blank weariness, at the lighted candle and thinking that Valentin was dying downstairs. Late, when the candle had burnt low, came a soft tap at his door. The doctor stood there with another light and a motion of despair.

"He must faire la fête toujours! He insists on seeing you, and I 'm afraid you must come. I think that at this rate he 'll hardly outlast the night."

Newman went back to Valentin's room, which he found lighted by a taper on the hearth, but with its occupant begging for something brighter. "I want to see your face. They say you work me up," he went on as Newman complied with this request, and I confess I 've felt worked up; but it is n't you—it's my own great intelligence, that sacred spark, of which you 've such an opinion. Sit down there and let me look at you again." Newman seated himself, folded his arms and bent a heavy gaze on his friend. He felt as if he were now playing a part, mechanically, in the most lugubrious of comedies. Valentin faced him thus for some time. "Yes, this morning I was right; you've something on your mind heavier than ever I've had. Come, I'm a dying man, and it's indecent to deceive me. Something happened after I left Paris. It was n't for nothing that my sister started off at this season of the year for Fleurières. Why was it? It sticks in my crop. I've been thinking it over, and if you don't tell me I shall guess." 396