Page:The red and the black (1916).djvu/547

Rh She lit several candles. When Fouqué could bring himself to look at her, she had placed Julien's head on a little marble table in front of her, and was kissing it on the forehead.

Mathilde followed her lover to the tomb which he had chosen. A great number of priests convoyed the bier, and, alone in her draped carriage, without anyone knowing it, she carried on her knees the head of the man whom she had loved so much.

When they arrived in this way at the most elevated peak of the high mountains of the Jura, twenty priests celebrated the service of the dead in the middle of the night in this little grotto, which was magnificently illuminated by a countless number of wax candles. Attracted by this strange and singular ceremony, all the inhabitants of the little mountain villages which the funeral had passed through, followed it.

Mathilde appeared in their midst in long mourning garments, and had several thousands of five-franc pieces thrown to them at the end of the service.

When she was left alone with Fouqué, she insisted on burying her lover's head with her own hands. Fouqué nearly went mad with grief.

Mathilde took care that this wild grotto should be decorated with marble monuments that had been sculpted in Italy at great expense.

Madame de Rênal kept her promise. She did not try to make any attempt upon her life; but she died embracing her children, three days after Julien.