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Updated: May 8, 2025
"Yet a little while," she thought, "and I shall be lying on a bed like that! And what shall I have lived for? What is the meaning of it?" The riddle of life itself was killing her, and she seemed to drown in a sea of inexpressible sorrow. Her memory wandered hopelessly among those past years. She saw Chirac with his wistful smile.
In five minutes Chirac had departed whether to his office or his home Sophia did not understand, and within a quarter of an hour she and Gerald were driving rapidly to the Gare de Lyon, Gerald stuffing into his pocket a large envelope full of papers which he had received by registered post. They caught the train by about a minute, and Chirac by a few seconds.
"Last year at this moment," said Chirac, "I was thinking of only one thing the masked ball at the opera. I could not sleep after it. This year even the churches, are not open. And you?" She put her lips together. "Do not ask me," she said. They proceeded in silence. "We are triste, we others," he said. "But the Prussians, in their trenches, they cannot be so gay, either!
At the same moment a tall, stout man with the hard face of a flourishing scoundrel, and a young, pallid girl on his arm, pushed aside both Gerald and Chirac and got into the cab with his companion. Chirac protested, telling him that the cab was already engaged. The usurper scowled and swore, and the young girl laughed boldly.
At intervals Gerald changed the valise from hand to hand; obstinately, he would not let Chirac touch it. They struggled upwards, through narrow curving streets. "Voila!" said Chirac. They were in front of the Hotel de l'Epee. Across the street was a cafe crammed with people. Several carriages stood in front.
The little Chirac, nervously active and restless, wanted to take her arm, but she would not allow it. The concierge and part of her family stared curiously at Sophia as she passed under the archway, for the course of her illness had excited the interest of the whole house.
On Christmas morning Chirac lay in bed rather late; the newspapers did not appear that day. Paris seemed to be in a sort of stupor. About eleven o'clock he came to the kitchen door. "I must speak with you," he said. His tone impressed Sophia. "Enter," said she. He went in, and closed the door like a conspirator. "We must have a little fete," he said. "You and I." "Fete!" she repeated.
Law's; you will see them every one in his ante-chamber." M. de Chirac, a celebrated physician, had bought stock at an unlucky period, and was very anxious to sell out. Stock, however continued to fall for two or three days, much to his alarm. His mind was filled with the subject, when he was suddenly called upon to attend a lady, who imagined herself unwell.
"I was saying to my wife," the landlord put in, "how she would have enjoyed that bone Diane!" He roared with laughter. Sophia and the landlady exchanged a curious sad smile at this pleasantry, which had been re-discovered by the landlord for perhaps the thousandth time during the siege, but which he evidently regarded as quite new and original. "Eh, well!" he continued confidentially to Chirac.
"Ah," said she, "I shall die; M. de Chirac has just said three times, as he felt my pulse, 'They keep sinking!" The Doctor recovered himself soon, and said, "You dream; your pulse is very healthy, and you are very well. I was thinking of the Mississippi stocks, upon which I lose my money, because their price sinks." This explanation satisfied the sick lady.
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