What was it, then, that had made her as if asleep, in her
late restless waiting? And the eternal question returned, the question
that she asked herself every evening when she went to her room. Did she
love him? For hours, in the middle of her great bed, she had turned over
again and again these words, seeking for meanings she could not find,
and thinking she was too ignorant to explain them. But that night, all
at once, she felt her heart was softened by some inexplicable happiness.
She cried nervously, without reason, and hid her head in her pillow that
no one might hear her.
Yes, now she loved him; she loved him enough to be willing to die for
him. But why? But how? She could not tell, she never would know; simply
from her whole heart came the cry that she did indeed love him. The
light had come to her at last; this new, overpowering joy overwhelmed
her like the most ardent rays of the sun.
For a long time her tears flowed, but not from sorrow. On the contrary,
she was filled with an inexplicable confusion of happiness that was
indefinable, regretting now, more deeply than ever, that she had not
made a _confidante_ of Hubertine. To-day her secret burdened her, and
she made an earnest vow to herself that henceforth she would be as cold
as an icicle towards Felicien, and would suffer everything rather than
allow him to see her tenderness.
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