Carriages rumbled in the street, steps sounded, and women's dresses
rustled in the corridor; sitting motionless there in the dark she did
not hear. She had put out the light that she might think, that she might
see only her own thoughts, only that idea which had taken possession
of her while coming down-stairs at Casa Guarnacci leaning on the
Professor's arm, after she had heard those terrible words: "We fear he
will not live!" and had almost lost consciousness. In the carriage with
Signora Albacina, in the room with her brother, even while obliged
to talk with one or the other, to pay attention to so many different
things, this idea, this proposal, which the burning heart was making to
the will, had been continually flashing within her. Now it flashed no
longer. Jeanne contemplated it lying quiet within her. In that figure
sitting motionless on the bed, in the darkness, two souls were
confronting each other in silence. A humble Jeanne, passionate, sure of
being able to sacrifice all to love, was measuring her strength against
a Jeanne unconsciously haughty, and sure of possessing a hard and cold
truth.
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