"
At the same moment my heart spoke to me as forcibly as she did, and
said what her voice said to my ear, what her looks said to my eyes,
what solemn, mute, funereal Nature in the splendor of her last hour,
said to all my senses. The two voices that I heard, the inward and the
outer voice, said the same words, as if one had been the echo or
translation of the other. I forgot the universe, and I answered, "Let
us die!"
* * * * *
I wound the fisherman's ropes which I found in the boat several times
round her body and mine, which were bound as in the same winding sheet.
I took her up in my arms, which I had left disengaged in order to
precipitate her with me into the lake.
At the very instant that I was taking the spring which would forever
have buried us in the waters, I saw her turn pale, her head drooped,
its lifeless weight sank upon my shoulder, and I felt her knees give
way beneath her body. Excessive emotion and the joy of dying together
had forestalled death. She had fainted in my arms.
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