The rain
was falling, and chilled us to the bones. You were crying
bitterly. And all that night and all the next day, aimless and
hopeless, we wandered about the streets. I must either die of
want or return to your father. I preferred death. Toward
evening--instinct having led me to the Seine--I sat down on one of
the stone benches of the Point-Neuf, holding you on my knees and
watching the flow of the dark river below. There was a strange
fascination--a promise of peace in its depths--that impelled me
almost irresistibly to plunge into the flood. If I had been alone
in the world, I should not have stopped to consider a second, but
on your account, Wilkie, I hesitated."
Moved by the thought of the danger he had escaped, M. Wilkie
shuddered. "B-r-r-r!" he growled. "You did well to hesitate."
She did not even hear him, but continued: "I at last decided that
it was best to put an end to this misery, and rising with
difficulty, I was approaching the parapet, when a gruff voice
beside us exclaimed: 'What are you doing there?' I turned,
thinking some police officer had spoken, but I was mistaken. By
the light of the street lamp, I perceived a man who looked some
thirty years of age, and had a frank and rather genial face. Why
this stranger instantly inspired me with unlimited confidence I
don't know. Perhaps it was an unconscious horror of death that
made me long for any token of human sympathy.
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