And their idyl, so pure and so painful, the long
story of their affection bathed in tears, likewise spread out before him.
She, having penetrated his sad secret, had come to Lourdes to pray to
Heaven for the miracle of his conversion. When they had remained alone
under the trees amidst the perfume of the invisible roses, during the
night procession, they had prayed one for the other, mingling one in the
other, with an ardent desire for their mutual happiness. Before the
Grotto, too, she had entreated the Blessed Virgin to forget her and to
save him, if she could obtain but one favour from her Divine Son. Then,
healed, beside herself, transported with love and gratitude, whirled with
her little car up the inclined ways to the Basilica, she had thought her
prayers granted, and had cried aloud the joy she felt that they should
have both been saved, together, together! Ah! that lie which he, prompted
by affection and charity, had told, that error in which he had from that
moment suffered her to remain, with what a weight did it oppress his
heart! It was the heavy slab which walled him in his voluntarily chosen
sepulchre. He remembered the frightful attack of grief which had almost
killed him in the gloom of the crypt, his sobs, his brutal revolt, his
longing to keep her for himself alone, to possess her since he knew her
to be his own--all that rising passion of his awakened manhood, which
little by little had fallen asleep again, drowned by the rushing river of
his tears; and in order that he might not destroy the divine illusion
which possessed her, yielding to brotherly compassion, he had taken that
heroic vow to lie to her, that vow which now filled him with such
anguish.
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