Page 243 - madame-bovary

his eyes staring. ‘What a mishap!’ he thought, ‘what a mis-
hap!’ Perhaps, after all, he had made some slip. He thought it
over, but could hit upon nothing. But the most famous sur-
geons also made mistakes; and that is what no one would
ever believe! People, on the contrary, would laugh, jeer! It
would spread as far as Forges, as Neufchatel, as Rouen, ev-
erywhere! Who could say if his colleagues would not write
against him. Polemics would ensue; he would have to an-
swer in the papers. Hippolyte might even prosecute him.
He saw himself dishonoured, ruined, lost; and his imagi-
nation, assailed by a world of hypotheses, tossed amongst
them like an empty cask borne by the sea and floating upon
the waves.
Emma, opposite, watched him; she did not share his hu-
miliation; she felt another—that of having supposed such
a man was worth anything. As if twenty times already she
had not sufficiently perceived his mediocrity.
Charles was walking up and down the room; his boots
creaked on the floor.
‘Sit down,’ she said; ‘you fidget me.’
He sat down again.
How was it that she—she, who was so intelligent—could
have allowed herself to be deceived again? and through what
deplorable madness had she thus ruined her life by continu-
al sacrifices? She recalled all her instincts of luxury, all the
privations of her soul, the sordidness of marriage, of the
household, her dream sinking into the mire like wounded
swallows; all that she had longed for, all that she had de-
nied herself, all that she might have had! And for what? for

Madame Bovary