Page 377 - madame-bovary

took little Berthe on his knees, and unfolding his medical
journal, tried to teach her to read. But the child, who never
had any lessons, soon looked up with large, sad eyes and be-
gan to cry. Then he comforted her; went to fetch water in her
can to make rivers on the sand path, or broke off branches
from the privet hedges to plant trees in the beds. This did
not spoil the garden much, all choked now with long weeds.
They owed Lestiboudois for so many days. Then the child
grew cold and asked for her mother.
‘Call the servant,’ said Charles. ‘You know, dearie, that
mamma does not like to be disturbed.’
Autumn was setting in, and the leaves were already fall-
ing, as they did two years ago when she was ill. Where
would it all end? And he walked up and down, his hands
behind his back.
Madame was in her room, which no one entered. She
stayed there all day long, torpid, half dressed, and from time
to time burning Turkish pastilles which she had bought at
Rouen in an Algerian’s shop. In order not to have at night
this sleeping man stretched at her side, by dint of manoeu-
vring, she at last succeeded in banishing him to the second
floor, while she read till morning extravagant books, full
of pictures of orgies and thrilling situations. Often, seized
with fear, she cried out, and Charles hurried to her.
‘Oh, go away!’ she would say.
Or at other times, consumed more ardently than ever
by that inner flame to which adultery added fuel, panting,
tremulous, all desire, she threw open her window, breathed
in the cold air, shook loose in the wind her masses of hair,

Madame Bovary