Page 491 - swanns-way

served, like many other remedies, to aggravate the disease,
but at least brought temporary relief to his sufferings), it
would have sufficed, had Odette only permitted him to re-
main in her house while she was out, to wait there until that
hour of her return, into whose stillness and peace would
flow, to be mingled and lost there, all memory of those in-
tervening hours which some sorcery, some cursed spell had
made him imagine as, somehow, different from the rest. But
she would not; he must return home; he forced himself, on
the way, to form various plans, ceased to think of Odette;
he even reached the stage, while he undressed, of turning
over all sorts of happy ideas in his mind: it was with a light
heart, buoyed with the anticipation of going to see some
favourite work of art on the morrow, that he jumped into
bed and turned out the light; but no sooner had he made
himself ready to sleep, relaxing a self-control of which he
was not even conscious, so habitual had it become, than an
icy shudder convulsed his body and he burst into sobs. He
did not wish to know why, but dried his eyes, saying with a
smile: ‘This is delightful; I’m becoming neurasthenic.’ Af-
ter which he could not save himself from utter exhaustion
at the thought that, next day, he must begin afresh his at-
tempt to find out what Odette had been doing, must use all
his influence to contrive to see her. This compulsion to an
activity without respite, without variety, without result, was
so cruel a scourge that one day, noticing a swelling over his
stomach, he felt an actual joy in the idea that he had, per-
haps, a tumour which would prove fatal, that he need not
concern himself with anything further, that it was his mal-

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