XV

She had taken his hand and was squeezing it, crushing it, burying her nails in his flesh.

He answered, quietly: “It is understood, then. It is useless to speak of all that again. You see I came today at once on receiving your letter.”

Walter, who had walked on in advance with his two daughters and Madeleine, was waiting for Du Roy beside the picture of Jesus Walking on the Waters .

“Fancy,” said he, laughing, “I found my wife yesterday on her knees before this picture, as if in a chapel. She was paying her devotions. How I did laugh.”

Madame Walter replied in a firm voice⁠—a voice thrilling with secret exultation: “It is that Christ who will save my soul. He gives me strength and courage every time I look at Him.” And pausing in front of the Divinity standing amidst the waters, she murmured: “How handsome he is. How afraid of Him those men are, and yet how they love Him. Look at His head, His eyes⁠—how simple yet how supernatural at the same time.”

Susan exclaimed, “But He resembles you, Pretty-boy. I am sure He resembles you. If you had a beard, or if He was clean shaven, you would be both alike. Oh, but it is striking!”

She insisted on his standing beside the picture, and they all, indeed, recognized that the two faces resembled one another. Everyone was astonished. Walter thought it very singular. Madeleine, smiling, declared that Jesus had a more manly air. Madame Walter stood motionless, gazing fixedly at the face of her lover beside the face of Christ, and had become as white as her hair.