“What a wretch! what a scoundrel! what an infamy!” she said to herself, as she fled with nervous steps beneath the aspens of the path. The disappointment of her failure increased the indignation of her outraged modesty; it seemed to her that Providence pursued her implacably, and, strengthening herself in her pride, she had never felt so much esteem for herself nor so much contempt for others. A spirit of warfare transformed her. She would have liked to strike all men, to spit in their faces, to crush them, and she walked rapidly straight on, pale, quivering, maddened, searching the empty horizon with tear-dimmed eyes, and as it were rejoicing in the hate that was choking her.
When she saw her house a numbness came over her. She could not go on; and yet she must. Besides, whither could she flee?
Félicité was waiting for her at the door. “Well?”
“No!” said Emma.
And for a quarter of an hour the two of them went over the various persons in Yonville who might perhaps be inclined to help her. But each time that Félicité named someone Emma replied—
“Impossible! they will not!”
“And the master’ll soon be in.”
“I know that well enough. Leave me alone.”
She had tried everything; there was nothing more to be done now; and when Charles came in she would have to say to him—
“Go away! This carpet on which you are walking is no longer ours. In your own house you do not possess a chair, a pin, a straw, and it is I, poor man, who have ruined you.”