The
priest who had told me her story was officiating at vespers, after
which I accosted him, and learnt from him the remaining circumstances.
He told me that from the time I had seen her at the chapel, her
disorder took a sudden turn for the worse, and her health rapidly
declined. Her cheerful intervals became shorter and less frequent, and
attended with more incoherency. She grew languid, silent, and moody in
her melancholy; her form was wasted, her looks pale and disconsolate,
and it was feared she would never recover. She became impatient of all
sounds of gayety, and was never so contented as when Eugene's mother
was near her. The good woman watched over her with patient, yearning
solicitude; and in seeking to beguile her sorrows, would half forget
her own. Sometimes, as she sat looking upon her pallid face, the tears
would fill her eyes, which, when Annette perceived, she would
anxiously wipe them away, and tell her not to grieve, for that Eugene
would soon return; and then she would affect a forced gayety, as in
former times, and sing a lively air; but a sudden recollection would
come over her, and she would burst into tears, hang on the poor
mother's neck, and entreat her not to curse her for having destroyed
her son.
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