Her agitation and her search were making her lose all sense of time, and she was late for lunch. But as usual he was not home yet himself, and did not arrive until a couple of minutes later. She thought that he seemed a little upset about something.

Now she was counting the hours until evening, and was alarmed to find how many there still were. How odd that was—you needed so little time to say goodbye, everything seemed worthless when you knew you couldn’t take it with you. A kind of drowsiness came over her. She mechanically went up and down the street again, at random now, without thinking or looking. The driver of a carriage pulled back his horses at a crossing; she had only just seen the pole of the carriage in front of her in time. The driver swore at her; she hardly turned. An accident would have meant safety, or postponement. Well, chance had spared her the decision. Wearily, she went on. It was good to think of nothing at all, just feel a confused, vague sense of the approaching end, a mist gently rising and enveloping everything.

When she happened to look up and saw the name of the street, she shuddered. In her confused wanderings, chance had brought her almost to the building where her former lover lived. Was that a sign? Perhaps he might yet be able to help her. He must know the woman’s address. She was trembling almost joyfully. Why hadn’t she thought of that before? It was the simplest solution! All at once her limbs felt stronger, hope gave new vigour to the sad, bewildered ideas in her head. He must go to that person with her and put an end to it once and for all. He must threaten the woman, force her to stop her blackmailing. Perhaps a good sum of money might even get her out of the city entirely. She suddenly felt sorry to have spoken as she did to the poor creature recently, but he would help her, she was sure of that. How strange that this hope of rescue came only now, at the last minute.

She hurried up the steps and rang the bell. No one came to the door. She listened; she felt as if she had heard cautious footsteps on the other side. She rang the bell once more. Silence again. And again a faint noise inside. Then her patience was exhausted—she rang and rang the bell without stopping. No less than her life was at stake.

At last there was movement behind the door, the lock clicked, and it was opened just a crack.