Page:Gide - Strait is the Gate.pdf/135

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129 STRAIT IS THE GATE “Juliette is better again . We are daily expecting her confinement, without undue anxiety. She knows that I am writing to you this morning. The day after our arrival at Aigues - Vives, she said to me : 'And Jerome ? What has become of him ? Does he write to you still ? 'And as I couldn't but tell her the truth : ' When you write to him , ' she said , 'tell him that ... she hesitated a moment , and then , smiling very sweetly, went on: 'that I am cured. I was rather afraid that in her letters, which are always so gay, she might be acting a part and taking herself in by it. The things she makes her happiness out of nowadays are so different from the things she had dreamt of, the things on which it seemed her happiness ought to have depended! ... Ah! this, that we call happiness, how intimate a part of the soul it is, and of what little importance are the outside elements which seem to go to its making! I spare you all the reflections I make during my walks along the garigue, when what astonishes me most is that I don't feel happier; Juliette's happiness ought to fill me with joy. why does my heart give way to an incomprehensible melancholy against which I am unable to fight ? The very beauty of the country, which I feel, which at any rate I recognise, adds still .

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