. . She was now feeling the same fiery
resentment as those women of former days who used to insult her Rene
when he was well and happy. She trembled with satisfaction and pride
when returning the greetings of her friends. Her eloquent eyes seemed
to be saying, "Yes, he is my betrothed . . . a hero!" She was constantly
arranging the war cross on his blouse of "horizon blue," taking pains
to place it as conspicuously as possible. She also spent much time in
prolonging the life of his shabby uniform--always the same one, the
old one which he was wearing when wounded. A new one would give him the
officery look of the soldiers who never left Paris.
As he grew stronger, Rene vainly tried to emancipate himself from her
dominant supervision. It was simply useless to try to walk with more
celerity or freedom.
"Lean on me!"
And he had to take his fiancee's arm. All her plans for the future were
based on the devotion with which she was going to protect her husband,
on the solicitude that she was going to dedicate to his crippled
condition.
"My poor, dear invalid," she would murmur lovingly. "So ugly and so
helpless those blackguards have left you! . . . But luckily you have
me, and I adore you! . . . It makes no difference to me that one of your
hands is gone. I will care for you; you shall be my little son. You will
just see, after we are married, how elegant and stylish I am going to
keep you.
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