Step by step, with patient tenacity, he executed a plan whose every detail he had long previously thought out.

His tactics were to appear before Adelaide like a living reproach--not that he flew into a passion, or upbraided her for her misconduct; but he had acquired a certain manner of looking at her, without saying a word, which terrified her.

Whenever she returned from a short sojourn in Macquart's hovel she could not turn her eyes on her son without a shudder.

She felt his cold glances, as sharp as steel blades pierce her deeply and pitilessly.

The severe, taciturn demeanour of the child of the man whom she had so soon forgotten strangely troubled her poor disordered brain.