She would fancy at times that Rougon had risen from the dead to punish her for her dissoluteness.

Every week she fell into one of those nervous fits which were shattering her constitution.

She was left to struggle until she recovered consciousness, after which she would creep about more feebly than ever.

She would also often sob the whole night long, holding her head in her hands, and accepting the wounds that Pierre dealt her with resignation, as if they had been the strokes of an avenging deity.

At other times she repudiated him; she would not acknowledge her own flesh and blood in that heavy-faced lad, whose calmness chilled her own feverishness so painfully.