And she said to herself: "I shall be smashed to pieces at the bottom." After the first shock, the crime appeared to her so monstrous that it seemed impossible.

Then, when convinced of the misbehaviour and murder, by recalling certain little incidents which she had formerly failed to understand, she was afraid of going out of her mind.

Therese and Laurent were really the murderers of Camille: Therese whom she had reared, Laurent whom she had loved with the devoted and tender affection of a mother.

These thoughts revolved in her head like an immense wheel, accompanied by a deafening noise.
She conjectured such vile details, fathomed such immense hypocrisy, assisting in thought at a double vision so atrocious in irony, that she would have liked to die, mechanical and implacable, pounded her brain with the weight and ceaseless action of a millstone.

She repeated to herself: "It is my children who have killed my child." And she could think of nothing else to express her despair.
In the sudden change that had come over her heart, she no longer recognised herself.