When he brightened to answer her it was as if with effort.

It seemed as if a weight were on the mind of the whole world--a preoccupation that I shared without understanding.

She herself, a certain absent-mindedness apart, seemed the only one that was entirely unaffected.
As we sat side by side in the little carriage, she said suddenly: "They are coming to the end of their tether, you see." I shrank away from her a little--but I did not see and did not want to see.

I said so.
It even seemed to me that de Mersch having got over the troubles _la bas_, was taking a new lease of life.
"I _did_ think," I said, "a little time ago that ..." The wheels of the coupe suddenly began to rattle abominably over the cobbles of a narrow street.

It was impossible to talk, and I was thrown back upon myself.