Here was the heritage of his past, the lengthening chain of slavery to his old self--was it his real self?
Here was what would prevent him from forgetting all that he had been and not been, all the happiness he might have had, all that he had lost--the ceaseless reminder.

He was still the victim to a poison which gave not only a struggle of body, but a struggle of soul--if he had a soul.
"If he had a soul!" The phrase kept repeating itself to him even as he fought the fever in his throat, resisting the temptation to take that medicine which the Curb's brother had sent him.
"If he had a soul!" The thinking served as an antidote, for by the ceaseless iteration his mind was lulled into a kind of drowse.

Again and again he went to the pail of water that stood on the window-sill, and lifting it to his lips, drank deep and full, to quench the wearing thirst.
"If he had a soul!" He looked at Louis Trudel, silent and morose, the clammy yellow of a great sickness in his face and hands, but his mind only intent on making a waistcoat--and the end of all things very near! The words he had written the night before came to him: "Therefore, wherefore, tailor-man?
Therefore, wherefore, God ?...

Show me a sign from Heaven, tailor-man!" As if in reply to his thoughts there came the sound of singing, and of bells ringing in the parish church.
A procession with banners was coming near.

It was a holy day, and Chaudiere was mindful of its duties.