orrow?"

"I hope so. Good night."

I left that infernal abode, and went home to bed.

CHAPTER XIII

The End of the Story Stranger Than the Beginning

At eight o'clock the next morning Jarbe told me that the Charpillon
wanted to see me, and that she had sent away her chairmen.

"Tell her that I can't see her."

But I had hardly spoken when she came in, and Jarbe went out. I addressed
her with the utmost calmness, and begged her to give me back the two
bills of exchange I had placed in her hands the night before.

"I haven't got them about me; but why do you want me to return them to
you?"

At this question I could contain myself no longer, and launched a storm
of abuse at her. It was an explosion which relieved nature, and ended
with an involuntary shower of tears. My infamous seductress stood as
calmly as Innocence itself; and when I was so choked with sobs that I
could not utter a word, she said she had only been cruel because her
mother had made her swear an oath never to give herself to anyone in her
own house, and that she had only come now to convince me of her love, to
give herself to me without reserve, and never to leave me any more if I
wished it.

The reader who imagines that at these words rage gave place to love, and
that I hastened to obtain the prize, does not know the nature of the
passion so well as the vile woman whose plaything I was. From hot love to
hot anger is a short journey, but the return is slow and difficult. If
there be only anger in a man's breast it may be subdued by tenderness, by
submission, and affection; but when to anger is added a feeling of
indignation at having been shamefully deceived, it is impossible to pass
suddenly to thoughts of love and voluptuous enjoyment. With me mere anger
has never been of long duration, but when I am indignant the only cure is
forgetfulness.

The Charpillon knew perfectly well that I would not take her at her word,
and this kind of science was inborn in her. The instinct of women teaches
them greater secrets than all the philosophy and the research of men.

In the evening this monster left me, feigning to be disappointed and
disconsolate, and saying,--

"I hope you will come and see me again when you are once more yourself."

She had spent eight hours with me, during which time she had only spoken
to deny my suppositions, which were perfectly true, but which she could
not afford to let pass. I had not taken anything all day, in or