"Yes; but while you loved me, the other woman--the one who was not you?"

She looked at him indignantly:

"Can you believe--"

"Did you not see him again at Florence? Did you not accompany him to the
station?"

She told him that he had come to Italy to find her; that she had seen
him; that she had broken with him; that he had gone, irritated, and that
since then he was trying to win her back; but that she had not even paid
any attention to him.

"My beloved, I see, I know, only you in the world." He shook his head.

"I do not believe you."

She revolted.

"I have told you everything. Accuse me, condemn me, but do not offend me
in my love for you."

He shook his head.

"Leave me. You have harmed me too much. I have loved you so much that
all the pain which you could have given me I would have taken, kept,
loved; but this is too hideous. I hate it. Leave me. I am suffering too
much. Farewell!"

She stood erect.

"I have come. It is my happiness, it is my life, I am fighting for. I
will not go."

And she said again all that she had already said. Violent and sincere,
sure of herself, she explained how she had broken the tie which was
already loose and irritated her; how since the day when she had loved
him she had been his only, without regret, without a wandering look or
thought. But in speaking to him of another she irritated him. And he
shouted at her:

"I do not believe you."

She only repeated her declarations.

And suddenly, instinctively, she looked at her watch:

"Oh, it is noon!"

She had often given that cry of alarm when the farewell hour had
surprised them. And Jacques shuddered at the phrase which was so
familiar, so painful, and was this time so desperate. For a few minutes
more she said ardent words and shed tears. Then she left him; she had
gained nothing.

At her house she found in the waiting-room the marketwoman, who had come
to present a bouquet to her. She remembered that her husband was a
State minister. There were telegrams, visiting-cards and letters,
congratulations and solicitations. Madame Marmet wrote to recommend her
nephew to General Lariviere.

She went into the dining-room and fell in a chair. M. Martin-Belleme was
just finishing his breakfast. He was expected at the Cabinet Council and
at the former Finance Minister's, to whom he owed a call.

"Do not forget, my dear friend, to call on Madame Berthier d'Eyzelles.
You know how sensitive she is."

She made n