it's all whipped cream and
jam--mulberry jam, you know, so as to have the proper dark colour."

"Why all this attack on me?" I asked. "What have I done?"

"You've done nothing," she cried. "We all love you, Durdles, because
you're such a baby, because you dream such dreams, see nothing as it
is.... And perhaps after all you're right--your vision is as good as
another. But this time you've made me restless. You're never to see me
as a noble woman again, Ivan Andreievitch. See me as I am, just for
five minutes! I haven't a drop of noble feeling in my soul!"

"You've just given him up," I said. "You've sent him back to England,
although you adore him, because your duty's with your husband. You're
breaking your heart--"

"Yes, I am breaking my heart," she said quietly. "I'm a dead woman
without him. And it's my weakness, my cowardice, that is sending him
away. What would a French woman or an English woman have done? Given up
the world for their lover. Given up a thousand Nicholases, sacrificed a
hundred Ninas--that's real life. That's real, I tell you. What feeling
is there in my soul that counts for a moment beside my feeling for
Sherry? I say and I feel and I know that I would die for him, die with
him, happily, gladly. Those are no empty words.

"I who have never been in love before, I am devoured by it now until
there is nothing left of me--nothing.... And yet I remain. It is our
weakness, our national idleness. I haven't the strength to leave
Nicholas. I am soft, sentimental, about his unhappiness. Pah! how I
despise myself.... I am capable of living on here for years with husband
and lover, going from one to another, weeping for both of them. Already
I am pleading with Sherry that he should remain here. We will see what
will happen. We will see what will happen! Ah, my contempt for myself!
Without bones, without energy, without character.

"But this is life, Ivan Andreievitch! I stay here, I send him away
because I cannot bear to see Nicholas suffer. And I do not care for
Nicholas. Do you understand that? I never loved him, and now I have a
contempt for him--in spite of myself. Uncle Alexei has done that. Oh
yes! He has made a fool of Nicholas for months, and although I have
hated him for doing that, I have seen, also, what a fool Nicholas is!
But he is a hero, too. Make _him_ as noble as you like, Ivan
Andreievitch. You cannot colour it too high. He is the real thing and I
am the sham.... But oh! I do not want