the floor.

"Listen to me," she began with an effort, "I have suffered much. I call
heaven to bear me witness that I would give my life for you. So long as
the faintest gleam of hope remains, I am ready to suffer anything; but,
although I may rouse your anger in saying to you that I am a woman, I am
nevertheless a woman, my friend. We can not go beyond the limits of human
endurance. Beyond a certain point I will not answer for the consequences.
All I can do at this moment is to get down on my knees before you and
beseech you not to go away."

She knelt down as she spoke. I arose.

"Fool that I am!" I muttered, bitterly; "fool, to try to get the truth
from a woman! He who undertakes such a task will earn naught but derision
and will deserve it! Truth! Only he who consorts with chambermaids knows
it, only he who steals to their pillow and listens to the unconscious
utterance of a dream, hears it. He alone knows it who makes a woman of
himself, and initiates himself into the secrets of her cult of
inconstancy! But man, who asks for it openly, he who opens a loyal hand
to receive that frightful alms, he will never obtain it! They are on
guard with him; for reply he receives a shrug of the shoulders, and, if
he rouses himself in his impatience, they rise in righteous indignation
like an outraged vestal, while there falls from their lips the great
feminine oracle that suspicion destroys love, and they refuse to pardon
an accusation which they are unable to meet. Ah! just God! How weary I
am! When will all this cease?"

"Whenever you please," said she, coldly; "I am as tired of it as you."

"At this very moment; I leave you forever, and may time justify you!
Time! Time! Oh! what a cold lover! Remember this adieu. Time! and thy
beauty, and thy love, and thy happiness, where will they be? Is it thus,
without regret, you allow me to go? Ah! the day when the jealous lover
will know that he has been unjust, the day when he shall see proofs, he
will understand what a heart he has wounded, is it not so? He will bewail
his shame, he will know neither joy nor sleep; he will live only in the
memory of the time when he might have been happy. But, on that day, his
proud mistress will turn pale as she sees herself avenged; she will say
to herself: 'If I had only done it sooner!' And believe me, if she loves
him, pride will not console her."

I tried to be calm, but I was no longer master of myself, and I began to
pace the floor as s