were at an end.
A week later you had embarked upon your first _liaison_. A month later
the whole town was aware of it.

That was about a year after the Professor's death. Six or seven years
have passed since then, and you have gone on from adventure to
adventure, all characterised by the same lamentable lack of discretion.
The reason for this lies in your own tendency to self-deception. You
want to make yourself and others believe that you are always looking for
ideal love and constant ties. In reality your motives are quite
different. You hug the traditional conviction that it would be
disgraceful to own that your pretended love is only an affair of the
senses. And yet, if you had not been so anxious to dupe yourself and
others, you might have gone through life frankly and freely.

The night is far advanced, moreover it is Christmas Eve.

I will not accuse you without producing proofs. Enclosed you will find
a whole series of letters, dated irregularly, for you only used to write
to me when I was away from home in the summer. In these letters, which I
have carefully collected, and for which I have no ground for reproaching
you, you will see yourself reflected as in a row of mirrors. Do not be
ashamed; your self-deception is not your fault; society is to blame. I
am not sending the letters back to discourage or hurt you; only that you
may see how, with each adventure, you have started with the same
sentimental illusions and ended with the same pitiable disenchantment.

A penniless widow turned forty--we are about the same age--with five
children has not much prospect of marrying again, however attractive she
may be. I have told you so repeatedly; but your feminine vanity refuses
to believe it. In each fresh adventure you have seen a possible
marriage--not because you feel specially drawn towards matrimony, but
because you are unwilling to leave the course free to younger women.

You have shown yourself in public with your admirers.

Neglecting the most ordinary precautions, you have allowed them to come
to your house; in a word, you have unblushingly advertised connections
which ought to have been concealed.

And the men you selected?

I do not wish to criticise your choice; but I quite understand why your
friends objected and were ashamed on your account.

At first people made the best of the situation, tacitly hoping that the
affairs might lead to marriage and that your monetary cares would thus
find a satis