He was looking at her with a stupid, gloomy gaze.

"Then," he stammered, "those tears, those prayers, those oaths!"

"I have reflected."

"It is not possible! If you spoke the truth, you would not be here."

"I am here to make you understand that we must give up projects
which cannot be realized. There are some social conventionalities
which cannot be torn up." As if he scarcely understood what she
said, he repeated,

"Social conventionalities!"

And suddenly falling at Mme. de Thaller's feet, his head thrown
back, and his hands clasped together,

"You lie!" he said. "Confess that you lie, and that it is a final
trial which you are imposing upon me. Or else have you, then,
never loved me? That's impossible! I would not believe you if you
were to say so. A woman who does not love a man cannot be to him
what you have been to me: she does not give herself up thus so
joyously and so completely. Have you, then, forgotten every thing?
Is it possible that you do not remember those divine evenings in the
Rue de Cirque?--those nights, the mere thought of which fires my
brain, and consumes my blood."

He was horrible to look at, horrible and ridiculous at the same
time. As he wished to take Mme. de Thaller's hands, she stepped
back, and he followed her, dragging himself on his knees.

"Where could you find," he continued, "a man to worship you like me,
with an ardent, absolute, blind, mad passion? With what can you
reproach me? Have I not sacrificed to you without a murmur every
thing that a man can sacrifice here below,--fortune, family, honor,
--to supply your extravagance, to anticipate your slightest fancies,
to give you gold to scatter by the handful? Did I not leave my own
family struggling with poverty? I would have snatched bread from
my children's mouths in order to purchase roses to scatter under
your footsteps. And for years did ever a word from me betray the
secret of our love? What have I not endured? You deceived me. I
knew it, and I said nothing. Upon a word from you I stepped aside
before him whom your caprice made happy for a day. You told me,
'Steal!' and I stole. You told me, 'Kill!' and I tried to kill."

"Fly. A man who has twelve hundred thousand francs in gold,
bank-notes, and good securities, can always get along."

"And my wife and children?"

"Maxence is old enough to help his mother. Gilberte will find a
husband: depend upon it. Besides, what's to prevent you fro