It was easy for me to see that in all, the ridicule expended on the
subject of this woman, on my unreasonable passion for her, was
premeditated. To say that she deserved severest censure, that she had
perhaps committed worse sins than those with which she was charged, that
was to make me feel that I had been merely one of her dupes.
All that did not please me; but Desgenais had undertaken the task of
curing me of my love and was prepared to treat my disease heroically. A
long friendship founded on mutual services gave him rights, and as his
motive appeared praiseworthy I allowed him to have his way.
Not only did he not spare me, but when he saw my trouble and my shame
increase, he pressed me the harder. My impatience was so obvious that he
could not continue, so he stopped and remained silent, a course that
irritated me still more.
In my turn I began to ask questions; I paced to and fro in my room.
Although the recital of that story was insupportable, I wanted to hear it
again. I tried to assume a smiling face and tranquil air, but in vain.
Desgenais suddenly became silent after having shown himself to be a most
virulent gossip. While I was pacing up and down my room he looked at me
calmly as though I was a caged fox.
I can not express my feeling. A woman who had so long been the idol of my
heart and who, since I had lost her, had caused me such deep affliction,
the only one I had ever loved, she for whom I would weep till death,
become suddenly a shameless wretch, the subject of coarse jests, of
universal censure and scandal! It seemed to me that I felt on my shoulder
the impression of a heated iron and that I was marked with a burning
stigma.
Pages:
59
60
61
62
63
64
65
66
67
68
69
70
71
72
73
74
75
76
77
78
79
80
81
82
83