You
kill all delicate and lofty sentiment in the hearts of those who love
you; soon you will believe in nothing except the material and the gross;
of love, there will remain for you only that which is visible and can be
touched with the finger. You are young, Octave, and you have still a long
life before you; you will have other mistresses. Yes, as you say, pride
is a little thing and it is not to it I look for consolation; but God
wills that one of your tears shall one day pay me for those which I now
shed for you!"
She arose.
"Must it be said? Must you know that for six months I have not sought
repose without repeating to myself that it was all in vain, that you
would never be cured; that I have never risen in the morning without
saying that another effort must be made; that after every word you have
spoken I have felt that I ought to leave you, and that you have not given
me a caress that I would rather die than endure; that, day by day, minute
by minute, hesitating between hope and fear, I have vainly tried to
conquer either my love or my grief; that, when I opened my heart to you,
you pierced it with a mocking glance, and that, when I closed it, it
seemed to me I felt within it a treasure that none but you could
dispense? Shall I speak of all the frailty and all the mysteries which
seem puerile to those who do not respect them? Shall I tell you that when
you left me in anger I shut myself up to read your first letters; that
there is a favorite waltz that I never played in vain when I felt too
keenly the suffering caused by your presence? Ah! wretch that I am! How
dearly all these unnumbered tears, all these follies so sweet to the
feeble, are purchased! Weep now; not even this punishment, this sorrow,
will avail you.
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