what would you think of a woman who could reveal the secret wounds
of her married life? Turenne kept his word to robbers; do I not owe to
my torturers the honor of a Turenne?"

"Have you passed your word to say nothing?"

"Monsieur de Cadignan did not think it necessary to bind me to
secrecy--You are asking more than my soul! Tyrant! you want me to bury
my honor itself in your breast," she said, casting upon d'Arthez a
look, by which she gave more value to her coming confidence than to her
personal self.

"You must think me a very ordinary man, if you fear any evil, no matter
what, from me," he said, with ill-concealed bitterness.

"Forgive me, friend," she replied, taking his hand in hers caressingly,
and letting her fingers wander gently over it. "I know your worth. You
have related to me your whole life; it is noble, it is beautiful, it is
sublime, and worthy of your name; perhaps, in return, I owe you mine.
But I fear to lower myself in your eyes by relating secrets which
are not wholly mine. How can you believe--you, a man of solitude and
poesy--the horrors of social life? Ah! you little think when you invent
your dramas that they are far surpassed by those that are played in
families apparently united. You are wholly ignorant of certain gilded
sorrows."

"I know all!" he cried.

"No, you know nothing."

D'Arthez felt like a man lost on the Alps of a dark night, who sees,
at the first gleam of dawn, a precipice at his feet. He looked at the
princess with a bewildered air, and felt a cold chill running down his
back. Diane thought for a moment that her man of genius was a weakling,
but a flash from his eyes reassured her.

"You have become to me almost my judge," she said, with a desperate air.
"I must speak now, in virtue of the right that all calumniated beings
have to show their innocence. I have been, I am still (if a poor recluse
forced by the world to renounce the world is still remembered) accused
of such light conduct, and so many evil things, that it may be allowed
me to find in one strong heart a haven from which I cannot be driven.
Hitherto I have always considered self-justification an insult to
innocence; and that is why I have disdained to defend myself. Besides,
to whom could I appeal? Such cruel things can be confided to none but
God or to one who seems to us very near Him--a priest, or another self.
Well! I do know this, if my secrets are not as safe there," she said,
laying her hand on d'