his life with your own--the whole of his
happiness with your own.

"I tell you, woman, every man like me, who abuses your vanity and your
weakness and afterward tells you he esteems you--lies! And if after all
you still believe he loves you, you do yourself fresh injury. No: we
soon learn to hate those irksome ties that become duties where we only
sought pleasures; and the first effort after they are formed is to
shatter them.

"As for the rest: women like you are not made for unholy love like ours.
Their charm is their purity, and losing that, they lose everything. But
it is a blessing to them to encounter one wretch, like myself, who cares
to say--Forget me, forever! Farewell!"

He left her, passed from the room with rapid strides, and, slamming
the door behind him, disappeared. Madame Lescande, who had listened,
motionless, and pale as marble, remained in the same lifeless attitude,
her eyes fixed, her hands clenched--yearning from the depths of her
heart that death would summon her. Suddenly a singular noise, seeming to
come from the next room, struck her ear. It was only a convulsive sob,
or violent and smothered laughter. The wildest and most terrible ideas
crowded to the mind of the unhappy woman; the foremost of them, that
her husband had secretly returned, that he knew all--that his brain had
given way, and that the laughter was the gibbering of his madness.

Feeling her own brain begin to reel, she sprang from the sofa,
and rushing to the door, threw it open. The next apartment was the
dining-room, dimly lighted by a hanging lamp. There she saw Camors,
crouched upon the floor, sobbing furiously and beating his forehead
against a chair which he strained in a convulsive embrace. Her tongue
refused its office; she could find no word, but seating herself near
him, gave way to her emotion, and wept silently. He dragged himself
nearer, seized the hem of her dress and covered it with kisses; his
breast heaved tumultuously, his lips trembled and he gasped the almost
inarticulate words, "Pardon! Oh, pardon me!"

This was all. Then he rose suddenly, rushed from the house, and the
instant after she heard the rolling of the wheels as his carriage
whirled him away.

If there were no morals and no remorse, French people would perhaps be
happier. But unfortunately it happens that a young woman, who believes
in little, like Madame Lescande, and a young man who believes in
nothing, like M. de Camors, can not have the p