ll asleep so
late that I did not awake till between eleven and twelve o'clock. I
rose at once to enquire after Manon's health; they told me that she had
gone out an hour before with her brother, who had come for her in a
hired carriage. Although there appeared something mysterious in such a
proceeding, I endeavoured to check my rising suspicions. I allowed
some hours to pass, during which I amused myself with reading. At
length, being unable any longer to stifle my uneasiness, I paced up and
down the apartments. A sealed letter upon Manon's table at last caught
my eye. It was addressed to me, and in her handwriting. I felt my
blood freeze as I opened it; it was in these words:

I protest to you, dearest chevalier, that you are the idol of my heart,
and that you are the only being on earth whom I can truly love; but do
you not see, my own poor dear chevalier, that in the situation to which
we are now reduced, fidelity would be worse than madness? Do you think
tenderness possibly compatible with starvation? For my part, hunger
would be sure to drive me to some fatal end. Heaving some day a sigh
for love, I should find it was my last. I adore you, rely upon that;
but leave to me, for a short while, the management of our fortunes.
God help the man who falls into my hands. My only wish is to render my
chevalier rich and happy. My brother will tell you about me; he can
vouch for my grief in yielding to the necessity of parting from you.

"I remained, after reading this, in a state which it would be difficult
to describe; for even now I know not the nature of the feelings which
then agitated me. It was one of those unique situations of which
others can never have experienced anything even approaching to
similarity. It is impossible to explain it, because other persons can
have no idea of its nature; and one can hardly even analyse it to
oneself. Memory furnishes nothing that will connect it with the past,
and therefore ordinary language is inadequate to describe it. Whatever
was its nature, however, it is certain that grief, hate, jealousy, and
shame entered into its composition. Fortunate would it have proved for
me if love also had not been a component part!

"'That she loves me,' I exclaimed, 'I can believe; but could she,
without being a monster, hate me? What right can man ever have to
woman's affections which I had not to Manon's? What is left to me,
after all the sacrifices I have made for her s