ll blazing; the passionate gaze remained unchanged, but what thoughts
had come and gone meanwhile! Twice he had kissed me on the forehead.

At Briare we had breakfast in the carriage. Then followed a talk like
our old talks at Blois, while the same Loire we used to admire called
forth our praises, and at half-past seven we entered the noble long
avenue of lime-trees, acacias, sycamores, and larches which leads
to Chantepleurs. At eight we dined; at ten we were in our bedroom, a
charming Gothic room, made comfortable with every modern luxury. Felipe,
who is thought so ugly, seemed to me quite beautiful in his graceful
kindness and the exquisite delicacy of his affection. Of passion, not
a trace. All through the journey he might have been an old friend of
fifteen years' standing. Later, he has described to me, with all the
vivid touches of his first letter, the furious storms that raged within
and were not allowed to ruffle the outer surface.

"So far, I have found nothing very terrible in marriage," I said, as I
walked to the window and looked out on the glorious moon which lit up a
charming park, breathing of heavy scents.

He drew near, put his arm again round me, and said:

"Why fear it? Have I ever yet proved false to my promise in gesture or
look? Why should I be false in the future?"

Yet never were words or glances more full of mastery; his voice thrilled
every fibre of my heart and roused a sleeping force; his eyes were like
the sun in power.

"Oh!" I exclaimed, "what a world of Moorish perfidy in this attitude of
perpetual prostration!"

He understood, my dear.

So, my fair sweetheart, if I have let months slip by without writing,
you can now divine the cause. I have to recall the girl's strange past
in order to explain the woman to myself. Renee, I understand you now.
Not to her dearest friend, not to her mother, not, perhaps, even to
herself, can a happy bride speak of her happiness. This memory ought to
remain absolutely her own, an added rapture--a thing beyond words, too
sacred for disclosure!

Is it possible that the name of duty has been given to the delicious
frenzy of the heart, to the overwhelming rush of passion? And for what
purpose? What malevolent power conceived the idea of crushing a woman's
sensitive delicacy and all the thousand wiles of her modesty under
the fetters of constraint? What sense of duty can force from her these
flowers of the heart, the roses of life, the passionate poet