and thus escape. In
vain; he had perforce to remain upon the field, face to face with an
adversary, who at last laid down her arms in a feigned complacence. But
it was too late. The fatal mistake, against which my mother had tried to
warm me, was made. My jealousy, exposed in all its nakedness, had led
to war and all its stratagems between Gaston and myself. Jealousy, dear,
has neither sense nor decency.

I made up my mind now to suffer in silence, but to keep my eyes open,
until my doubts were resolved one way or another. Then I would either
break with Gaston or bow to my misfortune: no middle course is possible
for a woman who respects herself.

What can he be concealing? For a secret there is, and the secret has
to do with a woman. Is it some youthful escapade for which he still
blushes? But if so, what? The word _what_ is written in letters of
fire on all I see. I read it in the glassy water of my lake, in the
shrubbery, in the clouds, on the ceilings, at table, in the flowers of
the carpets. A voice cries to me _what?_ in my sleep. Dating from the
morning of my discovery, a cruel interest has sprung into our lives, and
I have become familiar with the bitterest thought that can corrode the
heart--the thought of treachery in him one loves. Oh! my dear, there is
heaven and hell together in such a life. Never had I felt this scorching
flame, I to whom love had appeared only in the form of devoutest
worship.

"So you wished to know the gloomy torture-chamber of pain!" I said to
myself. Good, the spirits of evil have heard your prayer; go on your
road, unhappy wretch!

May 30th.

Since that fatal day Gaston no longer works with the careless ease of
the wealthy artist, whose work is merely pastime; he sets himself tasks
like a professional writer. Four hours a day he devotes to finishing his
two plays.

"He wants money!"

A voice within whispered the thought. But why? He spends next to
nothing; we have absolutely no secrets from each other; there is not a
corner of his study which my eyes and my fingers may not explore. His
yearly expenditure does not amount to two thousand francs, and I know
that he has thirty thousand, I can hardly say laid by, but scattered
loose in a drawer. You can guess what is coming. At midnight, while he
was sleeping, I went to see if the money was still there. An icy shiver
ran through me. The drawer was empty.

That same week I discovered that he went to Sevres to fetch his letters,