"But perhaps you have never answered it."
"That is true."
"I knew very well that you were false, like other women."
Madame Jules continued to smile.
"Listen, monsieur," she said; "if I told you the real reason, you
would think it ridiculous. I do not think it false to abstain from
telling things that the world would laugh at."
"All secrets demand, in order to be told, a friendship of which I am
no doubt unworthy, madame. But you cannot have any but noble secrets;
do you think me capable of jesting on noble things?"
"Yes," she said, "you, like all the rest, laugh at our purest
sentiments; you calumniate them. Besides, I have no secrets. I have
the right to love my husband in the face of all the world, and I say
so,--I am proud of it; and if you laugh at me when I tell you that I
dance only with him, I shall have a bad opinion of your heart."
"Have you never danced since your marriage with any one but your
husband?"
"Never. His arm is the only one on which I have leaned; I have never
felt the touch of another man."
"Has your physician never felt your pulse?"
"Now you are laughing at me."
"No, madame, I admire you, because I comprehend you. But you let a man
hear your voice, you let yourself be seen, you--in short, you permit
our eyes to admire you--"
"Ah!" she said, interrupting him, "that is one of my griefs. Yes, I
wish it were possible for a married woman to live secluded with her
husband, as a mistress lives with her lover, for then--"
"Then why were you, two hours ago, on foot, disguised, in the rue
Soly?"
"The rue Soly, where is that?"
And her pure voice gave no sign of any emotion; no feature of her face
quivered; she did not blush; she remained calm.
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