Quite otherwise. Anyone can foresee the rupture between
Mme de Beauseant and M. d'Ajuda (for he is going to marry Mlle de
Rochefide, it seems), that affair made it clear to my mind that
these very sacrifices on the woman's part are almost always the
cause of the man's desertion. If you had loved me sincerely, you
would have kept away for a time.--Now, I will lay aside all
vanity for you; is not that something? What will not people say
of a woman to whom no man attaches himself? Oh, she is
heartless, brainless, soulless; and what is more, devoid of
charm! Coquettes will not spare me. They will rob me of the
very qualities that mortify them. So long as my reputation is
safe, what do I care if my rivals deny my merits? They certainly
will not inherit them. Come, my friend; give up something for
her who sacrifices so much for you. Do not come quite so often;
I shall love you none the less."
"Ah!" said Armand, with the profound irony of a wounded heart
in his words and tone. "Love, so the scribblers say, only feeds
on illusions. Nothing could be truer, I see; I am expected to
imagine that I am loved. But, there!--there are some thoughts
like wounds, from which there is no recovery. My belief in you
was one of the last left to me, and now I see that there is
nothing left to believe in this earth."
She began to smile.
"Yes," Montriveau went on in an unsteady voice, "this Catholic
faith to which you wish to convert me is a lie that men make for
themselves; hope is a lie at the expense of the future; pride, a
lie between us and our fellows; and pity, and prudence, and
terror are cunning lies.
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