remembered) accused of such light conduct, and so many evil things,
that it may be allowed me to find in one strong heart a haven from
which I cannot be driven. Hitherto I have always considered
self-justification an insult to innocence; and that is why I have
disdained to defend myself. Besides, to whom could I appeal? Such
cruel things can be confided to none but God or to one who seems to us
very near Him--a priest, or another self. Well! I do know this, if my
secrets are not as safe there," she said, laying her hand on
d'Arthez's heart, "as they are here" (pressing the upper end of her
busk beneath her fingers), "then you are not the grand d'Arthez I
think you--I shall have been deceived."

A tear moistened d'Arthez's eyes, and Diane drank it in with a side
look, which, however, gave no motion either to the pupils or the lids
of her eyes. It was quick and neat, like the action of a cat pouncing
on a mouse.

D'Arthez, for the first time, after sixty days of protocols, ventured
to take that warm and perfumed hand, and press it to his lips with a
long-drawn kiss, extending from the wrist to the tip of the fingers,
which made the princess augur well of literature. She thought to
herself that men of genius must know how to love with more perfection
than conceited fops, men of the world, diplomatists, and even
soldiers, although such beings have nothing else to do. She was a
connoisseur, and knew very well that the capacity for love reveals
itself chiefly in mere nothings. A woman well informed in such matters
can read her future in a simple gesture; just as Cuvier could say from
the fragment of a bone: This belonged to an animal of such or such
dimensions, with or without horns, carnivorous, herbivorous,
amphibious, etc., age, so many thousand years. Sure now of finding in