"Why do you weep?" she said. "You are not a child, Wilfrid. Come back
to me. I wish it. You are annoyed if I show just displeasure. You see
that I am fatigued and ill, yet you force me to think and speak, and
listen to persuasions and ideas that weary me. If you had any real
perception of my nature, you would have made some music, you would
have lulled my feelings--but no, you love me for yourself and not for
myself."

The storm which convulsed the young man's heart calmed down at these
words. He slowly approached her, letting his eyes take in the
seductive creature who lay exhausted before him, her head resting in
her hand and her elbow on the couch.

"You think that I do not love you," she resumed. "You are mistaken.
Listen to me, Wilfrid. You are beginning to know much; you have
suffered much. Let me explain your thoughts to you. You wished to take
my hand just now"; she rose to a sitting posture, and her graceful
motions seemed to emit light. "When a young girl allows her hand to be
taken it is as though she made a promise, is it not? and ought she not
to fulfil it? You well know that I cannot be yours. Two sentiments
divide and inspire the love of all the women of the earth. Either they
devote themselves to suffering, degraded, and criminal beings whom
they desire to console, uplift, redeem; or they give themselves to
superior men, sublime and strong, whom they adore and seek to
comprehend, and by whom they are often annihilated. You have been
degraded, though now you are purified by the fires of repentance, and
to-day you are once more noble; but I know myself too feeble to be
your equal, and too religious to bow before any power but that On
High. I may refer thus to your life, my friend, for we are in the
North, among the clouds, where all things are abstractions."