"Ah, how cowardly we are!" exclaimed Marceline, abruptly, changing her
tone. "Yes, how cowardly we are to love them--those, those dreadful men,
who know so little how to care for us. I say that for Gontran. What was
he doing while I was telling you my sorrows, Aunt Louise? Quite calmly
taking a trip around the world. But let him speak now, let him speak,
especially as I cannot any more. In all my life I have never made so
long a speech. Speak, sir; why were you going round the world?"

"Because your mother, on the morning of the day before you departed for
Aix-les-Bains, had had a very long conversation with me."

"And she had said to you?"

"She had said to me, 'Put a stop to this; marry her or go away, and let
her not hear of you again till her marriage.' And as I had for some time
been debating whether to take a little trip to Japan, I started for
Japan."

"He started for Japan! That goes without saying. You hear him, Aunt
Louise; he admits that this time last year he preferred to expatriate
himself rather than marry me. So there he was in America, in China, and
in Japan. This lasted ten months; from time to time, humbly and timidly,
I asked for news of him. He was very well; his last letter was from
Shanghai, or Sidney, or Java. For me, not a word, not a
remembrance--nothing, nothing, absolutely nothing!"

"I had promised your mother. One day at Yokohama I had bought you a lot
of fascinating little things. The box was done up and addressed to you
when I remembered my promise. I sent all those Japaneseries to your