drew yet further examples from her triumphant career.

She gave a deep sigh.

"The child is admirably gifted. But she is to be pitied; she has been
born into a bad period. There is no longer a public nowadays; no
critics, no plays, no theatres, no artists. It is a decadence of art."

Chevalier shook his head.

"No need to pity her," he said. "She will have all that she can wish;
she will succeed; she will be wealthy. She is a selfish little jade, and
a woman who is selfish can get anything she likes. But for people with
hearts there's nothing left but to hang a stone round one's neck and
throw oneself into the river. But, I too, I shall go far. I, too, shall
climb high. I, too, will be a selfish hound."

He got up and went out without waiting for the end of the play. He did
not return to Félicie's dressing-room for fear of meeting Ligny there,
the sight of whom was insupportable, and because by avoiding it he could
pretend to himself that Ligny had not returned thither.

Conscious of physical distress on going away from her, he took five or
six turns under the dark, deserted arcades of the Odéon, went down the
steps into the night, and turned up the Rue de Médicis. Coachmen were
dozing on their boxes, while waiting for the end of the performance, and
high over the tops of the plane-trees the moon was racing through the
clouds. Treasuring in his heart an absurd yet soothing remnant of hope,
he went, this night, as on other nights, to wait for Félicie at her
mother's flat.