"I was stupid. I did not think. I did not know. I did not wish to
know."

He rose and exclaimed, in an explosion of hatred:

"I did not wish him to be that man."

She sat in the place which he had left, and there, plaintively, in a low
voice, she explained the past. In that time she lived in a world
horribly commonplace. She had yielded, but she had regretted at once.
If he but knew the sadness of her life he would not be jealous. He would
pity her. She shook her head and said, looking at him through the
falling locks of her hair:

"I am talking to you of another woman. There is nothing in common
between that woman and me. I exist only since I have known you, since I
have belonged to you."

He walked about the room madly. He laughed painfully.

"Yes; but while you loved me, the other woman--the one who was not you?"

She looked at him indignantly:

"Can you believe--"

"Did you not see him again at Florence? Did you not accompany him to the
station?"