"Forgive!--forgive!"

"You must think me strangely calm," said the brave woman; "but I shed all
my tears yesterday. You may have thought that I was weeping over our
ruin; you were mistaken. While one is young and strong as we are,
such cowardly conduct is not permissible. We are armed against want and
can fight it face to face. No, I was weeping for our departed happiness,
for you, for the madness that led you to throw away your only, your true
friend."

She was lovely, lovelier than Sidonie had ever been, as she spoke thus,
enveloped by a pure light which seemed to fall upon her from a great
height, like the radiance of a fathomless, cloudless sky; whereas the
other's irregular features had always seemed to owe their brilliancy,
their saucy, insolent charm to the false glamour of the footlights in
some cheap theatre. The touch of statuesque immobility formerly
noticeable in Claire's face was vivified by anxiety, by doubt, by all the
torture of passion; and like those gold ingots which have their full
value only when the Mint has placed its stamp upon them, those beautiful
features stamped with the effigy of sorrow had acquired since the
preceding day an ineffaceable expression which perfected their beauty.

Georges gazed at her in admiration. She seemed to him more alive, more
womanly, and worthy of adoration because of their separation and all the
obstacles that he now knew to stand between them. Remorse, despair,
shame entered his heart simultaneously with this new love, and he would
have fallen on his knees before her.

"No, no, do not kneel," said Claire; "if you knew of what you remind me,
if you knew what a lying face, distorted with hatred, I saw at my feet