'You stretch the point of honour.'

'It is our way. Dear friend, we are French. And I presume to think that
our French system is not always wrong, for if my father had not broken it
by treating you as one of us and leaving me with you, should I have heard
. . . ?'

'I have displeased you.'

'Do not suppose that. But, I mean, a mother would not have left me.'

'You wished to avoid it.'

'Do not blame me. I had some instinct; you were very pale.'

'You knew I loved you.'

'No.'

'Yes; for this morning . . .'

This morning it seemed to me, and I regretted my fancy, that you were
inclined to trifle, as, they say, young men do.'

'With Renee?'

'With your friend Renee. And those are the hills of Petrarch's tomb?
They are mountains.'