about it. But you must pardon a man of spirit if he feels
humiliated at being taken for a spaniel."

The tone in which the last remark was uttered might perhaps have
frightened another woman; but when the wearer of a petticoat has
allowed herself to be addressed as a Divinity, and thereby set
herself above all other mortals, no power on earth can be so
haughty.

"M. le Marquis, I am in despair that God should not have
invented some nobler way for a man to confirm the gift of his
heart than by the manifestation of prodigiously vulgar desires.
We become bond-slaves when we give ourselves body and soul, but a
man is bound to nothing by accepting the gift. Who will assure
me that love will last? The very love that I might show for you
at every moment, the better to keep your love, might serve you as
a reason for deserting me. I have no wish to be a second edition
of Mme de Beauseant. Who can ever know what it is that keeps you
beside us? Our persistent coldness of heart is the cause of an
unfailing passion in some of you; other men ask for an untiring
devotion, to be idolized at every moment; some for gentleness,
others for tyranny. No woman in this world as yet has really
read the riddle of man's heart."

There was a pause. When she spoke again it was in a different
tone.

"After all, my friend, you cannot prevent a woman from trembling
at the question, 'Will this love last always?' Hard though my
words may be, the dread of losing you puts them into my mouth.