Friendship and honor were at stake; they stood at his left hand, as his new-born passion stood already at his right; they claimed him as well, and their grasp had a pressure which might become acutely painful.

The soul is a still more tender organism than the body, and it shrinks from the prospect of being subjected to violence.

Violence--spiritual violence--was what our luxurious hero feared; and it is not too much to say that as he lingered there by the sea, late into the night, while the gurgitation of the waves grew deeper to his ear, the prospect came to have an element of positive terror.

The two faces of his situation stood confronting each other; it was a rigid, brutal opposition, and Bernard held his breath for a while with the wonder of what would come of it.

He sat a long time upon the beach; the night grew very cold, but he had no sense of it.
Then he went away and passed before the Casino again, and wandered through the village.