You never have loved me, confess now!" By dint of this persistence, Reine by degrees lost her self-confidence.
She could realize how much Claudet was suffering, and she reproached herself for the torture she was inflicting upon him.

Driven into a corner, and recognizing that the avowal he was asking for was the only one that would drive him away, she hesitated no longer.
"Alas!" she murmured, lowering her eyes, "since you force me to tell you some truths that I would rather have kept from you, I confess you have guessed.

I have a sincere friendship for you, but that is all.

I have concluded that to marry a person one ought to love him differently, more than everything else in the world, and I feel that my heart is not turned altogether toward you." "No," said Claudet, bitterly, "it is turned elsewhere." "What do you mean?
I do not understand you." "I mean that you love some one else." "That is not true," she protested.
"You are blushing--a proof that I have hit the nail!" "Enough of this!" cried she, imperiously.
"You are right.

Now that you have said you don't want me any longer, I have no right to ask anything further.