Then he debated with himself whether to throw her brutally on the floor and violate her.
But her bewildered eyes frightened him.
She was panting and her arms hung limp at her sides as she leaned, very pale, against the bookcase.
"Ah!" he said, marching up and down, knocking into the furniture, "I must really love you, if in spite of your supplications and refusals--" She joined her hands to keep him away.
"Good God!" he said, exasperated, "what are you made of ?" She came to herself, and, offended, she said to him, "Monsieur, I too suffer.

Spare me," and pell-mell she spoke of her husband, of her confessor, and became so incoherent that Durtal was frightened.

She was silent, then in a singing voice she said, "Tell me, you will come to my house tomorrow night, won't you ?" "But I suffer too!" She seemed not to hear him.

In her smoky eyes, far, far back, there seemed to be a twinkle of feeble light.

She murmured, in the cadence of a canticle, "Tell me, dear, you will come tomorrow night, won't you ?" "Yes," he said at last.
Then she readjusted herself and without saying a word quitted the room.
In silence he accompanied her to the entrance.