After all, could I have tied a mill-stone round the neck of him I love?
What can he do here?
Who am I to bind him to me?
Besides, do I not love him with a friendship so divine that I can bear the loss of my own happiness and my hopes?
You know I have often blamed myself for letting my hopes rest upon a grave, and for knowing they were waiting on that poor old lady's death.

If Savinien is rich and happy with another I have enough to pay for my entrance to a convent, where I shall go at once.

There can no more be two loves in a woman's heart than there can be two masters in heaven, and the life of a religious is attractive to me." "He could not let his mother go alone to Rouvre," said the abbe, gently.
"Do not let us talk of that, my dear good friend," she answered.

"I will write to-night and set him free.

I am glad to have to close the windows of this room," she continued, telling her old friend of the anonymous letters, but declaring that she would not allow any inquiries to be made as to who her unknown lover might be.
"Why! it was an anonymous letter that first took Madame de Portenduere to Rouvre," cried the abbe.