I prefer to go home,' and I turned to walk on.
"Didier looked at me, and the look in his eyes was very sad.
"'Then it is true,' he said.
"'What is true ?' "'That you are so changed'-- he did not say 'thou'-- 'that you wish to go away and leave us all.

The poor bon papa is right.' "'What has bon papa been saying ?' I cried, more and more angry, 'What is it to you what I do?
Attend to your own affairs, I beg you, Monsieur Didier Larreya, and leave me mine.' "Didier stopped, and before I knew what he was doing, took both my hands in his.
"'Listen, Marie,' he said.

'You _must_.

You are scarcely more than a child, and I was glad for you to be so.

It would not be me that would wish to see you all wise, all settled down like an old woman at your age.
But you force me to say what I had not wished to say yet for a long time.
I am older than you, eight years older, and I know my own mind.