The revelation just made by Madame de Guéran to MM. Périères and de Morin was certainly calculated to drive them to despair. If they had had any doubts about the power she exercised over them, their feelings and sufferings during the past few days would have removed them all. They were as deeply, seriously in love as it was possible for men to be; absolutely conquered and enslaved. And it was at this very moment, when they were acknowledging to themselves their defeat and the intensity of their love, that they heard her say—"Give up all hope, give me up, for I belong no more to myself!" The blow, however, was not so severe as they might have supposed, because its effect had been weakened, deadened by the revulsion of feeling they had just experienced. For had they not sought Madame de Guéran for the sole purpose of heaping reproaches upon her, complaining of her treason, and saying farewell to her? They had looked upon her as lost after the cruellest fashion, M. de Morin picturing himself as sacrificed to M. Périères, and the latter, on the other hand, assuming that his rival was the lucky man, the victor, and the husband elect. Jealousy is the legitimate offspring of wounded _amour-propre_, the two sentiments depend on one another, are natural to each other, and one springs from the other. Get rid of _amour-propre_, and jealousy will disappear; do away with jealousy, and the most unhappy love will, at all events, be calm and tranquil. Say to love—"Your beloved will not have anything to say to you because she loves another"—and off he will go in desperation, meditating revenge or suicide, according to his temperament. But say to him—"This woman keeps you at a distance simply because she neither can nor will belong to any one; she loves you, but she will never tell you so, nor will she allow you to tell her"—and away goes his anger; he loves still, perhaps may love always, but quietly and resignedly. MM. Périères and de Morin had experienced the first of these feelings; they had now arrived at the second, and there they stopped. Madame de Guéran had certainly banished them and treated them with coldness, but she had neither deceived nor betrayed them. Each of them might still suppose himself to be preferred before his rival. They were neither of them being sacrificed to any particular person, but to an idea, a vague hope, an abstract and almost legendary husband. The two young men no longer looked at each other so fiercely as they had done some moments previously. On the contrary, they appeared anxious for an excuse to be near each other, and to exchange a smile and a warm shake of the hand, such as had of late been conspicuous by their absence. They looked like two friends delighted at seeing each other again after a long absence.