"Oh, do not think of it!" And she shuddered. "But you are right. Love alone has saved us. But at first even the knowledge that you were La Tournoire, and that none the less I loved you, did not make me turn back. If my duty to my father had before required that I should sacrifice you, did my duty not still require it? Did it make any change in my duty that I loved you? What right had I, when devoted to a task like mine, to love any one? If I had violated my duty by loving you, ought I not to disregard my love, stifle it, act as if it did not exist? I had to forget that I was a woman who loved, remember only that I was a daughter. My filial duty was no less, my proper choice between my father and another was not altered by my having fallen in love. I must carry my horrible task to the end. What a night of struggle was that at the inn, after I had learned that the appointed victim was you! And now it was necessary that you should not leave me; therefore I spoke no more of the barrier between us. I fortified myself to hide my feelings and maintain my pretence. Surely you noticed the change in me, the forced composure and cheerfulness. How I tried to harden myself! "And after that the words of love you so often spoke to me, what bliss and what anguish they caused me! I was to have made you love me, but you loved me already. I ought to have rejoiced at this, for the success that it promised my purpose. Yet, it was on that account that I shuddered at it; and if it did give me moments of joy it was because it was pleasant to have your love. My heart rose at the thought that I was loved by you, and fell at the thought that your love was to cause your death. Often, for your own sake, I wished that I might fail, that you would not love me; yet for my father's sake I had to wish that I should succeed, had to be glad that you loved me. To make you fall the more easily into the hands of your enemies, I had to show love for you. How easy it was to show what I felt; yet what anguish I underwent in showing it, when by doing so I led you to death! The more I appeared to love you, the more truly I disclosed my heart, yet the greater I felt was my treason! I do not think any woman's heart was ever so torn by opposing motives!" "My beloved, all that is past forever!" "In my dreams at Maury, we would be strolling together among roses, under cloudless skies, nothing to darken my joy. Then I would see you wounded, the soldiers of the governor gathered around you and laughing at my horror and grief. I would awake and vow not to betray you, and then I would see my father's face, pale and haggard, and my dead mother's wet with tears for his misery and supplicating me to save him!" "My poor Julie!"