streets.... She had swallowed my fortune in one gulp.... Her lips had rendered my mentality sterile at the first touch--. Now she is gambling with my honor, that is consistent.... With my honor!... How could she know that I had none left?... But am I really going to kill her?... When one is dead, everything is forgotten!... One bares one's head before the coffin of a criminal, one bows in sadness before the dead body of a prostitute.... In the churches, believers kneel down and pray for those who have suffered, for those who have sinned.... At the cemeteries reverence watches over the graves and the cross protects them.... To die is to be forgiven!... Yes, death is beautiful, holy, noble!... Death is the beginning of the great eternal light.... Ah, to die!... to stretch oneself out on a mattress softer than the softest moss in birds' nests.... To think no more.... To hear the noise of life no longer!... To feel the infinite sweetness of nothingness!... To be a soul!... I shall not kill her.... I shall not kill her because she has to suffer ... terribly, always.... Let her suffer in all her beauty, in all her pride, in her exposed carnality of a prostitute!... I shall not kill her, but I shall disfigure her to such an extent, I shall make her look so repulsive that people, frightened, will flee at the sight of her.... And every evening I shall compel her to appear on the streets, at the theatre, everywhere with her nose crushed, her eyes bulging out from under eyelids fringed with black rings, without a veil!... Suddenly sobs from my throat.... I fling myself on the couch, biting the cushion, and cry and cry!... Minutes, hours pass and I am still crying!... Ah! Juliette, vile Juliette!... Why did you do that?... Why?... Could you not say to me: "Here now, you are not rich any more and all I want of you is money.... Leave me!" That would have been cruel, it might have meant my death.... But what of it?... It would have been better.... How can I look into your face now?... How can our mouths ever touch each other?... There is now between us the thick wall of that wicked place!... Ah! Juliette!... Wretched Juliette!...