"Of course I expressed my appreciation of his kindness in the plainest possible words, broke with him once and for all, and ran off to my betrothed, to whom I excitedly related the whole chronicle of what I had heard about her way of life. The idea had never even entered my head that she would answer me in any other way than with a burst of burning indignation, and I had already been considering what kind words I should make use of in order to soothe her. But she heard me through without emotion, indeed without even blushing, so that for a moment I was fool enough to say to myself, 'I really believe she is so innocent that she doesn't even understand what I have been telling her.' But when I ceased speaking, she looked me full in the face, quite unabashed and with her most angelic expression, and said: 'This is all a lie, except in one particular. I committed a single wrong when I was a mere child, and that was the reason why I refused to become your wife. Do now as you like; you know what you take when you take me.' "This confession, which she made with her irresistible melodramatic voice, blinded me completely; and I was more convinced than ever that all the rest of the talk about her deceitfulness and coquetry, and her heartless flirting with foolish young admirers, was a lie. 'No,' I cried, folding her in my arms, 'you shall not find yourself disappointed in me, you shall not find a narrow-minded Philistine, when you thought you were giving yourself up to a free artist's soul. What lies behind you shall cast no shadow over our future. If it is true that you love me, why then--' and here I quoted, slightly changing it to suit the occasion, a verse of poetry that I had read but a short time before and had thought very profound. 'Was _I_ a saint before I asked your hand? And yet I was master of my fate, and knew what I did. No, let there be day before us and behind us night, that none may look upon us! Only promise me that in the _future_ all your thoughts shall belong to me alone.'