"There, now, that's just what puzzles me; all the books one reads are full of love--there's nothing but that! And then in real life one sees nothing of it--at least I don't see anything of it; on the contrary, I see every one doing without it, and quite easily, too. Sometimes I wonder whether it is not just invented for books, whether it is not all imagined by authors--really." Denoisel laughed at the young girl's words. "Tell me, Renee," he said, "since we are men for the time being, as you just said and as we talk to each other of what we feel, quite frankly like two old friends, I should like to ask you in my turn whether you have ever--well, not been in love with any one, but whether you have ever cared for any one?" "No, never," answered Renee, after a moment's reflection, "but then I am not a fair example. I fancy that such things happen to people who have an empty heart, no one to think about; people who are not taken up, absorbed, possessed and, as it were, protected by one of those affections which take hold of you wholly and entirely--the affection one has for one's father, for instance." Denoisel did not answer. "You don't believe that that does preserve you?" said Renee. "Well, but I can assure you I have tried in vain to remember. Oh, I'm examining my conscience thoroughly, I promise you. Well, from my very childhood, I cannot remember anything--no, nothing at all. And yet some of my little friends, who were no older than I was, would kiss the inside of the caps of the little boys who used to play with us; and they would collect the peach-stones from the plates the little boys had used and put them into a box and then take the box to bed with them. Yes, I remember all that. Noemi, for instance, Mlle. Bourjot, was very great at all that. But as for me, I simply went on with my games." "And later on when you were no longer a child?" "Later on? I have always been a child as regards all that. No, there is nothing at all--I cannot remember a single impression. I mean--well, I'm going to be quite frank with you--I had just a slight, a very slight commencement of what you were talking about--just a sensation of that feeling that I recognised later on in novels--and can you guess for whom?" "No."