Annette had become aware of his love for her. She was amused by it at first, then touched, then grateful, a little, a good deal, in spite of everything. ("The least handsome boy in the world can only give what he has. Thank you, my good Julien.") Then she was a little troubled. She told herself frankly that she should not allow him to start down that slope. But it gave the boy so much happiness, and certainly it was not displeasing to her. Annette was susceptible to affection; susceptible also to gentle attentions, the flattery of tenderness. Too much so, perhaps. She confessed it. Love, the admiration she read in his eyes were for her a caress that she could not but wish to have repeated. . . . Yes, she admitted it: perhaps it was not quite right, but it was so natural! She would have to make some little effort to deprive herself of it. She did so, but she had no luck; everything she said to push Julien away from her (did she really say everything?) attracted him all the more. It was a fatality! One has to resign oneself to a fatality. She laughed at herself, while Julien, troubled, wondered if she was not laughing at him. "Hypocrite, hypocrite! Haven't you any shame?" She had no shame. Can one resist pleasing a heart that has surrendered itself into one's hands? It brightens one's days. And what harm does it do? What is the danger? As long as one is calm and master of oneself and desires only what is good, the good of the other person! She did not know that one of the insidious paths through which love finds its way is the fond vanity of believing that one is necessary--that feeling which is so strong in the heart of a true woman: it satisfies her double need of doing good, which she confesses, and of pride, which she does not confess. It is so strong that when she has a well-developed soul she often prefers the man for whom she cares less, but whom she can protect, to the man for whom she cares more, but who can get along without her. Is not this the essence of maternity? Suppose the big boy were to remain the little chick as long as he lived! The woman with a mother's heart, like Annette, finds it easy to attribute to a man whose love appeals to her a charm he does not possess. Her instinct disposes her to observe only his good qualities. Julien had plenty of these. Annette rejoiced to see his timidity vanishing and his real nature, which had been repressed, expanding in the daylight with the soft happiness of the convalescent. She said to herself that hitherto no one had understood this man, not even the mother of whom he was always talking and of whom she was beginning to be jealous. As for poor Julien, he did not know himself. . . . Who would have suspected that under this rough shell there was a tender, delicate soul? . . . (She was exaggerating.) . . . He needed confidence and he had lacked it: confidence in others, confidence in himself. To believe in himself he needed another believer.