Yes, her gratitude. For there was no use in my recognising in her every moral superiority over the women that I had previously met; I was still confident that I was doing her a favour in loving her. Her father might belong to a family much older than my own; but he was nevertheless my employé. She would mount in the social scale. I would raise her to my level. Through me she would attain the summit of fortune. Out of a little sylvan nymph I was going to create one of those divinities who reign over Paris, one of those queens whose despotic tyranny and recognised fascination I had recently experienced. Was not that enough to intoxicate her? I thought how I could inform her of her good fortune tactfully, in order not to overwhelm her with the revelation. Thus do we judge from on high when we perch ourselves upon riches and prejudice. We like to believe that we attach no importance to them, that we are showing genuine simplicity, that we treat as equals those whom we overwhelm with our insolence; and all the time the treasures of the soul escape our vision. We need the virgin ore, and we make use only of the minted gold! I should have prolonged this period of waiting; for me a period of spiritual refreshment. Raymonde was nearing her twentieth birthday, the white summit of her first youth. In her “desert” she had sprung up like a lily of the fields. She was ignorant of the very existence of those sensations, those flirtations, those trivial love affairs, which, weak emotions though they are, mere forerunners to true love, are yet sufficient to tarnish the heart of a young girl, to put upon it a useless stigma before life has really begun. But those women who preserve themselves unsullied even in their inmost thoughts, who cross their pure hands upon their breasts as though to guard the tabernacle of their future and only love--what husband can ever merit the absolute surrender that they will some day make to him? Can he ever comprehend, can he ever realise the significance of such a gift of infinite confidence, of undying promise? He accepts his conquest as if it were a foreign country, while all the sweetness of a fatherland is offered to him. Yes, I should have prolonged that period of waiting. Before marriage every man ought to compel himself to retire from the world, to leave an interval between his past and that future for which he is not prepared. A little time must be permitted to flow over our dead passions. A new life demands a new-born spirit. My self-conceit convinced me that I was beloved by Raymonde, although nothing had betrayed her. Might I not have profited by this security to attempt to merit her love by cultivating my own? Was there any need to demand so soon a useless confession, when the spectacle of a heart which was ignorant of itself could cleanse my heart that knew too much?