Without an end,--but I have not the cruelty, knowing you to be devoid of imagination, to let you torture yourself in the vain pursuit of the resolution of the two or three perturbations which my thoughtless words forced on your mind. So I mean to explain the few mysteries--psychological and otherwise--which might trouble the serenity of your mornings. First, why did I leave? Ah! do not ask it of me, I no longer know why,--but it is irrevocable. What would you? He captured me. I had to be taken. How often have I not told you that it was necessary to take me and by force and ruse to capture my wavering will? There are such fine strategies that one surrenders, not because of being at the end of resistance, but because the stroke is so well played that it gives pleasure. Ah! you believe women are insensible to Art? At least, this is clear: he captured me. We were waltzing. He carried me away. "Carry me where you will!"--That was the first submission which--mentally--I made him. It was toward the hour when the ball's intoxication commenced to evaporate and left me anticipating of the pleasures of sleep. He asked me for the honor (see, nothing premeditated, the honor!) of escorting me home, at the very moment when, wishing to leave, I feared to leave entranced, and find myself alone in the night. I accepted and sent him to call a carriage and await me there. But he discovered that I was still enjoying myself: he had to wait several hours. Finally, I fled like Cinderella. I had asked him to wait for me, and he was waiting. I fear that all this explains nothing, but the result is still more inexplicable. After all, I only wish to vindicate myself of all conspiracy and to convince you of my perfect innocence. It was he, it might have been you,--and I believed that it would be you. Now, is it my fault? The flower belongs to him who plucks it. I can now confess to you. Dimly, I loved you. Ah! that means a great deal! But you did not project any light on this dim twilight. Yes, attempts, trials, approaches, and so on, with which to make a treatise on Analytical Indecision,--and then what? In short, _you_ did not capture me! Why did I not coöperate in the matter? Ah! it is not our feminine habit, and it seems I have already told you that I had been too badly punished for a first choice to make a second one. Now, it is the same as in the romances: By the grace of God! And no responsibility.