"When I knew for a certainty that a lukewarm affection was all you would ever feel for me, I lost hope, and in losing hope, I lost my foothold on life. I wanted to die--I determined to die. Time and time again, I pressed your pistol to my forehead, but something stronger than my will always prevented me from pulling the trigger; and finally I sought forgetfulness in drink, because I had not the courage to find it in death. At first I tried to hide my condition from you, but there came a moment when the sight of your bland self-satisfaction became unbearable, when your absolute unconsciousness of the havoc you had made of my life maddened me. I wanted you to suffer! Oh, not as I had suffered, you are not capable of that; but at any rate I could hurt your vanity and deal a death-blow to your pride! You had disgraced me when you tricked me into giving myself to a man who did not love me; I determined to disgrace you by reeling through the public streets. And I was glad, glad!" she cried with indescribable bitterness. "When I saw you grow pale with anger, when I saw you tremble with shame, I suppose you fancy that I must, at times, have suffered from remorse and humiliation? I swear that never for a moment have I regretted the course I chose. I am ashamed of nothing except that I lacked the courage to kill myself. Drink? I bless it! How I welcomed the gradual deadening of my senses, the dulling of my fevered brain! When I awoke from my long torpor and found myself at Charleroi, I cursed the doctor who had brought me back to life. Little by little the old agony returned. The thought of you haunted me day and night, while a raging thirst racked my body, and from this twofold torture the constant supervision of the nurses prevented me from obtaining even a temporary respite. It was hell!" For a moment Cyril felt a wave of pity sweep over him, but suddenly he stiffened. "You forget to mention that--consolation was offered you." "Consolation! Had I found that, I should not be here! I admit, however, that when I first noticed that M. de Brissac was attracted by me, I was mildly pleased. It was a solace to my wounded vanity to find that some one still found me desirable. But I swear that it never even occurred to me to give myself to him, till the doctor told me that you were coming to take me away with you. See you again? Subject myself anew to your indifference--your contempt? Never! So I took the only means of escaping from you which offered itself. And I am glad, glad that I flung myself into the mire, for by defiling love, I killed it. I am at last free from the obsession which has been the torment of my life. Neither you nor any other man will again fire my imagination or stir my senses. I am dead, but I am also free--free!"