"Better say night. A bad conscience has need of night."
"Conscience always stops on the steps of the temple of love. Did you ever know anyone who, truly in love with a woman, devoured by desire for her, has been hindered by conscience? I know nobody. If any human being came to me with a tale like that, I should tell him frankly that he lied. No mouse ever hesitated before cheese; no man before a woman, in fear of his conscience."
"All the worse for men if that is so. But I repeat it is not about this that I wish to speak at this moment. At the risk of your carrying out your half-veiled threats, I am resolved to put an end to this persecution, and it shall be ended. Indeed, it shall be ended!"
"Do you know one thing, Cristina? I have come to think that you enjoy being obstinate rather than virtuous."
"Do you know another thing, Castell? I have always thought that there is no love whatever in your make-up, but, instead, a monstrous vanity that has need of satisfying itself at the cost of the honor and happiness of your best friend."
"If there was nothing in me but vanity, how long would it have taken it to be revenged upon this scorn, these insults? I doubt if there is a woman in the world who knows how better to cut the heart with a gesture, envenom the soul, and fill it with mad anger by a glance. I am persuaded that you cannot love, but only scorn, a man. If you condescend to your husband, it is because he is a poor, miserable thing who doesn't dare hold up his head in your presence."
"Spare your insults! This is well! If you had always talked like this, I should have been saved much pain. Now let us come to the other matter. It is absolutely necessary that from this night henceforth you must cease to mortify me, either with words, looks, or hints of any kind. It is absolutely necessary that, if you cannot treat me with respect as the wife of your friend, I should be to you as any indifferent person. And, further, I am resolved, thinking everything over, to give an account of what has passed to my husband."
"This is decreed?" he asked in a mocking tone.
"This is decreed!" she said angrily.
There was a pause.