"If I had a lover—er—equal to the occasion, perhaps."
"Oh! as to that——"
"Now, Monsieur Jean, we have not yet settled your affair," she interrupted, throwing herself again upon the divan among the cushions.
"No; not quite," said he.
She tried to think connectedly. But everything seemed such a jumble. And out of this chaos of thought came the details of the miserable part she had played.
Her part!
What if he knew that she was merely the wretched tool of the police? What would he say if he came to know that she had once reported his movements at the Préfecture? And what would he do if he were aware that she knew the true relation of Lerouge and Mlle. Remy and had intentionally misled both him and Madeleine?
Fortunately, Mlle. Fouchette had been spared the knowledge of the real cause of Madeleine's misfortune,—the jealous grisette whom she had set on to worse than murder.
But she was thinking only of Jean Marot now. Love had awakened her soul to the enormity of her offence. It also caused her to suffer remorse for her general conduct. Before she loved she never cared; she had never suffered mentally. Now she was on the rack. She was being punished.
Love had furrowed the virgin ground of her heart and turned up self-consciousness and conscience, and sowed womanly sweetness, and tenderness, and pity, and humility, and the sensitiveness to pain.