“One month after that happy day—a year ago—you gave me back my promise, told me to consider myself free from any engagement, and never to come near you again. If I could have discovered in what way I had offended you—But no, you refused to explain. You drove me away, and to obey you I told everyone that I had left you of my own accord. You told me that an invincible obstacle had arisen between us, and I believed you, fool that I was! The obstacle was your own heart, Madeleine. I have always worn the medal; but it has not brought me happiness or good fortune.”
As white and motionless as a statue, Madeleine stood with bowed head before this storm of passionate reproach.
“I told you to forget me,” she murmured.
“Forget!” exclaimed Prosper, excitedly, “forget! Can I forget! Is it in my power to stop, by an effort of will, the circulation of my blood? Ah, you have never loved! To forget, as to stop the beatings of the heart, there is but one means—death!”
This word, uttered with the fixed determination of a desperate, reckless man, caused Madeleine to shudder.
“Miserable man!” she exclaimed.
“Yes, miserable man, and a thousand times more miserable than you can imagine! You can never understand the tortures I have suffered, when for a year I would awake every morning, and say to myself, ‘It is all over, she has ceased to love me!’ This great sorrow stared me in the face day and night in spite of all my efforts to dispel it. And you speak of forgetfulness! I sought it at the bottom of poisoned cups, but found it not. I tried to extinguish this memory of the past, that tears my heart to shreds like a devouring flame; in vain. When the body succumbed, the pitiless heart kept watch. With this corroding torture making life a burden, do you wonder that I should seek rest which can only be obtained by suicide?”
“I forbid you to utter that word.”
“You forget, Madeleine, that you have no right to forbid me, unless you love me. Love would make you all powerful, and me obedient.”
With an imperious gesture Madeleine interrupted him as if she wished to speak, and perhaps to explain all, to exculpate herself.