And yet I prefer to believe Catherine more sensitive to material sacrifices, and almost indifferent to the soul's devotion, than to believe she unblushingly gave herself to the future confidant of the Minister of Foreign Affairs.
Those four months passed at the Grove were radiant, oh, very radiant for me, whose happiness was pure, and not tinged with shame.
Only, at this moment, circumstances strike me which I had not previously observed.
At the Grove, Catherine plied me with questions as to my labours with M. de Sérigny; she interrogated me minutely as to the impressions or memories which I retained. When I confessed frankly their insignificance, and chose rather to speak of our love, she was annoyed and pouted, she reproached me with being either too discreet or too frivolous.
When I wished to abandon the ungrateful career which I had adopted in idleness, Catherine employed all the resources of her mind, all her influence, all her power over me to deter me from resigning my position.
It is true that these questions and this persuasion were alike used in the name of the profound interest which she felt for me.
I believe it, for it would be outrageous to suppose that her reluctance to see me abandon my career was prompted by her reluctance to forfeit the price of her long premeditated error.
Since her return to Paris, what has her life been? Did she sacrifice at my request her accustomed social relations? On the contrary, she increased them, and her drawing-room has become a centre of diplomatic intrigue.
Our long days of tender affection have given place to occupations which are not those of a woman dominated by love.
If I sadly reproach her for this unhappy change, her answer is that she must obey her husband's expressed wishes,—wishes that are all the more sacred to her since she has been guilty of so censurable an error.