"Listen, I am not a coward," he said. "The choice of my life is not entirely in my own hands. Circumstances have brought it about that I am everything to Anne. I shall not give her up—no matter what happens."
"You prefer to sacrifice your children?"
"They have their mother."
"And their mother?"
No answer following the question, Philippe added:
"Shall you see her again before your departure?"
"No, what should I say to her? That she should break our legal ties, that she should try to remake her own happiness—she is so young, so lovely, so fascinating—and that I can never be anything to her again?"
"And that you are not happy?"
"What matter."
And those words fell like a stone into a dry well.