“You have done me more harm than all my other troubles put together. To-day I suffer less, therefore I love you less. Be kind; do not increase my pain; if you suffer, remember that—I—live.”
She withdrew her hand, which I held, cold, motionless, but moist, in mine, and darted like an arrow through the corridor in which this scene of actual tragedy took place.
At dinner, the count subjected me to a torture I had little expected. “So the Marchioness of Dudley is not in Paris?” he said.
I blushed excessively, but answered, “No.”
“She is not in Tours,” continued the count.
“She is not divorced, and she can go back to England. Her husband would be very glad if she would return to him,” I said, eagerly.
“Has she children?” asked Madame de Mortsauf, in a changed voice.
“Two sons,” I replied.
“Where are they?”
“In England, with their father.”