"No, it is useless. I will confine myself to asking you, for it alters the nature of the sin, whether in your case there have been any private sins, or any sins committed between persons of the same sex?"
"Not since I left school."
"Have you committed adultery?"
"Yes."
"Am I to understand that in your relations with women, you have committed every possible excess?"
Durtal made an affirmative sign.
"That is sufficient."
And the monk was silent.
Durtal choked with disgust; the avowal of these horrors was a terrible effort to him; yet crushed as he was by shame, he was beginning to breathe, when suddenly he plunged his head again in his hands.
The remembrance of the sacrilege in which Madame Chantelouve had made him share, came back to him.