"All the same, Lisa, I love you still. Is there no hope for me? I have no prejudices. I want you, Lisa, just as you are. Your life shall be perfectly free—your career your own."
"You are good, Paul, and I have played with you precisely as a cat plays with a mouse. You will have observed I have a good deal of the cat in me. Believe me, I am in earnest when I say I am quite unworthy of your love——"
"No, Lisa," he began.
"Listen, Paul. I want you to understand how much I love my lost darling. If he were to leave his wife and child, now and come to me and say he loved me, I would go with him to the end of the earth. No, no, Paul. My hope is only in my work. I know I shall realise my ambition. Some day you will marry a better woman than I am. And if," she continued, with a smile, "you care to write and let me know, be sure I shall congratulate you right heartily. Now tell me I have your sympathy, and then let us say good-bye."
"I love you, Lisa. Is that not sufficient proof of my sympathy? I shall leave Paris to-night."
"Come, Paul, kiss me! For the first time and last!"
He brushed her lips so lightly that he scarce had the consciousness of doing so; then he staggered from the room.