"To no one."
"Then why are you so sad? Why do you weep? Why do you tremble? It is I who ought to weep and tremble, and yet I don't weep unless to see you weep. Your weeping breaks my heart, makes me desperate."
"Anna, listen to me. By the memory of your mother I implore you to listen, to understand. I am miserable because of you, on your account—in thinking of what I have allowed you to do, of how you are throwing away your future, of the unhappiness that awaits you; without a home, without a name, persecuted by your family——"
"If you loved me, you wouldn't think these things; you wouldn't say them."
"I have always said them, Anna; I have always repeated them. I have ruined you. For three days I have been in an agony of remorse; it is the same to-day. Though you are the light of my life, I must say it to you. To-day I can't forgive myself; to-morrow you will be unable to forgive me. Oh, my love! I am a gentleman, I am a Christian; and yet I have been weak enough to allow you and me to commit this sin, this fault."
Speaking thus, with an infinite earnestness, all the honesty of his noble soul showed itself, a soul bowed down by remorse. She looked at him and listened to him with stupefaction, amazed at this spectacle of a rectitude, of a virtue that was greater than love, for she believed only in love.
"I don't understand you," she said.
"And yet you must—you must. If you don't see the reasons for my conduct you will despise me, you will hate me. You must try, with all your heart, with all your mind, to understand. You mustn't let yourself be carried away by your love. You must be calm, you must be cool."
"I can't."
"O God!" he said in despair.