"Oh! it is so difficult! How can I tell you? . . . I love him. . . . I love him tremendously. . . . He is so wonderful!"
(She began to describe him complaisantly, under Sylvie's mocking eyes. Then she broke off. . . .)
"I love him very much . . . very much. . . . And then, too, I don't love him. . . . There are things about him . . . I could never live with . . . I never could. . . . And then, he loves me too much. He would like to eat me. . . ."
(Sylvie burst out laughing.)
". . . It's true, eat me entirely, devour my whole life, all my own thoughts, the very air I breathe. . . . Oh! he's an excellent eater, my Roger! It's a pleasure to see him at the table. . . . He has a good appetite. . . . But I, I don't want to be eaten."
She too laughed heartily; and Sylvie, who was sitting in her lap, laughed against her neck. Annette went on:
"It's frightful to feel yourself being devoured like that, alive, to have nothing of your own any more, not to be able to keep anything any longer. . . . And he doesn't suspect it. . . . He loves me madly, and I have an idea, you see, that he doesn't even try to understand me, that he doesn't even think about it. He comes, he takes, he carries me off. . . ."
"Well, that's terribly nice!" observed Sylvie.
"You are always thinking about silly things!" said Annette, clasping her in her arms.
"And what would you like to have me think about?"