This is what Modeste read a few days later, as she sat by her window on a fine summer’s day:—­

Mademoiselle,—­Without hypocrisy or evasion, yes, if I had been certain that you possessed an immense fortune I should have acted differently.  Why?  I have searched for the reason; here it is.  We have within us an inborn feeling, inordinately developed by social life, which drives us to the pursuit and to the possession of happiness.  Most men confound happiness with the means that lead to it; money in their eyes is the chief element of happiness.  I should, therefore, have endeavored to win you, prompted by that social sentiment which has in all ages made wealth a religion.  At least, I think I should.  It is not to be expected of a man still young that he can have the wisdom to substitute sound sense for the pleasure of the senses; within sight of a prey the brutal instincts hidden in the heart of man drive him on.  Instead of that lesson, I should have sent you compliments and flatteries.  Should I have kept my own esteem in so doing?  I doubt it.  Mademoiselle, in such a case success brings absolution; but happiness?  That is another thing.  Should I have distrusted my wife had I won her in that way?  Most assuredly I should.  Your advance on me would sooner or later have come between us.  Your husband, however grand your fancy may make him, would have ended by reproaching you for having abased him.  You, yourself, might have come, sooner or later, to despise him.  The strong man forgives, but the poet whines.  Such, mademoiselle, is the answer which my honesty compels me to make to you.

And now, listen to me.  You have the triumph of forcing me to reflect deeply,—­first on you, whom I do not sufficiently know; next, on myself, of whom I knew too little.  You have had the power to stir up many of the evil thoughts which crouched in my heart, as in all hearts; but from them something good and generous has come forth, and I salute you with my most fervent benedictions, just as at sea we salute the lighthouse which shows the rocks on which we were about to perish.  Here is my confession, for I would not lose your esteem nor my own for all the treasures of earth.

I wished to know who you are.  I have just returned from Havre, where I saw Francoise Cochet, and followed her to Ingouville.  You are as beautiful as the woman of a poet’s dream; but I do not know if you are Mademoiselle Vilquin concealed under Mademoiselle d’Herouville, or Mademoiselle d’Herouville hidden under Mademoiselle Vilquin.  Though all is fair in war, I blushed at such spying and stopped short in my inquiries.  You have roused my curiosity; forgive me for being somewhat of a woman; it is, I believe, the privilege of a poet.

Now that I have laid bare my heart and allowed you to read it, you will believe in the sincerity of what I am about to add.  Though the glimpse I had of you was all too rapid, it has sufficed