My dear Paul, never have you been so noble in my eyes as you are at this moment.  To despair of nothing, to start courageously to seek a fortune!  Only your character, your strength of mind could do it.  I sit at your feet.  A man who avows his weakness with your good faith, who rebuilds his fortune from the same motive that made him wreck it, for love’s sake, for the sake of an irresistible passion, oh, Paul, that man is sublime!  Therefore, fear nothing; go on, through all obstacles, not doubting your Natalie—­for that would be doubting yourself.  Poor darling, you mean to live in me?  And I shall ever be in you.  I shall not be here; I shall be wherever you are, wherever you go.

Though your letter has caused me the keenest pain, it has also filled me with joy—­you have made me know those two extremes!  Seeing how you love me, I have been proud to learn that my love is truly felt.  Sometimes I have thought that I loved you more than you loved me.  Now, I admit myself vanquished, you have added the delightful superiority—­of loving—­to all the others with which you are blest.  That precious letter in which your soul reveals itself will lie upon my heart during all your absence; for my soul, too, is in it; that letter is my glory.

I shall go to live at Lanstrac with my mother.  I die to the world; I will economize my income and pay your debts to their last farthing.  From this day forth, Paul, I am another woman.  I bid farewell forever to society; I will have no pleasures that you cannot share.  Besides, Paul, I ought to leave Paris and live in retirement.  Dear friend, you will soon have a noble reason to make your fortune.  If your courage needed a spur you would find it in this.  Cannot you guess?  We shall have a child.  Your cherished desires are granted.  I feared to give you one of those false hopes which hurt so much—­have we not had grief enough already on that score?  I was determined not to be mistaken in this good news.  To-day I feel certain, and it makes me happy to shed this joy upon your sorrows.

This morning, fearing nothing and thinking you still at home, I went to the Assumption; all things smiled upon me; how could I foresee misfortune?  As I left the church I met my mother; she had heard of your distress, and came, by post, with all her savings, thirty thousand francs, hoping to help you.  Ah! what a heart is hers, Paul!  I felt joyful, and hurried home to tell you this good news, and to breakfast with you in the greenhouse, where I ordered just the dainties that you like.  Well, Augustine brought me your letter,—­a letter from you, when we had slept together!  A cold fear seized me; it was like a dream!  I read your letter!  I read it weeping, and my mother shared my tears.  I was half-dead.  Such love, such courage, such happiness, such misery!  The richest fortunes