Clemence remained for some time powerless to reply; her respiration was so painful that each breath seemed like suffocation; her head, after rolling about on the back of the chair, fell upon her breast, like a blade of grass broken and bruised by the rain.

“If you have read those letters,” she murmured, when she had strength enough to speak, “you must know that I am not as unworthy as you think.  I am very guilty—­but I still have a right to be forgiven.”

Christian, at this moment, had he been gifted with the intelligence which fathoms the mysteries of the heart, might have renewed the bonds which were so near being broken; he could at least have stopped Clemence upon a dangerous path and saved her from a most irreparable fall.  But his nature was too unrefined for him to see the degrees which separate weakness from vice, and the intoxication of a loving heart from the depravity of a corrupt character.  With the obstinacy of narrow-minded people, he had been looking at the whole thing in its worst light, and for several hours already he had decided upon his wife’s guilt in his own mind; this served now as a foundation for his stern conduct.  His features remained perfectly impassive as he listened to Clemence’s words of justification, which she uttered in a weak, broken voice.

“I know that I merit your hatred-but if you could know how much I suffer, you would surely forgive me—­You left me in Paris very young, inexperienced; I ought to have fought against this feeling better than I did, but I used up in this struggle all the strength that I had—­You can see how pale and changed I have become within the past year.  I have aged several years in those few months; I am not yet what you call a—­a lost woman.  He ought to have told you that—­”

“Oh, he has! of course he has,” replied Christian with bitter irony.  “Oh, you have in him a loyal cavalier!”

“You do not believe me, then! you do not believe me!” she continued, wringing her hands in despair; “but read these letters, the last ones.  See whether one writes like this to a woman who is entirely lost—­”

She tried to take the package which her husband held; instead of giving the letters to her, he lighted them at the candle and then threw them into the fireplace.  Clemence uttered a cry and darted forward to save them, but Christian’s iron hand seized her and pushed her back into her chair.

“I understand how much you care for this correspondence,” said he, in a more excited tone, “but you are more loving than prudent.  Let me destroy one witness which accuses you.  Do you know that I have already killed a man on account of these letters?”

“Killed!” exclaimed Madame de Bergenheim, whom this word drove almost to madness, for she could not understand its real meaning and applied it to her lover.  “Well, then, kill me too, for I lied when I said that I repented.  I do not repent!  I am guilty!  I deceived you!  I love him and I abhor you; I love him! kill me!”