"
"Ah, that ends it!" replied Ernest. "She loves you, or she will love
you if you desire it. Your fame won half the battle. Well, you may now
have it all your own way. You shall go there alone in future. Modeste
despises me; she is right to do so; and I don't see any reason why I
should condemn myself to see, to love, desire, and adore that which I
can never possess."
After a few consoling remarks, dashed with his own satisfaction at
having made a new version of Caesar's phrase, Canalis divulged a
desire to break with the Duchesse de Chaulieu. La Briere, totally
unable to keep up the conversation, made the beauty of the night an
excuse to be set down, and then rushed like one possessed to the
seashore, where he stayed till past ten, in a half-demented state,
walking hurriedly up and down, talking aloud in broken sentences,
sometimes standing still or sitting down, without noticing the
uneasiness of two custom-house officers who were on the watch. After
loving Modeste's wit and intellect and her aggressive frankness, he
now joined adoration of her beauty--that is to say, love without
reason, love inexplicable--to all the other reasons which had drawn
him ten days earlier, to the church in Havre.
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