“I came to tell you, dear, but I can’t tell you now … you would not believe me! You have lost faith in me, Raoul; it is finished!”
She spoke in such a despairing voice that the lad began to feel remorse for his cruelty.
“But look here!” he cried. “Can’t you tell me what all this means! … You are free, there is no one to interfere with you. … You go about Paris. … You put on a domino to come to the ball. … Why do you not go home? … What have you been doing this past fortnight? … What is this tale about the Angel of Music, which you have been telling Mamma Valérius? Someone may have taken you in, played upon your innocence. I was a witness of it myself, at Perros … but you know what to believe now! You seem to me quite sensible, Christine. You know what you are doing. … And meanwhile Mamma Valérius lies waiting for you at home and appealing to your ‘good genius!’ … Explain yourself, Christine, I beg of you! Anyone might have been deceived as I was. What is this farce?”
Christine simply took off her mask and said: “Dear, it is a tragedy!”
Raoul now saw her face and could not restrain an exclamation of surprise and terror. The fresh complexion of former days was gone. A mortal pallor covered those features, which he had known so charming and so gentle, and sorrow had furrowed them with pitiless lines and traced dark and unspeakably sad shadows under her eyes.
“My dearest! My dearest!” he moaned, holding out his arms. “You promised to forgive me …”
“Perhaps! … Some day, perhaps!” she said, resuming her mask; and she went away, forbidding him, with a gesture, to follow her.
He tried to disobey her; but she turned round and repeated her gesture of farewell with such authority that he dared not move a step.