“The appalling language she applied to me? I can, then!” I broke in with a laugh that was doubtless significant enough.

It only, in truth, left my friend still more grave. “Well, perhaps I ought to also⁠—since I’ve heard some of it before! Yet I can’t bear it,” the poor woman went on while, with the same movement, she glanced, on my dressing table, at the face of my watch. “But I must go back.”

I kept her, however. “Ah, if you can’t bear it⁠—!”

“How can I stop with her, you mean? Why, just for that: to get her away. Far from this,” she pursued, “far from them ⁠—”

“She may be different? She may be free?” I seized her almost with joy. “Then, in spite of yesterday, you believe ⁠—”