Mauprat
stand. I will act on it, and if I cannot be happy, I will have my revenge."
"Take your revenge as much as you please," she said. "That will only make me despise you."
So saying, she drew from her bosom a piece of paper, and burnt it in the flame of her candle.
"What are you doing?" I exclaimed.
"I am burning a letter I had written to you," she answered. "I wanted to make you listen to reason, but it is quite useless; one cannot reason with brutes."
"Give me that letter at once," I cried, rushing at her to seize the burning paper.
But she withdrew it quickly and, fearlessly extinguishing it in her hand, threw the candle at my feet and fled in the darkness. I ran after her, but in vain. She was in her room before I could get there, and had slammed the door and drawn the bolts. I could hear the voice of Mademoiselle Leblanc asking her young mistress the cause of her fright.
"It is nothing," replied Edmée's trembling voice, "nothing but a joke."
I went into the garden, and strode up and down the walks at a furious rate. My anger gave place to the most profound melancholy. Edmée, proud and daring, seemed to me more desirable than ever. It is the nature of all desire to be excited and nourished by opposition. I felt that I had offended her, and that she did not love me, that perhaps she never would love me; and, without abandoning my criminal resolution to make her mine by force, I gave way to grief at the thought of her hatred of me. I went and leaned upon a gloomy old wall which happened to be near, and, burying my face in my hands, I
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