Page:Villette (1st edition).djvu/726

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46
VILLETTE.

voted and infatuated, where you ought to be cool as your name. Don't suppose that I wish you to have a passion for me, Mademoiselle; Dieu vous en garde! What do you start for? Because I said passion? Well, I say it again. There is such a word, and there is such a thing—though not within these walls, thank Heaven! You are no child that one should not speak of what exists; but I only uttered the word—the thing, I assure you, is alien to my whole life and views. It died in the past—in the present it lies buried—its grave is deep-dug, well-heaped, and many winters old: in the future there will be a resurrection, as I believe to my soul's consolation; but all will then be changed—form and feeling: the mortal will have put on immortality—it will rise, not for earth, but heaven. All I say to you, Miss Lucy Snowe, is—that you ought to treat Professor Paul Emanuel decently."

I could not, and did not, contradict such a sentiment.

"Tell me," he pursued, "when it is your fête-day, and I will not grudge a few centimes for a small offering."

"You will be like me, monsieur: this cost more than a few centimes, and I did not grudge its price."