"If I was unfeeling with you," he implored, "only consider! You had broken
your engagement without giving any reason; I saw you at the party dancing
with Joseph; I believed myself trifled with, I said that if you could treat
in that way there was nothing you could say that I cared to hear. I was
blind to the truth; I was blinded by suffering.
"If you suffered, it was your own fault," she replied, calm as the Fate that
holds the shears and the thread. "I wanted to explain to you why I broke my
engagement and why I went with Joseph: you refused to allow me."
"But before that! Remember that I had gone to see you the night before. You
had a chance to explain then. But you did not explain. Still, I did not
doubt that your reason was good. I did not ask you to state it. But when I
saw you at the party with Joseph, was I not right, in thinking that the time
for an explanation had passed?"
"No," she replied. "As long as I did not give any reason, you ought not to
have asked for one; but when I wished to give it, you should have been ready
to hear it."
He drew himself up quickly.
"This is a poor pitiful misunderstanding.
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