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      Ah, well! In making the movement occasioned by the pain, this shoulder was for the moment higher than that. (He raises the right arm a little.) "Ah, said my opponent, laughing, I made a mistake, it is the right which is highest." It was not bad – for him, but it was bad taste. Then I fired. It was the first time that poor fellow showed any wit; he wasn't used to it; it killed him.

      He wants to rise in the estimation of our hostess; he is a clever fellow.

      He is peculiar, that man.

      Do you find him odd?

      Yes, he is so unlike any one else.

      Indeed?

      What is the matter with you? What are you thinking about?

      I am thinking that that odd man is very happy.

      In having the left shoulder higher than the right, and a ball in the latter?

      In having what I have not, in having forty millions.

      Ah, yes, that would help us out of our difficulties.

      My poor Lionnette, I am very unhappy.

      Why?

      Because I am not able to give you any longer what I formerly gave you.

      I shall do very well without it.

      You are incapable of it; you said it yourself just now.

      There are moments when I no longer know what I say; you must not pay attention to it. Chance has done much for me in my life; it may still find a way.

      And if chance gets tired, and if you also get as tired? I shall never say – "if you love me no more;" in your heart you have never loved me.

      Why did I marry you, then?

      Because your mother advised you to do it.

      It is perhaps the only good advice she ever gave me, and I assure you I have been very grateful for what you have done for me.

      Gratitude is not love.

      Love comes afterwards.

      A long time afterwards, for it has not come yet.

      The most beautiful creature in the world could not give more than she has. I have given all I had to give. Is it love? Is it not love? I know not. I have no line of comparison, never having given to any one but you.

      (She hesitates a moment before continuing.)

      You were going to say something else.

      No.

      Yes. Say it, whatever it was.

      (He draws Lionnette by the hand, close to him.)

      There are the plots beginning again. An odd kind of a house this.

      (The three persons go out on the terrace, and from there into the garden, where one sees no more of them.)

      I was going to say that perhaps you find that I do not love you enough, because you love me too much. Then you have been much too good to me; you have done whatever I wished; you did wrong. You should have been more my master, in order to counterbalance the bad influence of my mother, to change my habits, to offer more resistance, and to save me from myself.

      To save you? What have you done then?

      I have ruined you.

      That is all.

      It is quite enough.

      You have never thought of…

      Of what?

      Of another?