She deciphered it without difficulty... "Cherbourg, 31 July, 1903."
"The very day we went to the Liais Garden, the day we went up that tower where I almost fainted with love.... I was so happy!"
She began crying. Through her tears she looked at her hands, turning them, looking at all the fingers one after another. She looked as though she were rediscovering them, taking possession of them once more.
Finally she got up and stamped her foot.
"Very well then, I don't love him any more. There! Good-bye, Monsieur Hervart. You deceived me, I shall never forgive you. And I had such confidence in him; I let myself rest so softly on his heart."
She was still crying.
"Now, I am ashamed...."
And she felt her body, from head to feet, as though to take possession of it also. She would have liked to press it, to wring it so that all the caresses, all the kisses which had sunk into her skin, penetrated her veins, thrilled her nerves, might be drained out of it.
In her already perverted innocence she pictured to herself the mutual caresses of Xavier
