only five o'clock in the morning, and the street was still deserted.
"All is lost. My father, fearing my tears, left Thursday night. Nobody knows where for? But here is his letter: read it." She climbed into the fiacre with Julien.
"I could forgive everything except the plan of seducing you because you are rich. That, unhappy girl, is the awful truth. I give you my word of honour that I will never consent to a marriage with that man. I will guarantee him an income of 10,000 francs if he will live far away beyond the French frontiers, or better still, in America. Read the letter which I have just received in answer to the enquiries which I have made. The impudent scoundrel had himself requested me to write to madame de Rênal. I will never read a single line you write concerning that man. I feel a horror for both Paris and yourself. I urge you to cover what is bound to happen with the utmost secrecy. Be frank, have nothing more to do with the vile man, and you will find again the father you have lost."
"Where is Madame de Rênal's letter? " said Julien coldly.
"Here it is. I did not want to shew it to you before you were prepared for it."
LETTER
"My duties to the sacred cause of religion and morality, oblige me, monsieur, to take the painful course which I have just done with regard to yourself: an infallible principle orders me to do harm to my neighbour at the present moment, but only in order to avoid an even greater scandal. My sentiment of duty must overcome the pain which I experience. It is only too true, monsieur, that the conduct of the person about whom you ask me to tell you the whole truth may seem incredible or even honest. It may possibly be considered proper to hide or to disguise part of the truth: that would be in accordance with both prudence and religion. But the conduct about which you desire information has been in fact reprehensible to the last degree, and more than I can say. Poor and greedy as the man is, it is only by the aid of the most consummate hypocrisy, and by seducing a weak and unhappy woman, that he has endeavoured to make a career for himself and become someone in the world. It is part of
