He had never quite understood her, not even in the old days. In the old days, as a young officer, he had seen in her a fine girl, a delicious girl, of whom he had been madly enamoured. He had never understood her eyes, never understood her soul; but formerly he had not thought so very much about those eyes and that soul, because in those days he didn't know much about himself either, did not know what he knew now. In those days, he only now and then had a vague glimpse of his own latent sentimentality: to-day, he knew that sentimentality to be there most positively, as a blue background to his soul. And he was so much afraid of that sentimentality, so much afraid lest he should miss the truth, the naked, mocking reality of that courtesan's soul, so much afraid lest he should make it out to be finer than it really was, kinder above all and gentler and more tender, that he could never speak to her without abusing her or swearing at her, his voice as rough as if he were roaring at one of his hussars.
"I mustn't let myself be put upon by her . . . or by myself either," he constantly reflected.
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