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192 Lirat. You don't suspect anything. I am lost, dishonored!"

"Dishonored, my friend? Are you sure of it? Do you have unclean debts? You'll pay them off!"

"It is not a question of that! I am dishonored! dishonored, do you understand? It has been four months since I have given Juliette any money. . . four months! And here I live, I eat, have my amusements. Every evening. . . before dinner. . . late at night. . . . Juliette re-enters the house. She is worn-out, pale, her hair disheveled. From what dens, what alcoves, what arms is she returning? Upon what pillows has her head reclined! Sometimes I see pieces of bed clothes insolently hanging on the top of her hair. . . . She no longer feels ashamed of it, she does not even take the trouble to lie about it. . . one might think it had been arranged between us. She undresses, and I believe she takes a perverse delight in showing me her ill-fastened skirts, her unlaced corset, all the disorder of her rumpled clothes, of her loosened garments which come off, falling to the ground about her, and lie conspicuously on the floor, filling the bedroom with the breath of other people!

"I tremble with rage and want to sink my teeth into her body; my wrath is kindled to a frenzy and boils within me—I feel like killing her. And I say nothing! Often I even come up to her to embrace her. . . but she pushes me away: 'No, leave me alone, I am tired!' At first, when this abominable life started, I used to beat her. . . for you must know, Lirat, there isn't a disgraceful act that I have not committed. I have exhausted every form of indecency yes, I beat her! She bent her back. . . and hardly uttered a complaint. One evening I seized her by the throat, I threw her to the ground. Oh! I had quite made up my mind to finish her. While I was strangling her, I turned my head