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At first, I was unable to realize it.

"But I see, Witold, that you have not the least love for me—that is, for what is most essential in me; I have at last found it out."

I mused awhile.

"And then, besides, what you say is untrue. Recall which of us two revels more in high-flown, naïve, silly, maudlin sentiment! Who was it was always dreaming of an ideal 'brotherhood of souls,' instead of regarding love in the ordinary way? It was I who cannot bear what is high-flown; I, who always had to bring you down from your stilts."

Witold was looking out of the window. There was in his bearing aristocratic boredom and lassitude, plainly expressed.

"Ah, Janka," he said, this time in a tone of supreme indifference, "that, too, is on your part all theory. Of this you only make use, that you may struggle against the high-flown sentimentality which you feel within you, though you disown it, and deny its existence. And the eternal conflict with yourself in which you are plunged, and your empty theories, with their unconscious hypocrisy—these are the best proof of what I say, and the most high-flown sentimentality of all. &hellip; Only