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Rh and awful void in my heart. I had the odd delusion—or had his words suggested the feeling?—that I really experienced the weakness of which he spoke, and was unable to escape from his hands. Thereupon, I began to cry.

"I don't—I don't believe—that you ever loved me!"

In an instant he had changed his manner, and become kind and gentle as he had always been before. He came to my side, with caresses and words of comfort; even a little friendly banter.

"Alas!" I groaned; "why did you never tell me about this before?"

"Because I was quite sure that you would burst out crying, as you are doing at present, you naughty child!"

At those words, directly and on the spur of the moment, there fell upon me a sense of strong distaste. Back to my memory came in swarms all sorts of seeming trifles, which, together with many a minute detail of our past, made proof demonstrative and irrefutable &hellip; of what he was.

"And you were quite sure, Witold, of something else into the bargain!"