Page:The Story of Manon Lescaut and of the Chevalier des Grieux.pdf/52

56 "who shall be like your Manon in all respects, save her inconstancy."

"Ah, sir!" said I, "as you love me, give me her, and her alone! Rest assured, dear father, that it was not she who betrayed me; she is incapable of such base and cruel treachery. It is that false-hearted B who is deceiving us—deceiving us all three. If you could but realize the tenderness and sincerity of her nature—if you could but know her—you would yourself love her!"

"Child!" retorted my father, "how can you thus blind yourself, after all that I have told you of her? It was she—she herself who gave you up into your brother's hands. It were well for you to forget her very name, and, if you are wise, to profit by the indulgence I am showing you."

I recognized only too clearly that he was right; and it was unreasoning impulse alone that made me thus side with my faithless mistress.

"Alas!" I rejoined, after a moment's silence, "it is but too true that I am the victim of the most shameful treachery! Yes," I continued, weeping from very mortification, "yes, I am indeed nothing but a child—I see it plainly. It was an easy matter for them to cheat credulity like mine. But I know how to be revenged!"

My father inquired what I intended to do.

"I will go to Paris," said I, "and set fire to B's house, that he and my faithless Manon may perish together in the flames!"

This outburst made my father laugh, and only resulted in my being watched with increased vigilance in my place of confinement.

I there spent six whole months, during the first of which there was little change in my condition. My feelings may be summed up as a perpetual alternation between love and hatred, between hope and despair, ac-