Page:The Writings of Prosper Merimee-Volume 3.djvu/186

164 164 THE ETRUSCAN VASE

that youths who had money ruined themselves and others."

" What became of this woman? "

" How should I know? . . . Probably she died in a hospital."

" Auguste, ... if that were true you would not speak so flippantly."

" Well, then, to tell you the truth, she is married to a respectable man, and when I came of age I gave her a small dowry."

" How good of you! . . . But why do you try to make yourself out so evil? "

" Oh, I am good enough. . . . The more I think of it the more I persuade myself that this woman really did care for me. . But on the other hand, it is difficult to discern true feeling under such a ridiculous expression of it."

" You ought to have shown me your letter. I should not have been jealous. . . . We women have finer tact than you, and we can tell at a glance, from the style of a letter, whether the writer is sincere, or feigning a passion he does not really feel."

" But what a number of times you have al- lowed yourself to be taken in by fools and rogues ! "

As he spoke he looked at the Etruscan vase