"Will you permit me?

"CAMORS."

This letter he was about despatching, when he received one containing the
following words:

"I shall be happy, Monsieur, if you will call upon me to-day, about
four o'clock.
"ELISE DE TECLE."

Upon which M. de Camors threw his own note in the fire, as entirely
superfluous.

No matter what interpretation he put upon this note, it was an evident
sign that love had triumphed and that virtue was defeated; for, after
what had passed the previous evening between Madame de Tecle and himself,
there was only one course for a virtuous woman to take; and that was
never to see him again. To see him was to pardon him; to pardon him was
to surrender herself to him, with or without circumlocution. Camors did
not allow himself to deplore any further an adventure which had so
suddenly lost its gravity. He soliloquized on the weakness of women.
He thought it bad taste in Madame de Tecle not to have maintained longer
the high ideal his innocence had created for her. Anticipating the
disenchantment which follows possession, he already saw her deprived of
all her prestige, and ticketed in the museum of his amorous souvenirs.

Nevertheless, when he approached her house, and had the feeling of her
near presence, he was troubled. Doubt--and anxiety assailed him. When