Moths by Ouida — page 293: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

SIOTHS. 288 ** Have you slept well, love?” * Not at all,” said Vere, who did not speak falsely in little things or large. _ “Ah! sighed Madame Nelaguine, and added, wistfully, ** Vera, i want to ask you to be still patient, to do nothing in haste; ina word, to forgive_still if you can. My dear, I am so pained, so shocked, so ashamed of all the insults my brother offers you; but he has had a lesson very grandly given; it may profit him, it may not; but in any way, Vera, asa woman in the world who vet can love you, my love, I want to entreat you, for all our sakes, and for your own above all, not to separate yourself from my brother.” . Vere, who had her eyes fixed on the distant snows of the mountains of Esterelle, turned and looked at her with surprise and with something of rebuke. ‘You mean?—I do not think I understand you.” ‘*] mean,” murmured her sister-in-law, almost nervously, ‘*do not seek for a divorce.” ‘* A divorce!” | Vere echoed the words in a sort of scorn, ‘“You do not know me much yet,” she said, calmly. ‘*The woman who can wish fora divorce and drag her wrongs into public-—such wrongs!—is already a wanton herself; at least I think so.” Madame Nelaguine breathed a little quickly with relief, yet with a new apprehension. ‘*‘You are beyond me, Vere, and in your Own way you are terribly stern.” ‘¢ What do you wish me to be?” said Vere, tranquilly. ‘‘If I were of softer mold I should make your brother’s name the shame of Europe. Be grateful to my coldness, it is his only shield.” ‘But you suffer ‘That is nothing to any one. WhenI married Prince Zouroff I knew very well that I should suffer always. Itis not his fault; he cannot change his nature.” His sister stood beside her and pulled the yellow tea-roses ai: sently. ‘‘You are altogether beyond me,” she said, hurriedly, “ang — yet youare nota forgiving woman, Vere?” , ‘*Forgiveness is a very vague word; it is used with very little thought. No, Ido not forgive, certainly. But Ido not avengs myself by giving my name to the mob and telling the whole world things that I blush even to know.” ‘‘Then you would never separate yourself from Sergius?” ‘<I may leave his roof if he try me too far—I have thought of it—but I will never ask the law to set me freefrom him. What could law do for me? Ji cannot undo whatis done. A woman who divorees her husband is a prostitute legalized by g form; that is all.” | ‘¢-You think fidelity due to the faithless?” ‘¢¥ think fidelity isthe only form of chastity left toa woman who is a wife; the man’s vices cannot affect the question, I ab- 39 an a ~ f | : aT ~M sy