Carnac's Folly

Suddenly a tempest of fire seemed to burn in his eyes, in his whole being. His face flushed: his eyes gleamed; his hands were thrust out with passion.

"Will you not understand that were I as foul as hell, a woman like you would make me clean again? The wild sin of our youth has eaten into the soul of my life. You think I have been indifferent to you and to our boy. No, never-never! That I left you both to yourselves was the best proof I was not neglectful. I was sorry, with all my soul, that you should have suffered through me. In the first reaction, I felt that nothing could put me right with you or with eternal justice. So I shrank away from you. You thought it was lust satisfied. I tell you it was honour shamed. Good God! You thought me just the brazen roue, who seized what came his way, who ate the fruit within his grasp, who lived to deceive for his own selfish joy.

"Did you think that? Then, if you did, I do not wonder you should be glad to see my son fighting me. It would seem the horrible revenge Destiny should take." He took a step nearer to her. His face flamed, his arms stretched out. "I have held you in these arms. I come with repentance in my heart, with--"

Her face now was flushed. She interrupted him.

"I don't believe in you, Barode Barouche. At least my husband did not go from his hearthstone looking for what belonged to others. No--No--no; however much I suffered, I understood that what he did not feel for me at least he felt for no one else. To him, life was his business, and to the long end business mastered his emotions. I have no faith in you! In the depth of my soul something cries out: 'He is not true. His life is false.' To leave me that was right, but, monsieur, not as you left me. You pick the fruit and eat it and spit upon the ground the fibre and the skin. I am no longer the slave of your false eloquence. It has nothing in it for me now, nothing at all--nothing."

"Yet your son--has he naught of me? If your son has genius, I have the right to say a part of it came from me. Why should you say that all that's good in the boy is yours--that the boy, in all he does and says, is yours! No--no. Your long years of suffering have hardened into injustice and wrong."