RUDIN
me to renounce the happiness which you have said yourself would have laid upon me no obligations. Your peace is dearer to me than anything in the world, and I should have been the basest of men, if I could have taken advantage———’
‘Perhaps, perhaps,’ interrupted Natalya, ‘perhaps you are right; I don’t know what I am saying. But up to this time I believed in you, believed in every word you said. . . . For the future, pray keep a watch upon your words, do not fling them about at hazard. When I said to you, “I love you,” I knew what that word meant; I was ready for everything. . . . Now I have only to thank you for a lesson—and to say good-bye.’
‘Stop, for God’s sake, Natalya Alexyevna, I beseech you. I do not deserve your contempt, I swear to you. Put yourself in my position. I am responsible for you and for myself. If I did not love you with the most devoted love—why, good God! I should have at once proposed you should run away with me. . . . Sooner or later your mother would forgive us—and then . . . But before thinking of my own happiness———’
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