“Speculation, speculation!' she [Caroline Hamelin] mechanically repeated, struggling with her doubts. 'Ah! the idea of it fills my heart with disturbing anguish.”

“In love as as in speculation there is much filth; in love also, people think only of their own gratification; yet without love there would be no life, and the world would come to an end.”

“Hélène, her eyes once more raised and remote, was deep in a dream. She was Lady Rowena, she was in love, with the deep peaceful passion of a noble soul. This spring morning, the loveliness of the great city, the first wallflowers scenting her lap, had little by little melted her heart.”

“There Albine lay, panting, exhausted by love, her hands clutched closer and closer to her heart, breathing her last. She parted her lips, seeking the kiss which should obliterate her, and then the hyacinths and tuberoses exhaled their incense, wrapping her in a final sigh, so profound that it drowned the chorus of roses, and in this culminating gasp of blossom, Albine was dead.”

“All of a sudden, in the good-natured child, the woman stood revealed, a disturbing woman with all the impulsive madness of her sex, opening the gates of the unknown world of desire. Nana was still smiling, but with the deadly smile of a man-eater.”

“Raising her arms, she defied Heaven. 'So,' she cried, 'you prefer your God to me? You think he is stronger than I am. You think he will love you better than I would? Ah, what a child you are! Do stop talking such twaddle. What we are going to do is go back to the garden together, and love each other, be happy and free, for that is life.”

“It was always the same; other people gave up loving before she did. They got spoilt, or else they went away; in any case, they were partly to blame. Why did it happen so? She herself never changed; when she loved anyone, it was for life. She could not understand desertion; it was something so huge, so monstrous that the notion of it made her little heart break.”