She had nothing to forgive, alas! This absence for a week was not a betrayal, it was not a fault against her; it was nothing, yet it was everything.

It was the end.

She knew it.
She wished to cease.

It was the consent of all the forces of her being.
She said to herself: "I have no reason to love him less.

Do I love him no more?
Did I ever love him ?" She did not know and she did not care to know.