I was denied a little child." For a moment, lowering her eyes, letting her hands fall, yielding to the maternal impulse, she only thought of loving and regretting the child that had not been vouchsafed to her--without perceiving that if she considered it her only possible salvation, it was because she did not have it.
"Charity?
They say that it makes us forget everything.

Oh, yes, to go distributing alms on the snowy streets, in a great fur cloak," she murmured and made a tired gesture, while the lover and I felt the shiver of the cold rainy evening and of all the winters past and yet to come.
"All that is diversion, deception.

It does not alter the truth a particle.

We shall die, we are going to die." She stopped crying, dried her eyes and assumed a tone so positive and calm that it gave the impression that she was leaving the subject.
"I want to ask you a question.

Answer me frankly.