My life is intolerable.'
"'Is there only one woman in the world?' she asked, smiling. 'Why
make yourself so miserable in so short a life?'
"I looked at Pauline in bewilderment. She left me before I noticed her
departure; the sound of her words had reached me, but not their sense.
Very soon I had to take my Memoirs in manuscript to my
literary-contractor. I was so absorbed by my passion, that I could not
remember how I had managed to live without money; I only knew that the
four hundred and fifty francs due to me would pay my debts. So I went
to receive my salary, and met Rastignac, who thought me changed and
thinner.
"'What hospital have you been discharged from?' he asked.
"'That woman is killing me,' I answered; 'I can neither despise her
nor forget her.'
"'You had much better kill her, then perhaps you would think no more
of her,' he said, laughing.
"'I have often thought of it,' I replied; 'but though sometimes the
thought of a crime revives my spirits, of violence and murder, either
or both, I am really incapable of carrying out the design. The
countess is an admirable monster who would crave for pardon, and not
every man is an Othello.'
"'She is like every woman who is beyond our reach,' Rastignac
interrupted.
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