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The excerpt represents the core issue or deciding factor on which you must meditate, and is drawn from The Deserted Woman by Honore de Balzac: gracious was she, so much herself with this stranger, with whom she
felt completely at ease, because she felt sure that they should never
meet again, that, after some delicious epigram of hers, Gaston
exclaimed unthinkingly:
"Oh! madame, how could any man have left you?"
The Vicomtesse was silent. Gaston reddened, he thought that he had
offended her; but she was not angry. The first deep thrill of delight
since the day of her calamity had taken her by surprise. The skill of
the cleverest /roue/ could not have made the impression that M. de
Nueil made with that cry from the heart. That verdict wrung from a
young man's candor gave her back innocence in her own eyes, condemned
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