The Count of Monte Cristo

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"What were you doing?" replied she.

"Oh, my mother!" exclaimed Albert, so overcome he could scarcely speak;
"it is not the same with you and me--you cannot have made the same
resolution I have, for I have come to warn you that I bid adieu to your
house, and--and to you."

"I also," replied Mercedes, "am going, and I acknowledge I had depended
on your accompanying me; have I deceived myself?"

"Mother," said Albert with firmness. "I cannot make you share the fate
I have planned for myself. I must live henceforth without rank and
fortune, and to begin this hard apprenticeship I must borrow from a
friend the loaf I shall eat until I have earned one. So, my dear mother,
I am going at once to ask Franz to lend me the small sum I shall require
to supply my present wants."