initial commit of ebook 17375HEADmain

1 files changed, 11524 insertions, 0 deletions

diff --git a/17375.txt b/17375.txt
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..e5536d6
--- /dev/null
+++ b/17375.txt
@@ -0,0 +1,11524 @@
+The Project Gutenberg eBook, The Works of Guy de Maupassant, Volume II (of
+8), by Guy de Maupassant
+
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+
+
+
+Title: The Works of Guy de Maupassant, Volume II (of 8)
+       Monsieur Parent -- The Father -- A Vagabond -- Useless Beauty -- Fly -- The Mad Woman -- That Pig of a Morin -- The Wooden Shoes -- A Normandy Joke -- A Cock Crowed -- Julot's Opinion -- Mademoiselle -- The Mountebanks -- The Sequel to a Divorce -- The Man with the Dogs -- The Clown -- Babette -- Sympathy -- The Debt -- An Artist -- Mademoiselle Fifi -- The Story of a Farm Girl -- Mamma Stirling -- Lilie Lala -- Madame Tellier's Establishment -- The Bandmaster's Sister -- False Alarm -- Wife and Mistress -- Mad -- An Unfortunate Likeness -- The New Sensation
+
+
+Author: Guy de Maupassant
+
+
+
+Release Date: December 22, 2005  [eBook #17375]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-646-US (US-ASCII)
+
+
+***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE WORKS OF GUY DE MAUPASSANT,
+VOLUME II (OF 8)***
+
+
+E-text prepared by Juliet Sutherland, Mary Meehan, and the Project
+Gutenberg Online Distributed Proofreading Team (https://www.pgdp.net/)
+
+
+
+THE WORKS OF GUY DE MAUPASSANT
+
+VOLUME II
+
+Monsieur Parent and Other Stories
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+Copyright, 1909, by
+Bigelow, Smith & Co.
+
+
+
+
+
+CONTENTS
+
+
+   MONSIEUR PARENT
+
+   THE FATHER
+
+   A VAGABOND
+
+   USELESS BEAUTY
+
+   FLY
+
+   THE MAD WOMAN
+
+   THAT PIG OF A MORIN
+
+   THE WOODEN SHOES
+
+   A NORMANDY JOKE
+
+   A COCK CROWED
+
+   JULOT'S OPINION
+
+   MADEMOISELLE
+
+   THE MOUNTEBANKS
+
+   THE SEQUEL TO A DIVORCE
+
+   THE MAN WITH THE DOGS
+
+   THE CLOWN
+
+   BABETTE
+
+   SYMPATHY
+
+   THE DEBT
+
+   AN ARTIST
+
+   MADEMOISELLE FIFI
+
+   THE STORY OF A FARM GIRL
+
+   MAMMA STIRLING
+
+   LILIE LALA
+
+   MADAME TELLIER'S ESTABLISHMENT
+
+   THE BANDMASTER'S SISTER
+
+   FALSE ALARM
+
+   WIFE AND MISTRESS
+
+   MAD
+
+   AN UNFORTUNATE LIKENESS
+
+   THE NEW SENSATION
+
+
+
+
+MONSIEUR PARENT
+
+
+I
+
+Little George was making hills of sand in one of the walks; he took it
+up with both his hands, made it into a pyramid, and then put a chestnut
+leaf on the top, and his father, sitting on an iron chair was looking at
+him with concentrated and affectionate attention, and saw nobody but him
+in that small public garden which was full of people. All along the
+circular road other children were occupied in the same manner, or else
+were indulging in childish games, while nursemaids were walking two and
+two, with their bright cap ribbons floating behind them, and carrying
+something wrapped up in lace, on their arms, and little girls in short
+petticoats and bare legs were talking seriously together, during the
+intervals of trundling their hoops.
+
+The sun was just disappearing behind the roofs of the _Rue
+Saint-Lazare_, but still shed its rays obliquely on that little
+over-dressed crowd. The chestnut trees were lighted up with its yellow
+rays, and the three fountains before the lofty porch of the church, had
+the appearance of liquid silver.
+
+Monsieur Parent looked at his son sitting in the dusk, he followed his
+slightest movements with affection, but accidentally looking up at the
+church clock, he saw that he was five minutes late, so he got up, took
+the child by the arm and shook his dress which was covered with sand,
+wiped his hands and led him in the direction of the _Rue Blanche_, and
+he walked quickly, so as not to get in after his wife, but as the child
+could not keep up with him, he took him up and carried him, though it
+made him pant when he had to walk up the steep street. He was a man of
+forty, turning gray already, rather stout, and had married, a few years
+previously, a young woman whom he dearly loved, but who now treated him
+with the severity and authority of an all-powerful despot. She found
+fault with him continually for everything that he did, or did not do,
+reproached him bitterly for his slightest acts, his habits, his simple
+pleasures, his tastes, his movements and walk, and for having a round
+stomach and a placid voice.
+
+He still loved her, however, but above all he loved the child which he
+had had by her, and George, who was now three, had become the greatest
+joy, and had preoccupation of his heart. He himself had a modest private
+fortune, and lived without doing anything on his twenty thousand francs
+a year, and his wife, who had been quite portionless, was constantly
+angry at her husband's inactivity.
+
+At last he reached his house, put down the child, wiped his forehead and
+walked upstairs, and when he got to the second floor, he rang. An old
+servant who had brought him up, one of those mistress-servants who are
+the tyrants of families, opened the door to him, and he asked her
+anxiously: "Has Madame come in yet?" The servant shrugged her shoulders:
+"When have you ever known Madame to come home at half past six,
+Monsieur?" And he replied with some embarrassment: "Very well; all the
+better; it will give me time to change my things, for I am very hot."
+
+The servant looked at him with angry and contemptuous pity, and
+grumbled: "Oh! I can see that well enough, you are covered with
+perspiration, Monsieur. I suppose you walked quickly and carried the
+child, and only to have to wait until half past seven, perhaps, for
+Madame. I have made up my mind not to have it ready at the time. Shall
+get it for eight o'clock, and if you have to wait, I cannot help it;
+roast meat ought not to be burnt!" Monsieur Parent, however, pretended
+not to hear, but only said: "All right! all right. You must wash
+George's hands, for he has been making sand pits. I will go and change
+my clothes; tell the maid to give the child a good washing."
+
+And he went into his own room, and as soon as he got in he locked the
+door, so as to be alone, quite alone. He was so used now to being abused
+and badly treated, that he never thought himself safe, except when he
+was locked in. He no longer ventured even to think, reflect and reason
+with himself, unless he had guarded himself against her looks and
+insinuations, by locking himself in. Having thrown himself into a chair,
+in order to rest for a few minutes before he put on clean linen, he
+remembered that Julie was beginning to be a fresh danger in the house.
+She hated his wife, that was quite plain, but she hated his friend Paul
+Limousin still more, who had continued to be the familiar and intimate
+friend of the house, after having been the inseparable companion of his
+bachelor days, which is very rare. It was Limousin who acted as a buffer
+between his wife and himself, and who defended him ardently, and even
+severely, against her undeserved reproaches, against crying scenes, and
+against all the daily miseries of his existence.
+
+But now for six months, Julie had constantly been saying things against
+her mistress, and repeated twenty times a day: "If I were you, Monsieur,
+I should not allow myself to be led by the nose like that. Well, well...
+There, ... everyone according to his nature." And one day, she had even
+ventured to be insolent to Henriette, who, however, merely said to her
+husband, at night: "You know, the next time she speaks to me like that,
+I shall turn her out of doors." But she, who feared nothing; seemed to
+be afraid of the old servant, and Parent attributed her mildness to her
+consideration for the old domestic who had brought him up, and who had
+closed his mother's eyes. Now, however, it was finished, matters could
+not go on like that much longer, and he was frightened at the idea of
+what was going to happen. What could he do? To get rid of Julie seemed
+to him to be such a formidable thing to do, that he hardly ventured to
+think of it, but it was just as impossible to uphold her against his
+wife, and before another month now, the situation would become
+unbearable between the two. He remained sitting there, with his arms
+hanging down, vaguely trying to discover some means to set matters
+straight, but without success, and he said to himself: "It is only lucky
+that I have George ... without him I should be very miserable."
+
+Then he thought he would consult Limousin, but the recollection of the
+hatred that existed between his friend and the servant made him fear
+lest the former should advise him to turn her away, and again he was
+lost in doubts and unhappy uncertainty. Just then the clock struck
+seven, and he started up. Seven o'clock, and he had not even changed his
+clothes yet! Then nervous and breathless, he undressed, put on a clean
+shirt, and hastily finished his toilet, as if he had been expected in
+the next room for some event of extreme importance, went into the
+drawing-room, happy at having nothing to fear. He glanced at the
+newspaper, went and looked out of the window, and then sat down on the
+sofa again, when the door opened, and the boy came in, washed, brushed
+and smiling, and Parent took him up in his arms and kissed him
+passionately; then he tossed him into the air, and held him up to the
+ceiling, but soon sat down again, as he was tired with all his efforts,
+and taking George onto his knee, he made him ride a cock-horse, and the
+child laughed and clapped his hands, and shouted with pleasure, as his
+father did also, for he laughed until his big stomach shook, for it
+amused him almost more than it did the child.
+
+He loved him with all the heart of a weak, resigned, ill-used man. He
+loved with mad bursts of affection, with caresses and with all the
+bashful tenderness which was hidden in him, and which had never found an
+outlet, even at the early period of his married life, for his wife had
+always shown herself cold and reserved. Just then, however, Julie came
+to the door, with a pale face and glistening eyes, and she said in a
+voice which trembled with exasperation: "It is half past seven,
+Monsieur." Parent gave an uneasy and resigned look at the clock and
+replied: "Yes, it certainly is half past seven." "Well, my dinner is
+quite ready, now."
+
+Seeing the storm which was coming, he tried to turn it aside. "But did
+you not tell me when I came in that it would not be ready before eight?"
+"Eight! what are you thinking about? You surely do not mean to let the
+child dine at eight o'clock? It would ruin his stomach. Just suppose
+that he only had his mother to look after him! She cares a great deal
+about her child. Oh! yes, we will speak about her; she is a mother. What
+a pity it is that there should be any mothers like her!"
+
+Parent thought it was time to cut short a threatened scene, and so he
+said: "Julie, I will not allow you to speak like that of your mistress.
+You understand me, do you not? Do not forget it for the future."
+
+The old servant, who was nearly choked with surprise, turned round and
+went out, slamming the door so violently after her, that the lusters on
+the chandelier rattled, and for some seconds it sounded as if a number
+of little invisible bells were ringing in the drawing room.
+
+George who was surprised at first, began to clap his hands merrily, and
+blowing out his cheeks, he gave a great _boum_ with all the strength of
+his lungs, to imitate the noise of the door banging. Then his father
+began to tell him stories, but his mind was so preoccupied that he every
+moment lost the thread of his story, and the child, who could not
+understand him, opened his eyes wide, in astonishment.
+
+Parent never took his eyes off the clock; he thought he could see the
+hands move, and he would have liked to have stopped them, until his
+wife's return. He was not vexed with her for being late, but he was
+frightened, frightened of her and of Julie, frightened at the thought of
+all that might happen. Ten minutes more, would suffice to bring about an
+irreparable catastrophe, explanations and acts of violence that he did
+not dare to picture to himself. The mere idea of a quarrel, of their
+loud voices, of insults flying through the air like bullets, the two
+women standing face to face, looking at each other and flinging abuse at
+one another, made his heart beat, and his tongue as parched as if he had
+been walking in the sun, and made him as limp as a rag, so limp that he
+no longer had the strength to lift up the child, and to dance him on his
+knee.
+
+Eight o'clock struck, the door opened once more and Julie came in again.
+She had lost her look of exasperation, but now she put on an air of cold
+and determined resolution, which was still more formidable. "Monsieur,"
+she said, "I served your mother until the day of her death, and I have
+attended to you from your birth until now, and I think it may be said
+that I am devoted to the family." She waited for a reply, and Parent
+stammered: "Why yes, certainly, my good Julie." She continued: "You know
+quite well that I have never done anything for the sake of money, but
+always for your sake; that I have never deceived you nor lied to you,
+that you have never had to find fault with me..." "Certainly, my good
+Julie." "Very well, then, Monsieur, it cannot go on any longer like
+this. I have said nothing, and left you in your ignorance, out of
+respect and liking for you, but it is too much, and everyone in the
+neighborhood is laughing at you. Everybody knows about it, and so I must
+tell you also, although I do not like to repeat it. The reason why
+Madame comes in at any time she chooses is, that she is doing abominable
+things."
+
+He seemed stupefied, and not to understand, and could only stammer out:
+"Hold your tongue, you know I have forbidden you ..." But she
+interrupted him with irresistible resolution. "No, Monsieur, I must tell
+you everything, now. For a long time Madame has been doing wrong with
+Monsieur Limousin, I have seen them kiss scores of times behind the
+doors. Ah! you may be sure that if Monsieur Limousin had been rich,
+Madame would never have married Monsieur Parent. If you remember how the
+marriage was brought about, you would understand the matter from
+beginning to end." Parent had risen, and stammered out, deadly pale:
+"Hold your tongue hold your tongue or ..." She went on, however: "No, I
+mean to tell you everything. She married you from interest, and she
+deceived you from the very first day. It was all settled between them
+beforehand. You need only reflect for a few moments to understand it,
+and then, as she was not satisfied with having married you, as she did
+not love you, she has made your life miserable, so miserable that it has
+almost broken my heart when I have seen it ..."
+
+He walked up and down the room with his hands clenched, repeating: "Hold
+your tongue ... hold your tongue ..." for he could find nothing else to
+say; the old servant, however, would not yield; she seemed resolved on
+everything, but George, who had been at first astonished, and then
+frightened at those angry voices, began to utter shrill screams, and
+remained behind his father, and he roared with his face puckered up and
+his mouth open.
+
+His son's screams exasperated Parent and filled him with rage and
+courage. He rushed at Julie with both arms raised, ready to strike
+her, and exclaiming: "Ah! you wretch! you will send the child out of
+his senses." He was already touching her, when she said: "Monsieur, you
+may beat me if you like, me who reared you, but that will not prevent
+your wife from deceiving you, or alter the fact that your child is not
+yours ..." He stopped suddenly, and let his arms fall, and he remained
+standing opposite to her, so overwhelmed that he could understand
+nothing more, and she added: "You need only look at the child to know
+who is its father! He is the very image of Monsieur Limousin, you need
+only look at his eyes and forehead, why, a blind man could not be
+mistaken in him...."
+
+But he had taken her by the shoulders, and was now shaking her with
+all his might, while he said: "Viper ... viper! Go out the room,
+viper! ... go out, or I shall kill you! ... Go out! Go out! ..."
+
+And with a desperate effort he threw her into the next room. She fell
+onto the table which was laid for dinner, breaking the glasses, and
+then, getting up, she put it between her master and herself, and while
+he was pursuing her, in order to take hold of her again, she flung
+terrible words at him: "You need only go out this evening after dinner,
+and come in again immediately ... and you will see! ... you will see
+whether I have been lying! Just try it ... and you will see." She had
+reached the kitchen door and escaped, but he ran after her, up the back
+stairs to her bedroom into which she had locked herself, and knocking
+at the door, he said! "You will leave my house this very instant." "You
+may be certain of that, Monsieur," was her reply. "In an hour's time I
+shall not be here any longer."
+
+He then went slowly downstairs again, holding on to the banister, so as
+not to fall, and went back to the drawing-room, where little George was
+sitting on the floor, crying; he fell into a chair, and looked at the
+child with dull eyes. He understood nothing, be knew nothing more, he
+felt dazed, stupefied, mad, as if he had just fallen on his head, and he
+scarcely even remembered the dreadful things the servant had told him.
+Then, by degrees his reason grew clearer like muddy water, and the
+abominable revelation began to work in his heart.
+
+Julie had spoken so clearly, with so much force, assurance and
+sincerity, that he did not doubt her good faith, but he persisted in not
+believing her penetration. She might have been deceived, blinded by her
+devotion to him, carried away by unconscious hatred for Henriette.
+However, in measure as he tried to reassure and to convince himself, a
+thousand small facts recurred to his recollection, his wife's words,
+Limousin's looks, a number of unobserved, almost unseen trifles, her
+going out late, their simultaneous absence, and even some almost
+insignificant, but strange gestures, which he could not understand, now
+assumed an extreme importance for him and established a connivance
+between them. Everything that had happened since his engagement, surged
+through his over-excited brain, in his misery, and he obstinately went
+through his five years of married life, trying to recollect every detail
+month by month, day by day, and every disquieting circumstance that he
+remembered stung him to the quick like a wasp's sting.
+
+He was not thinking of George any more, who was quiet now and on the
+carpet, but seeing that no notice was being taken of him the boy began
+to cry. Then his father ran up to him, took him into his arms, and
+covered him with kisses. His child remained to him at any rate! What did
+the rest matter? He held him in his arms and pressed his lips onto his
+light hair, and relieved and composed, he whispered: "George, ... my
+little George, ... my dear little George ..." But he suddenly remembered
+what Julie had said! ... Yes! she had said that he was Limousin's
+child... Oh! It could not be possible, surely! He could not believe it,
+could not doubt, even for a moment, that he was his own child. It was
+one of those low scandals which spring from servants' brains! And he
+repeated: "George ... my dear little George." The youngster was quiet
+again, now that his father was fondling him.
+
+Parent felt the warmth of the little chest penetrate to his through
+their clothes, and it filled him with love, courage and happiness; that
+gentle heat soothed him, fortified him and saved him. Then he put the
+small, curly head away from him a little and looked at it
+affectionately, still repeating: "George! ... Oh! my little George! ..."
+But suddenly he thought, "Suppose he were to resemble Limousin, ...
+after all!"
+
+There was something strange working within him, a fierce feeling, a
+poignant and violent sensation of cold in his whole body, in all his
+limbs, as if his bones had suddenly been turned to ice. Oh! if he were
+to resemble Limousin and he continued to look at George, who was
+laughing now. He looked at him with haggard, troubled eyes, and he tried
+to discover whether there was any likeness in his forehead, in his nose,
+mouth or cheeks. His thoughts wandered like they do when a person is
+going mad, and his child's face changed in his eyes, and assumed a
+strange look, and unlikely resemblances.
+
+Julie had said: "A blind man could not be mistaken in him." There must,
+therefore, be something striking, an undeniable likeness! But what? The
+forehead? Yes, perhaps, Limousin's forehead, however, was narrower. The
+mouth then? But Limousin wore a beard, and how could any one verify the
+likeness between the fat chin of the child, and the hairy chin of that
+man?
+
+Parent thought: "I cannot see anything now, I am too much upset;
+I could not recognize anything at present ... I must wait; I must
+look at him well to-morrow morning, when I am getting up." And
+immediately afterwards he said to himself: "But if he is like me,
+I shall be saved! saved!" And he crossed the drawing-room in two strides,
+to examine the child's face by the side of his own in the looking-glass.
+He had George on his arm, so that their faces might be close together,
+and he spoke out loud almost without knowing it. "Yes ... we have the
+same nose ... the same nose ... perhaps, but that is not sure ... and
+the same look ... But no, he has blue eyes ... Then good heavens! I shall
+go mad ... I cannot see anything more ... I am going mad!..."
+
+He went away from the glass to the other end of the drawing-room, and
+putting the child into an easy chair, he fell into another and began to
+cry; and he sobbed so violently that George, who was frightened at
+hearing him, immediately began to scream.
+
+The hall bell rang, and Parent gave a bound as if a bullet had gone
+through him. "There she is," he said ... "What shall I do? ..." And he
+ran and locked himself up in his room, so at any rate to have time to
+bathe his eyes. But in a few moments another ring at the bell made him
+jump again, and he remembered that Julie had left, without the housemaid
+knowing it, and so nobody would go to open the door. What was he to do?
+He went himself, and suddenly he felt brave, resolute, ready for
+dissimulation and the struggle. The terrible blow had matured him in a
+few moments, and then he wished to know the truth, he wished it with the
+rage of a timid man, and with the tenacity of an easy-going man, who has
+been exasperated.
+
+But nevertheless he trembled! Was it fear? Yes . . . Perhaps he was
+still frightened of her? Does one know how much excited cowardice there
+often is in boldness? He went to the door with furtive steps, and
+stopped to listen; his heart beat furiously, and he heard nothing but
+the noise of that dull throbbing in his chest, and George's shrill
+voice, who was still crying in the drawing room. Suddenly, however, the
+noise of the bell over his head startled him like an explosion; then he
+seized the lock, turned the key and opening the door, saw his wife and
+Limousin standing before him on the stairs.
+
+With an air of astonishment, which also betrayed a little irritation
+she said: "So you open the door now? Where is Julie?" His throat
+felt tight, and his breathing was labored and he tried to reply,
+without being able to utter a word, so she continued: "Are you
+dumb? I asked you where Julie is?" And then he managed to say:
+"She ... she ... has ... gone ..." Whereupon his wife began to get
+angry. "What do you mean by _gone_? Where has she gone? Why?" By
+degrees he regained his coolness, and he felt immense hatred for that
+insolent woman who was standing before him, rise up in him: "Yes,
+she has gone altogether ... I sent her away ..." "You have sent away
+Julie?... Why you must be mad." "Yes, I have sent her away because she
+was insolent ... and because, because she was ill-using the child."
+"Julie?" "Yes ... Julie." "What was she insolent about?" "About you."
+"About me?" "Yes, because the dinner was burnt, and you did not come in."
+"And she said ...?" "She said ... offensive things about you ... which
+I ought not ... which I could not listen to ..." "What did she say?"
+"It is no good repeating them." "I want to hear them." "She said it
+was unfortunate for a man like me to be married to a woman like you,
+unpunctual, careless, disorderly, a bad mother and a bad wife ..."
+
+The young woman had gone into the anteroom followed by Limousin, who did
+not say a word at this unexpected position of things. She shut the door
+quickly, threw her cloak onto a chair, and going straight up to her
+husband, she stammered out: "You say? ... you say? ... that I am ...?"
+
+He was very pale and calm and replied: "I say nothing, my dear. I am
+simply repeating what Julie said to me, as you wanted to know what it
+was, and I wish you to remark that I turned her off just on account of
+what she said."
+
+She trembled with a violent longing to tear out his beard and scratch
+his face. In his voice and manner she felt that he was asserting his
+position as master, although she had nothing to say by way of reply, and
+she tried to assume the offensive, by saying something unpleasant: "I
+suppose you have had dinner?" she asked.
+
+"No, I waited for you." She shrugged her shoulders impatiently. "It is
+very stupid of you to wait after half past seven," she said. "You might
+have guessed that I was detained, that I had a good many things to do,
+visits and shopping."
+
+And then suddenly, she felt that she wanted to explain how she had spent
+her time, and she told him in abrupt, haughty words, that having to buy
+some furniture in a shop a long distance off, very far off, in the _Rue
+de Rennes_, she had met Limousin at past seven o'clock on the _Boulevard
+Saint-Germain_, and that then she had gone with him to have something to
+eat in a restaurant, as she did not like to go to one by herself,
+although she was faint with hunger. That was how she had dined, with
+Limousin, if it could be called dining, for they had only had some soup
+and half a fowl, as they were in a great hurry to get back, and Parent
+replied simply: "Well, you were quite right. I am not finding fault with
+you."
+
+Then Limousin, who had not spoken till then, and who had been half
+hidden behind Henriette, came forward, and put out his hand, saying:
+"Are you very well?" Parent took his hand, and shaking it gently,
+replied: "Yes, I am very well." But the young woman had felt a reproach
+in her husband's last words. "Finding fault! ... Why do you speak of
+finding fault? ... One might think that you meant to imply something."
+"Not at all," he replied, by way of excuse. "I simply meant, that I was
+not at all anxious although you were late, and that I did not find fault
+with you for it." She, however, took the high hand, and tried to find a
+pretext for a quarrel. "Although I was late? ... One might really think
+that it was one o'clock in the morning, and that I spent my nights away
+from home." "Certainly not, my dear. I said _late_, because I could find
+no other word. You said you should be back at half past six, and you
+returned at half past eight. That was surely being late! I understand it
+perfectly well ... I am not at all surprised ... even. But ... but ... I
+can hardly use any other word." "But you pronounce them, as if I had
+been out all night." "Oh! no, ... oh! no ..."
+
+She saw that he would yield on every point, and she was going into her
+own room, when at last she noticed that George was screaming, and then
+she asked, with some feeling: "Whatever is the matter with the child?"
+"I told you, that Julie had been rather unkind to him?" "What has the
+wretch been doing to him?" "Oh! Nothing much. She gave him a push, and
+he fell down."
+
+She wanted to see her child, and ran into the dining-room but stopped
+short at the sight of the table covered with spilt wine, with broken
+decanters and glasses and overturned salt-cellars. "Who did all that
+mischief?" she asked. "It was Julie who ..." But she interrupted him
+furiously: "That is too much, really! Julie speaks of me as if I were a
+shameless woman, beats my child, breaks my plates and dishes, turns my
+house upside down, and it appears that you think it all quite natural."
+"Certainly not, as I have got rid of her!" "Really ... you have got rid
+of her! ... But you ought to have given her in charge. In such cases,
+one ought to call in the Commissary of Police!" "But ... my dear ... I
+really could not ... there was no reason ... It would have been very
+difficult." She shrugged her shoulders disdainfully.
+
+"There, you will never be anything but a poor, wretched fellow, a man
+without a will, without any firmness or energy. Ah! she must have said
+some nice things to you, your Julie, to make you turn her off like that.
+I should like to have been here for a minute, only for a minute." Then
+she opened the drawing-room door and ran to George, took him into her
+arms and kissed him, and said: "Georgie, what is it, my darling, my
+pretty one, my treasure?" But as she was fondling him he did not speak,
+and she repeated: "What is the matter with you?" And he having seen,
+with his child's eyes, that something was wrong, replied: "Julie beat
+papa."
+
+Henriette turned towards her husband, in stupefaction at first, but then
+an irresistible desire to laugh shone in her eyes, passed like a slight
+shiver over her delicate cheeks, made her upper lip curl and her
+nostrils dilate, and at last a clear, bright burst of mirth came from
+her lips, a torrent of gayety which was lively and sonorous as the song
+of a bird. She repeated, with little mischievous exclamations which
+issued from between her white teeth, and hurt Parent as much as a bite
+would have done: "Ha!... ha!... ha!... ha! she beat ... she beat ... my
+husband ... ha!... ha! ha!... How funny!... Do you hear, Limousin? Julie
+has beaten ... has beaten ... my ... husband ... Oh! dear oh! dear ...
+how very funny!"
+
+But Parent protested: "No ... no ... it is not true, it is not true ...
+It was I, on the contrary, who threw her into the dining room so
+violently that she knocked the table over. The child did not see
+clearly, I beat her!" "Here, my darling." Henriette said to her boy "did
+Julie beat papa?" "Yes, it was Julie," he replied. But then, suddenly
+turning to another idea, she said, "But the child has had no dinner?
+You have had nothing to eat, my pet?" "No, mamma." Then she again turned
+furiously onto her husband. "Why, you must be mad, utterly mad! It is
+half past eight, and George has had no dinner!"
+
+He excused himself as best he could, for he had nearly lost his wits by
+the overwhelming scene and the explanation, and felt crushed by this
+ruin of his life. "But, my dear, we were waiting for you, as I did not
+wish to dine without you. As you come home late every day, I expected
+you every moment."
+
+She threw her bonnet, which she had kept on till then, into an easy
+chair, and in an angry voice she said: "It is really intolerable to have
+to do with people who can understand nothing, who can divine nothing,
+and do nothing by themselves. So, I suppose, if I were to come in at
+twelve o'clock at night, the child would have had nothing to eat? Just
+as if you could not have understood that, as it was after half past
+seven, I was prevented from coming home, that I had met with some
+hindrance!..."
+
+Parent trembled, for he felt that his anger was getting the upper hand,
+but Limousin interposed and turning towards the young woman, he said:
+"My dear friend, you are altogether unjust. Parent could not guess that
+you would come here so late, as you never do so, and then, how would you
+expect him to get over the difficulty all by himself, after having sent
+away Julie?"
+
+But Henriette was very angry and replied "Well, at any rate, he must
+get over the difficulty himself, for I will not help him. Let him settle
+it". And she went into her own room, quite forgetting that her child had
+not had anything to eat.
+
+Then Limousin immediately set to work to help his friend. He picked up
+the broken glass which strewed the table and took them out. He replaced
+the plates, knives and forks and put the child into his high chair.
+While Parent went to look for the lady's maid, to wait at table; who
+came in great astonishment. As she had heard nothing in George's room,
+where she had been working. She soon however, brought in the soup, a
+burnt leg of mutton, and mashed potatoes.
+
+Parent sat by the side of the child, very much upset and distressed at
+all that had happened. He gave the boy his dinner, and endeavored to eat
+something him self. But he could only swallow with an effort, as if his
+throat had been paralyzed. By degrees, he was seized by an insane desire
+of looking at Limousin who was sitting opposite to him and making bread
+pellets, to see whether George was like him, but he did not venture to
+raise his eyes for some time; at last, however, he made up his mind to
+do so, and gave a quick, sharp look at the face which he knew so well,
+although he almost fancied that he had never looked at it carefully, as
+it looked so different to what he had fancied. From time to time he
+looked at him, trying to recognize a likeness in the smallest lines of
+his face, in the slightest features, and then he looked at his son,
+under the pretext of feeding him.
+
+Two words were sounding in his ears "His father! his father! his
+father!" They buzzed in his temples at every beat of his heart. Yes,
+that man, that tranquil man who was sitting on the other side of the
+table was, perhaps, the father of his son, of George, of his little
+George. Parent left off eating; he could not manage any more; a terrible
+pain, one of those attacks of pain which make men scream, roll on the
+ground and bite the furniture, was tearing at his entrails, and he felt
+inclined to take a knife and plunge it into his stomach. It would ease
+him and save him, and all would be over.
+
+For could he live now? Could he get up in the morning, join in the
+meals, go out into the streets, go to bed at night and sleep with that
+idea dominating him: "Limousin is Little George's father!" No, he would
+not have the strength to walk a step, to dress himself, to think of
+anything, to speak to anybody! Every day, every hour, every moment, he
+should be trying to know, to guess, to discover this terrible secret.
+And the little boy, his dear little boy, he could not look at him any
+more without enduring the terrible pains of that doubt, of being
+tortured by it to the very marrow of his bones. He would be obliged to
+live there, to remain in that house, with that child whom he should love
+and hate! Yes, he should certainly end by hating him. What torture! Oh!
+If he were sure that Limousin was his father, he might, perhaps, grow
+calm, become accustomed to his misfortune and his pain, but not to know,
+was intolerable.
+
+Not to know, to be always trying to find out, to be continually
+suffering, to kiss the child every moment, another man's child, to take
+him out for walks, to carry him, to caress him, to love him, and to
+think continually: "Perhaps he is not my child? Would it not be better
+not to see him, to abandon him,--to lose him in the streets, or to go
+away, far away, himself so far away that he should never hear anything
+more spoken about, never!"
+
+He started when he heard the door open. His wife came. "I am hungry,"
+she said; "are not you also, Limousin?" He hesitated a little, and then
+said: "Yes, I am, upon my word." And she had the leg of mutton brought
+in again, while Parent asked himself: "Have they had dinner? Or are they
+late because they have had a lovers' meeting?"
+
+They both ate with a very good appetite. Henriette was very calm, but
+laughed and joked, and her husband watched her furtively. She had on a
+pink dressing gown trimmed with white lace, and her fair head, her white
+neck and her plump hands stood out from that coquettish and perfumed
+dress, like from a sea shell, edged with foam. What had she been doing
+all day with that man? Parent could see them kissing, and stammering out
+words of ardent love! How was it that he could not manage to know
+everything, to guess the whole truth, by looking at them, sitting side
+by side, opposite to him?
+
+What fun they must be making of him, if he had been their dupe since the
+first day? Was it possible to make a fool of a man, of a worthy man,
+because his father had left him a little money? Why could one not see
+these things in people's souls, how was it that nothing revealed to
+upright hearts the deceits of infamous hearts, how was it that voices
+had the same sound for adoring as for lying, why was a false, deceptive
+look the same as a sincere one? And he watched them waiting to catch a
+gesture, a word, an intonation; then suddenly he thought: "I will
+surprise them this evening," and he said: "My dear, as I have dismissed
+Julie, I will see about getting another this very day, and I shall go
+out immediately to procure one by to-morrow morning, so I may not be in
+until late."
+
+"Very well," she replied; "go, I shall not stir from here. Limousin will
+keep me company. We will wait for you." And then, turning to the maid,
+she said: "You had better put George to bed, and then you can clear away
+and go up to your own room."
+
+Parent had got up; he was unsteady on his legs, dazed and giddy, and
+saying: "I shall see you again later on," he went out, holding onto the
+wall, for the floor seemed to roll, like a ship. George had been carried
+out by his nurse, whilst Henriette and Limousin went into the
+drawing-room, and as soon as the door was shut, he said: "You must be
+mad, surely, to torment your husband as you do?" She immediately turned
+on him: "Ah! Do you know that I think the habit you have got into
+lately, of looking upon Parent as a martyr, is very unpleasant?"
+
+Limousin threw himself into an easy-chair, and crossed his legs: "I am
+not setting him up as a martyr in the least, but I think that, situated
+as we are, it is ridiculous to defy this man as you do, from morning
+till night." She took a cigarette from the mantel-piece, lighted it, and
+replied: "But I do not defy him, quite the contrary; only, he irritates
+me by his stupidity ... and I treat him as he deserves." Limousin
+continued impatiently: "What you are doing is very foolish! However, all
+women are alike. Look here: he is an excellent, kind fellow, stupidly
+confiding and good, who never interferes with us, who does not suspect
+us for a moment, who leaves us quite free and undisturbed, whenever we
+like, and you do all you can to put him into a rage and to spoil our
+life."
+
+She turned to him: "I say, you worry me. You are a coward, like all
+other men are! You are frightened of that poor creature!" He immediately
+jumped up and said, furiously: "I should like to know what he does, and
+why you are so set against him? Does he make you unhappy? Does he beat
+you? Does he deceive you and go with another woman? No, it is really too
+bad to make him suffer, merely because he is too kind, and to hate him
+merely because you are unfaithful to him." She went up to Limousin, and
+looking him full in the face, she said: "And you reproach me with
+deceiving him? You? You? What a filthy heart you must have?"
+
+He felt rather ashamed, and tried to defend himself: "I am not
+reproaching you, my dear; I am only asking you to treat your husband
+gently, because we both of us require him to trust us. I think that you
+ought to see that."
+
+They were close together; he, tall, dark, with long whiskers, and the
+rather vulgar manners of a good-looking man, who is very well satisfied
+with himself; she, small, fair and pink, a little Parisian, half
+shopkeeper, half one of those of easy virtue, born behind a shop,
+brought up at its door to entice customers by her looks, and married,
+accidentally, in consequence to a simple, unsophisticated man, who saw
+her outside the door every morning when he went out, and every evening
+when he came home.
+
+"But do you not understand, you great booby," she said, "that I hate him
+just because he married me, because he bought me; in fact, because
+everything that he says and does, everything that he thinks, acts on my
+nerves? He exasperates me every moment by his stupidity, which you call
+his kindness, by his dullness, which you call his confidence, and then,
+above all, because he is my husband, instead of you! I feel him between
+us, although he does not interfere with us much. And then?... and
+then?... No, it is, after all, too idiotic of him not to guess anything!
+I wish he would at any rate be a little jealous. There are moments when
+I feel inclined to say to him: 'Do you not see, you stupid creature,
+that Paul is my lover?'"
+
+Limousin began to laugh: "Meanwhile, it would be a good thing if you
+were to keep quiet, and not disturb our life." "Oh! I shall not disturb
+it, you may be sure! There is nothing to fear, with such a fool. No; but
+it is quite incomprehensible that you cannot understand how hateful he
+is to me, how he irritates me. You always seem to like him, and you
+shake hands with him cordially. Men are very surprising at times."
+
+"One must know how to dissimulate, my dear." "It is no question of
+dissimulation, but of feeling. One might think that, when you men
+deceive another, you liked him all the more on that account, while we
+women hate the man from the moment that we have betrayed him." "I do not
+see why one should hate an excellent fellow, because one has his wife."
+"You do not see it?... You do not see it?... You all of you are wanting
+in that fineness of feeling! However, that is one of those things which
+one feels, and which one cannot express. And then, moreover, one ought
+not.... No, you would not understand; it is quite useless. You men have
+no delicacy of feeling."
+
+And smiling, with the gentle contempt of a debauched woman, she put both
+her hands onto his shoulders and held up her lips to him, and he stooped
+down and clasped her closely in his arms, and their lips met. And as
+they stood in front of the chimney glass, another couple exactly like
+them, embraced behind the clock.
+
+They heard nothing, neither the noise of the key, nor the creaking of
+the door, but suddenly Henriette, with a loud cry, pushed Limousin away
+with both her arms, and they saw Parent, who was looking at them, livid
+with rage, without his shoes on, and his hat over his forehead. He
+looked at them, one after the other, with a quick glance of his eyes
+without moving his head. He appeared mad, and then, without saying a
+word, he threw himself on Limousin; he seized him as if he were going to
+strangle him, and flung him into the opposite corner of the room so
+violently that the other lost his balance, and beating the air with his
+hand, cracked against the wall with his head.
+
+But when Henriette saw that her husband was going to murder her lover,
+she threw herself onto Parent, seized him by the neck and digging her
+ten delicate and rosy fingers into his neck, she squeezed him so
+tightly, with all the vigor of a desperate woman, that the blood spurted
+out under her nails, and she bit his shoulder, as if she wished to tear
+it with her teeth. Parent, half-strangled and choked, loosened his hold
+on Limousin, in order to shake off his wife, who was hanging onto his
+neck; and putting his arms around her waist, he flung her also to the
+other end of the drawing-room.
+
+Then, as his passion was short-lived, like that of most good-tempered
+men, and his strength was soon exhausted, he remained standing between
+the two, panting, worn out, not knowing what to do next. His brutal fury
+had expended itself in that effort, like the froth of a bottle of
+champagne, and his unwonted energy ended in a want of breath. As soon as
+he could speak, however he said: "Go away ... both of you ...
+immediately ... go away!..."
+
+Limousin remained motionless in his corner, against the wall, too
+startled to understand anything as yet, too frightened to move a finger,
+while Henriette, with her hands resting on a small, round table, her
+head bent forward, with her hair hanging down, the bodice of her dress
+unfastened and bosom bare, waited like a wild animal which is about to
+spring, and Parent went on, in a stronger voice: "Go away
+immediately.... Get out of the house!"
+
+His wife, however, seeing that he had got over his first exasperation,
+grew bolder, drew herself up, took two steps towards him, and grown
+almost insolent already, she said: "Have you lost your head?... What is
+the matter with you?... What is the meaning of this unjustifiable
+violence?" But he turned towards her, and raising his fist to strike
+her, he stammered out: "Oh!... oh!... this is too much!... too much!...
+I ... heard everything! Everything!... do you understand?...
+Everything!... you wretch ... you wretch ... you are two wretches!...
+Get out of the house!... both of you!... Immediately ... or I shall
+kill you!... Leave the house!..."
+
+She saw that it was all over, and that he knew everything, that she
+could not prove her innocence, and that she must comply, but all her
+impudence had returned to her, and her hatred for the man, which was
+exasperated now, drove her to audacity, made her feel the need of
+bravadoes, and of defying him, and so she said in a clear voice: "Come,
+Limousin, as he is going to turn me out of doors, I will go to your
+lodgings with you."
+
+But Limousin did not move, and Parent, in a fresh access of rage, cried
+out: "Go, will you! go, you wretches!... or else!... or else!..." and he
+seized a chair and whirled it over his head.
+
+Then Henriette walked quickly across the room, took her lover by the
+arm, dragged him from the wall to which he appeared fixed, and dragged
+him towards the door, saying: "Do come, my friend ... you see that the
+man is mad.... Do come!"
+
+As she went out, she turned round to her husband, trying to think of
+something that she could do, something that she could invent to wound
+him to the heart as she left the house, and an idea struck her, one of
+those venomous, deadly ideas in which all a woman's perfidy shows
+itself, and she said resolutely: "I am going to take my child with me."
+
+Parent was stupefied and stammered: "Your ... your ... child? You dare
+to talk of your child?... You venture ... you venture to ask for your
+child ... after ... after ... Oh! oh! that is too much!... Go, you
+horrid wretch!... Go!..." She went up to him again, almost smiling,
+almost avenged already, and defying him, standing close to him, and face
+to face, she said: "I want my child, and you have no right to keep him,
+because he is not yours ... do you understand?... he is not yours ... he
+is Limousin's." And Parent cried out in bewilderment: "You lie ... you
+lie you wretch!"
+
+But she continued: "You fool! Everybody knows it, except you. I tell
+you, this is his father. You need only look at him, to see it...."
+
+Parent staggered back from her, and then he suddenly turned round, took
+a candle and rushed into the next room; almost immediately, however, he
+returned, carrying little George, wrapped up in his bed clothes, and the
+child, who had been suddenly awakened, was crying with fright. Parent
+threw him into his wife's arms, and then, without saying anything more,
+he pushed her roughly out, towards the stairs, where Limousin was
+waiting, from motives of prudence.
+
+Then he shut the door again, double-locked it, and bolted it, and he had
+scarcely got into the drawing-room, when he fell onto the floor at full
+length.
+
+
+II
+
+Parent lived alone, quite alone. During the five weeks that followed
+their separation, the feeling of surprise at his new life, prevented him
+from thinking much. He had resumed his bachelor life, his habits of
+lounging about, and he took his meals at a restaurant, as he had done
+formerly. As he had wished to avoid any scandal, he made his wife an
+allowance, which was settled by their lawyers. By degrees, however, the
+thoughts of the child began to haunt him. Often, when he was at home
+alone at night, he suddenly thought he heard George calling out _papa_,
+and his heart used to begin to beat, and he got up quickly and opened
+the door to see whether, by chance, the child might have returned, like
+dogs or pigeons do. Why should a child have less instinct than an
+animal?
+
+After finding that he was mistaken, he went and sat down in his armchair
+again and thought of the boy, and he thought of him for hours, and whole
+days. It was not only a moral, but still more a physical obsession, a
+nervous longing to kiss him, to hold and fondle him, to take him onto
+his knees and dance him. He felt the child's little arms round his neck,
+his little mouth pressing a kiss on his beard, his soft hair tickling
+his cheeks, and the remembrance of all those childish ways, made him
+suffer like the desire for some beloved woman, who has run away, and
+then twenty or a hundred times a day he asked himself the question,
+whether he was or was not George's father, and at night, especially, he
+indulged in interminable speculations on the point, and almost before he
+was in bed, he every night recommenced the same series of despairing
+arguments.
+
+After his wife's departure, he had at first not felt the slightest
+doubt; certainly the child was Limousin's, but by degrees he began to
+waver. Henriette's words could not be of any value. She had merely
+braved him, and tried to drive him to desperation, and calmly weighing
+the _pros_ and _cons_, there seemed to be every chance that she had
+lied, though perhaps only Limousin could tell the truth. But how was he
+to find it out, how could he question him or persuade him to confess the
+real facts?
+
+Sometimes Parent would get up in the middle of the night, fully
+determined to go and see Limousin and to beg him, to offer him anything
+he wanted, to put an end to this intolerable misery. Then he went back
+to bed in despair, reflecting that her lover would also lie, no doubt!
+He would be even sure to lie, in order to prevent him from taking away
+the child, if he were really his father. What could he do, then?
+Absolutely nothing!
+
+And he was sorry that he had thus suddenly brought about the crisis,
+that he had not taken time for reflection, that he had not waited and
+dissimulated for a month or two, so as to find out for himself. He ought
+to have pretended to suspect nothing, and have allowed them to betray
+themselves at their leisure. It would have been enough for him, to see
+the other kiss the child, to guess and to understand. A friend does not
+kiss a child as a father does. He should have watched them behind the
+doors. Why had he not thought of that? If Limousin, when left alone with
+George, had not at once taken him up, clasped him in his arms and kissed
+him passionately; if he had looked on indifferently while he was
+playing, without taking any notice of him, no doubt or hesitation could
+have been possible; in that case he would not have been the father, he
+would not have thought that he was, would not have felt that he was.
+Thus Parent would have kept the child, while he got rid of the mother,
+and he would have been happy, perfectly happy.
+
+He tossed about in bed, hot and unhappy, trying to recollect Limousin's
+ways with the child. But he could not remember anything suspicious, not
+a gesture, not a look, neither word nor caress. And the child's mother
+took very little notice of him, and if she had had him by her lover, she
+would, no doubt, have loved him more.
+
+They had, therefore, separated him from his son, from vengeance, from
+cruelty, to punish him for having surprised them, and he made up his
+mind to go the next morning and obtain the magistrate's assistance to
+gain possession of George, but almost as soon as he had formed that
+resolution, he felt assured of the contrary. From the moment that
+Limousin had been Henriette's lover, her adored lover, she would
+certainly have given herself up to him, from the very first, with that
+ardor of self-abandonment which makes women conceive. The cold reserve
+which she had always shown in her intimate relations with him, Parent,
+was surely also an obstacle to her having been fecundated by his
+embrace.
+
+In that case he would be claiming, he would take with him, constantly
+keep and look after, the child of another man. He would not be able to
+look at him, kiss him, hear him say "Papa" without being struck and
+tortured by the thought, "he is not my child." He was going to condemn
+himself to that torture, and that wretched life every moment! No, it
+would be better to live alone, to grow old alone, and to die alone.
+
+And every day and every night, these dreadful doubts and sufferings,
+which nothing could calm or end, recommenced. He especially dreaded the
+darkness of the evening, the melancholy feeling of the twilight. Then a
+flood of sorrow invaded his heart, a torrent of despair, which seemed to
+overwhelm him and drive him mad. He was as frightened of his own
+thoughts as men are of criminals, and he fled before them as one does
+from wild beasts. Above all things he feared his empty, dark, horrible
+dwelling, and the deserted streets, in which, here and there, a gas lamp
+flickers, where the isolated foot passenger whom one hears in the
+distance seems to be a night-prowler, and makes one walk faster or
+slower, according to whether he is coming towards you or following you.
+
+And in spite of himself, and by instinct, Parent went in the direction
+of the broad, well-lighted, populous streets. The light and the crowd
+attracted him, occupied his mind and distracted his thoughts, and when
+he was tired of walking aimlessly about amongst the moving crowd, when
+he saw the foot passengers becoming more scarce, and the pavements less
+crowded, the fear of solitude and silence drove him into some large
+_cafe_ full of drinkers and of light. He went there like flies go to a
+candle, and he used to sit down at one of the little round tables, and
+ask for a _bock_[1], which he used to drink slowly, feeling uneasy every
+time that a customer got up to go. He would have liked to take him by
+the arm, hold him back and beg him to stay a little longer, so much did
+he dread the time when the waiter would come up to him and say angrily:
+"Come, Monsieur, it is closing time!"
+
+[Footnote 1: Glass of Bavarian beer]
+
+For every evening he stopped last. He saw them carry in the tables, turn
+out the gas jets one by one, except his and that at the counter. He
+looked unhappily at the cashier counting the money and locking it up in
+the drawer, and then he went, being usually pushed out by the waiters,
+who murmured: "Another one who has too much! One might think he had no
+place to sleep in."
+
+As soon as he was alone in the dark street, he began to think of George
+again, and to rack his brains in trying to discover whether or not he
+was this child's father.
+
+He thus became in the habit of going to the beer houses, where the
+continual elbowing of the drinkers brings you in contact with a familiar
+and silent public, where the heavy clouds of tobacco smoke lulls
+disquietude, while the heavy beer dulls the mind and calms the heart. He
+almost lived there. He was scarcely up, before he went there to find
+people to occupy his looks and his thoughts, and soon, as he felt too
+idle to move, he took his meals there. About twelve o'clock he used to
+rap on the marble table, and the waiter quickly brought a plate, a
+glass, a table napkin, and his lunch when he had ordered it. When he had
+done, he slowly drank his cup of black coffee, with his eyes fixed on
+the decanter of brandy, which would soon procure him an hour or two of
+forgetfulness. First of all he dipped his lips into the cognac, as if to
+get the flavor of it with the tip of his tongue. Then he threw his head
+back and poured it into his mouth, drop by drop, and turned the strong
+liquor over on his palate, his gums and the mucous membrane of his
+cheeks, and then he swallowed it slowly, and felt it going down his
+throat, and into his stomach.
+
+After every meal he thus during more than an hour, sipped three or four
+small glasses of brandy, which stupefied him by degrees, and then his
+head dropped onto his chest, he shut his eyes and went to sleep: then,
+having drunk it, he raised himself on the seat covered with red velvet,
+pulled his trousers up, and his waistcoat down, so as to cover the linen
+which appeared between the two, drew down his shirt sleeves and took up
+the newspapers again, which he had already read in the morning, and read
+them all through again, from beginning to end, and between four and five
+o'clock he went for a walk on the boulevards, to get a little fresh air,
+as he used to say, and then came back to the seat which had been
+reserved for him, and asked for his absinthe. He used to talk to the
+regular customers, whose acquaintance he had made. They discussed the
+news of the day, and political events, and that carried him on till
+dinner-time, and he spent the evening like he had the afternoon, until
+it was time to close. That was a terrible moment for him, when he was
+obliged to go out into the dark, into the empty room full of dreadful
+recollections, of horrible thoughts and of mental agony. He no longer
+saw any of his old friends, none of his relations, nobody who might
+remind him of his past life. But as his apartments were a hell to him,
+he took a room in a large hotel, a good room on the ground floor, so as
+to see the passers-by. He was no longer alone in that great building, he
+felt people swarming round him, he heard voices in the adjoining rooms,
+and when his former sufferings tormented him too much at the sight of
+his bed which was turned back, and of his solitary fire-place, he went
+out into the wide passages and walked up and down them like a sentinel,
+before all the closed doors, and looked sadly at the shoes standing in
+couples outside each, women's little boots by the side of men's thick
+ones, and he thought that no doubt all these people were happy, and were
+sleeping sweetly side by side or in each other's arms, in their warm
+bed.
+
+Five years passed thus; five miserable years with no other events
+except from time to time a passing love affair which lasted a couple of
+hours at the cost of forty francs. But one day when he was taking his
+usual walk between the _Madeleine_ and the _Rue Drouot_, he suddenly saw
+a lady, whose bearing struck him. A tall gentleman and a child were with
+her, and all three were walking in front of him. He asked himself where
+he had seen them before, when suddenly he recognized a movement of her
+hand: it was his wife, his wife with Limousin and his child, his little
+George.
+
+His heart beat as if it would suffocate him, but he did not stop, for he
+wished to see them and he followed them. They looked like a family of
+the better middle class. Henriette was leaning on Paul's arm and
+speaking to him in a low voice and looking at him sideways occasionally.
+Parent saw her side face, and recognized its graceful outlines, the
+movements of her lips, her smile and her caressing looks, but the child
+chiefly took up his attention. How tall and strong he was! Parent could
+not see his face, but only his long, fair curls. That tall boy with bare
+legs, who was walking by his mother's side like a little man, was
+George.
+
+He saw them suddenly, all three, as they stopped in front of a shop.
+Limousin had grown very gray, had aged, and was thinner; his wife, on
+the contrary, was as young looking as ever, and had grown stouter;
+George he would not have recognized, he was so different to what he had
+been formerly.
+
+They went on again, and Parent followed them, then walked on quickly,
+passed them and then turned round, so as to meet them face to face. As
+he passed the child he felt a mad longing to take him into his arms and
+run off with him, and he knocked against him as if it were
+accidentally. The boy turned round and looked at the clumsy man angrily,
+and Parent went off hastily, struck and hurt by the look. He went off
+like a thief, seized by a horrible fear lest he should have been seen
+and recognized by his wife and her lover, and he went to his _cafe_
+without stopping, and fell breathless into his chair, and that evening
+he drank three absinthes.
+
+For four months he felt the pain of that meeting in his heart. Every
+night he saw the three again, happy and tranquil, father, mother and
+child walking on the boulevard before going in to dinner, and that new
+vision effaced the old one. It was another matter, another hallucination
+now, and also a fresh pain. Little George, his little George, the child
+he had so much loved and so often kissed formerly, disappeared in the
+far distance, and he saw a new one, like a brother of the first, a
+little boy with bare legs, who did not know him! He suffered terribly at
+that thought. The child's love was dead; there was no bond between them;
+the child would not have held out his arms when he saw him. He had even
+looked at him angrily.
+
+Then, by degrees he grew calmer, his mental torture diminished, the
+image that had appeared to his eyes and which haunted his nights became
+more indistinct and less frequent. He began once more to live nearly
+like everybody else, like all those idle people who drink beer off
+marble topped tables and wear out the seats of their trousers on the
+threadbare velvet of the couches.
+
+He grew old amidst the smoke from the pipes, lost his hair under the gas
+lights, looked upon his weekly bath, on his fortnightly visit to the
+barber's to have his hair cut, and on the purchase of a new coat or hat,
+as an event. When he got to his _cafe_ in a new hat covering he used to
+look at himself in the glass for a long time before sitting down, and
+took it off and put it on again several times following, and at last
+asked his friend, the lady at the bar, who was watching him with
+interest, whether she thought it suited him.
+
+Two or three times a year he went to the theater, and in the summer he
+sometimes spent his evenings at one of the open air concerts in the
+_Champs-Elysees_. He brought back from them some airs which ran in his
+head for several weeks, and which he even hummed, beating time with his
+foot, while he was drinking his beer, and so the years followed each
+other, slow, monotonous and short, because they were quite uneventful.
+
+He did not feel them glide past him. He went on towards death without
+fear or agitation, sitting at a table in a _cafe_, and only the great
+glass against which he rested his head, which was every day becoming
+balder, reflected the ravages of time which flies and devours men, poor
+men.
+
+He only very rarely now thought of the terrible drama which had wrecked
+his life, for twenty years had passed since that terrible evening, but
+the life he had led since then had worn him out, and the landlord of his
+cafe would often say to him: "You ought to pull yourself together a
+little, Monsieur Parent; you should get some fresh air and go into the
+country; I assure you that you have changed very much within the last
+few months." And when his customer had gone out, he used to say to the
+barmaid: "That poor Monsieur Parent is booked for another world; it is
+no good never to go out of Paris. Advise him to go out of town for a day
+occasionally; he has confidence in you. It is nice weather, and will do
+him good." And she, full of pity and good will for such a regular
+customer, said to Parent every day: "Come, Monsieur, make up your mind
+to get a little fresh air; it is so charming in the country when the
+weather is fine. Oh! If I could, I would spend my life there."
+
+And she told him her dreams, the simple and poetical dreams of all the
+poor girls who are shut up from one year's end to the other in a shop
+and who see the noisy life of the streets go while they think of the
+calm and pleasant life in the country, of life under the trees, under
+the bright sun shining on the meadows, of deep woods and clear rivers,
+of cows lying in the grass, and of all the different flowers, blue, red,
+yellow, purple, lilac, pink and white, which are so pretty, so fresh, so
+sweet, all the wild flowers which one picks as one walks, and makes into
+large nosegays.
+
+She liked to speak to him frequently of her continual, unrealized and
+unrealizable longing, and he, an old man without hope, was fond of
+listening to her, and used to go and sit near the counter to talk to
+Mademoiselle Zoe and to discuss the country with her. Then, by degrees
+he was seized by a vague desire to go just once and see whether it was
+really so pleasant there, as she said, outside the walls of the great
+city, and so one morning he said to her: "Do you know where one can get
+a good lunch in the neighborhood of Paris?" "Go to the Terrace at
+Saint-Germain; it is delightful there!"
+
+He had been there formerly, just when he had got engaged, and so he made
+up his mind to go there again, and he chose a Sunday without any special
+reason, but merely because people generally do go out on Sundays, even
+when they have nothing to do all the week, and so one Sunday morning he
+went to Saint-Germain. It was at the beginning of July, on a very bright
+and hot day. Sitting by the door of the railway-carriage, he watched the
+trees and the strangely built little houses in the outskirts of Paris
+fly past. He felt low-spirited, and vexed at having yielded to that new
+longing, and at having broken through his usual habits. The view, which
+was continually changing, and always the same, wearied him. He was
+thirsty; he would have liked to get out at every station and sit down in
+the _cafe_ which he saw outside and drink a _bock_ or two, and then take
+the first train back to Paris. And then, the journey seemed very long to
+him. He used to remain sitting for whole days, as long as he had the
+same motionless objects before his eyes, but he found it very trying and
+fatiguing to remain sitting while he was being whirled along, and to see
+the whole country fly by, while he himself was motionless.
+
+However, he found the Seine interesting, every time he crossed it. Under
+the bridge at Chatou he saw some skiffs going at great pace under the
+vigorous strokes of the bare-armed oarsmen, and he thought: "There are
+some fellows who are certainly enjoying themselves!" And then the train
+entered the tunnel just before you get to the station at Saint-Germain,
+and soon stopped at the arrival platform, where Parent got out, and
+walked slowly, for he already felt tired, towards the _Terrace_, with
+his hands behind his back, and when he got to the iron balustrade, he
+stopped to look at the distant horizon. The vast plain spread out before
+him like the sea, green, and studded with large villages, almost as
+populous as towns. White roads crossed it, and it was well wooded in
+places; the ponds at Vesinet glistened like plates of silver, and the
+distant ridges of Sannois and Argenteuil were covered with light, bluish
+mist, so that they could scarcely be distinguished. The sun bathed the
+whole landscape in its full, warm light, and the Seine, which twined
+like an endless serpent through the plain, flowed round the villages and
+along the slopes, and Parent inhaled the warm breeze which seemed to
+make his heart young again, to enliven his spirits and to vivify his
+blood, and said to himself: "It is very nice here."
+
+Then he went on a few steps, and stopped again to look about him, and
+the utter misery of his existence seemed to be brought out into full
+relief, by the intense light which inundated the country. He saw his
+twenty years of _cafe_-life, dull, monotonous, heart-breaking. He might
+have traveled like others did, have gone amongst foreigners, to unknown
+countries beyond the sea, have interested himself somewhat in everything
+which other men are passionately devoted to, in arts and sciences, he
+might have enjoyed life in a thousand forms, that mysterious life which
+is either charming or painful, constantly changing, always inexplicable
+and strange. Now, however, it was too late. He would go on drinking
+_bock_ after _bock_ until he died, without any family, without friends,
+without hope, without any curiosity about anything, and he was seized
+with a feeling of misery and a wish to run away, to hide himself in
+Paris, in his _cafe_ and his befuddlement! All the thoughts, all the
+dreams, all the desires which are dormant in the sloth of stagnating
+hearts, had reawakened, being brought to life by those rays of sunlight
+on the plain.
+
+He felt that if he were to remain there any longer, he should lose his
+head, and so he made haste to get to the _Pavillon Henri IV_ for lunch,
+to try and forget his troubles under the influence of wine and alcohol,
+and at any rate to have someone to speak to.
+
+He took a small table in one of the arbors, from which one can see all
+the surrounding country, ordered his lunch and asked to be served at
+once. Then some more people arrived and sat down at tables near him and
+he felt more comfortable; he was no longer alone. Three persons were
+lunching near him, and he had looked at them two or three times without
+seeing them clearly, as one looks at total strangers, but suddenly a
+woman's voice sent a shiver through him, which seemed to penetrate to
+his very marrow. "George," it had said, "will you carve the chicken?"
+And another replied: "Yes, Mamma."
+
+Parent looked up, and he understood, he guessed immediately who those
+people were! He should certainly not have known them again. His wife had
+grown quite white and very stout, an old, serious, respectable lady, and
+she held her head forwards as she ate, for fear of spotting her dress,
+although she had a table napkin tucked under her chin. George had become
+a man; he had a slight beard, that unequal and almost colorless beard
+which becurls the cheeks of youths. He wore a high hat, a white
+waistcoat and a single eyeglass, because it looked dandified, no doubt.
+Parent looked at him in astonishment! Was that George, his son? No, he
+did not know that young man; there could be nothing in common between
+them. Limousin had his back to him, and was eating, with his shoulders
+rather bent.
+
+Well, all three of them seemed happy and satisfied; they came and dined
+in the country, at well-known restaurants. They had had a calm and
+pleasant existence, a family existence in a warm and comfortable house,
+filled with all those trifles which make life agreeable, with affection,
+with all those tender words which people exchange continually when they
+love each other. They had lived thus, thanks to him, Parent, on his
+money, after having deceived him, robbed him, ruined him! They had
+condemned him, the innocent, the simple-minded, the jovial man to all
+the miseries of solitude, to that abominable life which he had led
+between the pavement and the counter, every moral torture and every
+physical misery! They had made him a useless being, who was lost and
+wretched amongst other people, a poor old man without any pleasures, or
+anything to look forward to, and who hoped for nothing from anyone. For
+him, the world was empty, because he loved nothing in the world. He
+might go among other nations or go about the streets, go into all the
+houses in Paris, open every room, but he would not find the beloved
+face, the face of wife or child, that he was in search of, and which
+smiles when it sees you, behind any door. And that idea worked upon him
+more than any other, the idea of a door which one opens, to see and to
+embrace somebody behind it.
+
+And that was the fault of those three wretches! the fault of that
+worthless woman, of that infamous friend and of that tall, light-haired
+lad who put on insolent airs. Now, he felt as angry with the child as he
+did with the other two! Was he not Limousin's son? Would Limousin have
+kept him and loved him, otherwise would not Limousin very quickly have
+got rid of the mother and of the child if he had not felt sure that it
+was his, certainly his? Does anybody bring up other people's children?
+And now they were there, quite close to him, those three who had made
+him suffer so much.
+
+Parent looked at them, irritated and excited at the recollection of all
+his sufferings and of his despair, and was especially exasperated at
+their placid and satisfied looks. He felt inclined to kill them, to
+throw his syphon of Seltzer water at them, to split open Limousin's
+head, which he every moment bent over his plate and raised it up again
+immediately. And they continued to live like that, without cares or
+anxiety of any kind. No! no! That was really too much, after all! He
+would avenge himself, he would have his revenge now, on the spot, as he
+had them under his hand. But how? He tried to think of some means, he
+pictured such dreadful things as one reads of in the newspapers
+occasionally, but could not hit on anything practical. And he went on
+drinking to excite himself, to give himself courage not to allow such an
+occasion to escape him, as he should certainly not meet with it again.
+
+Suddenly an idea struck him, a terrible idea, and he left off drinking
+to mature it. A smile rose to his lips, and he murmured: "I have got
+them, I have got them. We will see; we will see." A waiter asked him:
+"What would you like now, Monsieur?" "Nothing. Coffee and cognac. The
+best." And he looked at them, as he sipped his brandy. There were too
+many people in the restaurant for what he wanted to do, so he would wait
+and follow them, for they would be sure to walk on the terrace or in the
+forest. When they had got a little distance off, he would join them,
+and then he would have his revenge, yes, he would have his revenge! It
+was certainly not too soon, after twenty-three years of suffering. Ah!
+They little guessed what was to happen to them.
+
+They finished their luncheon slowly, and they talked in perfect
+security. Parent could not hear what they were saying, but he saw their
+calm movements, and his wife's face, especially, exasperated him. She
+had assumed a haughty air, the air of a stout, devout woman, of an
+irreproachably devout woman, sheathed in principles, iron-clad in
+virtue. Then they paid the bill and got up, and then he saw Limousin. He
+might have been taken for a retired diplomatist, for he looked a man of
+great importance with his soft, white whiskers, the tips of which fell
+onto the facings of his coat.
+
+They went out. George was smoking a cigar and had his hat on one side,
+and Parent followed them. First of all they went up and down the
+terrace, and calmly admired the landscape, like people who have well
+satisfied their hunger, and then they went into the forest, and Parent
+rubbed his hands and followed them at a distance, hiding himself, so as
+not to excite their suspicion too soon. They walked slowly, enjoying the
+fresh green, and the warm air. Henriette was holding Limousin's arm and
+walked upright at his side, like a wife who is sure, and proud of
+herself. George was cutting off the leaves with his stick, and
+occasionally jumped over the ditches by the road side, like a fiery
+young horse ready to gallop off through the trees.
+
+Parent came up to them by degrees, panting rather from excitement and
+fatigue, for he never walked now. He soon came up to them, but he was
+seized by fear, an inexplicable fear, and he passed them, so as to turn
+round and meet them face to face. He walked on, his heart beating, for
+he knew that they were just behind him now, and he said to himself:
+"Come, now is the time. Courage! courage! Now is the moment!"
+
+He turned round. They were all three sitting on the grass, at the foot
+of a huge tree, and they were still talking, and he made up his mind,
+and came back rapidly, and then stopping in front of them in the middle
+of the road, he said abruptly, in a voice broken by emotion: "It is I!
+Here I am! I suppose you did not expect me?" They all three looked at
+him carefully, for they thought that he was mad, and he continued: "One
+might think that you did not know me again. Just look at me! I am
+Parent, Henri Parent. You did not expect me, eh? You thought it was all
+over, and that you would never see me again. Ah! But here I am once
+more, you see, and now we will have an explanation."
+
+Henriette was terrified and hid her face in her hands, murmuring: "Oh!
+Good Heavens!" And seeing this stranger who seemed to be threatening his
+mother, George sprang up, ready to seize him by the collar, while
+Limousin, who was thunderstruck, looked at this specter in horror, who,
+after panting for a few moments, continued: "So now we will have an
+explanation; the proper moment for it has come! Ah! you deceived me, you
+condemned me to the life of a convict, and you thought that I should
+never catch you!"
+
+But the young man took him by the shoulders and pushed him back: "Are
+you mad?" he asked. "What do you want? Go on your way immediately, or I
+shall give you a thrashing!" But Parent replied: "What do I want? I want
+to tell you who these people are." George, however, was in a rage and
+shook him; was even going to strike him, but the other said: "Just let
+me go. I am your father ... There, look whether they recognize me now,
+the wretches!" And the alarmed young man, removed his hands, and turned
+to his mother, while Parent, as soon as he was released, went towards
+her.
+
+"Well," he said, "tell him who I am, you! Tell him that my name is Henri
+Parent, that I am his father because his name is George Parent, because
+you are my wife, because you are all three living on my money, on the
+allowance of ten thousand francs which I have made you, since I drove
+you out of my house. Will you tell him also why I drove you out? Because
+I surprised you with this beggar, this wretch, your lover! Tell him what
+I was, an honorable man, whom you married for my money, and whom you
+deceived from the very first day. Tell him who you are, and who I
+am ..."
+
+He stammered and panted for breath, in his rage, and the woman exclaimed
+in a heartrending voice: "Paul, Paul, stop him; make him be quiet; do
+not let him say this before my son!" Limousin had also got up, and he
+said in a quite low voice: "Hold your tongue! Hold your tongue! Do
+understand what you are doing!" But Parent continued furiously: "I quite
+know what I am doing, and that is not all. There is one thing that I
+will know, something that has tormented me for twenty years." And then
+turning to George, who was leaning against a tree in consternation, he
+said: "Listen to me. When she left my house, she thought it was not
+enough to have deceived me, but she also wanted to drive me to despair.
+You were my only consolation, and she took you with her, swearing that
+I was not your father, but that he was your father! Was she lying? I do
+not know, and I have been asking myself the question for the last twenty
+years."
+
+He went close up to her, tragic and terrible, and pulling away her hands
+with which she had covered her face, he continued: "Well, I call upon
+you now to tell me which of us two is the father of this young man; he
+or I, your husband or your lover. Come! Come! tell us." Limousin rushed
+at him, but Parent pushed him back, and sneering in his fury, he said:
+"Ah! you are brave now! You are braver than you were that day when you
+ran downstairs because I was going to half murder you. Very well! If she
+will not reply, tell me yourself. You ought to know as well as she. Tell
+me, are you this young fellow's father? Come! Come! Tell me!"
+
+Then he turned to his wife again: "If you will not tell me, at any rate
+tell your son. He is a man, now, and he has the right to know who is his
+father. I do not know, and I never did know, never, never! I cannot tell
+you, my boy." He seemed to be losing his senses, his voice grew shrill
+and he worked his arms about as if he had an epileptic attack. "Come!...
+Give me an answer.... She does not know.... I will make a bet that she
+does not know ... No ... she does not know, by Jove!... She used to go
+to bed with both of us! Ha! ha! ha!... nobody knows ... nobody.... How
+can any one know such things?... You will not know, either, my boy, you
+will not know any more than I do.... never.... Look here.... Ask her ...
+you will find that she does not know.... I do not know either.... You
+can choose ... yes, you can choose ... him or me.... Choose.... Good
+evening.... It is all over.... If she makes up her mind to tell you,
+come and let me know, will you? I am living at the _Hotel des
+Continents_.... I should be glad to know.... Good evening.... I hope you
+will enjoy yourselves very much...."
+
+And he went away gesticulating, and talking to himself under the tall
+trees, into the empty, cool air, which was full of the smell of the sap.
+He did not turn round to look at them, but went straight on, walking
+under the stimulus of his rage, under a storm of passion, with that one
+fixed idea in his mind, and presently he found himself outside the
+station. A train was about to start and he got in. During the journey,
+his anger calmed down, he regained his senses and returned to Paris,
+astonished at his own boldness, and feeling as aching and knocked up, as
+if he had broken some bones, but nevertheless he went to have a _bock_
+at his brewery.
+
+When she saw him come in, Mademoiselle Zoe was surprised and said:
+"What! back already? are you tired?" "I am tired ... very tired.... You
+know, when one is not used to going out.... But I have done with it. I
+shall not go into the country again. I had better have stopped here. For
+the future, I shall not stir out again."
+
+But she could not persuade him to tell her about his little excursion,
+although she wanted very much to hear all about it, and for the first
+time in his life he got thoroughly drunk that night, and had to be
+carried home.
+
+
+
+
+THE FATHER
+
+
+I
+
+As he lived at Batignolles and was a clerk in the Public Education
+Office, he took the omnibus every morning, when he went to the center of
+Paris, sitting opposite a girl with whom he fell in love.
+
+She went to the shop where she was employed, at the same time every day.
+She was a little brunette, one of those dark girls whose eyes are so
+dark that they look like spots, and whose complexion has a look like
+ivory. He always saw her coming at the corner of the same street, and
+she generally had to run to catch the heavy vehicle, and sprang upon the
+steps before the horses had quite stopped. Then she got inside, rather
+out of breath, and sitting down, she looked round her.
+
+The first time that he saw her, Francois Tessier felt that her face
+pleased him extremely. One sometimes meets one of those women whom one
+longs to clasp madly in one's arms immediately, without even knowing
+her. That girl answered to his inward desires, to his secret hopes, to
+that sort of ideal of love which one cherishes in the depths of the
+heart, without knowing it.
+
+He looked at her intently, in spite of himself, and she grew embarrassed
+at his looks and blushed. He saw it and tried to turn away his eyes; but
+he involuntarily fixed them upon her again every moment, although he
+tried to look in another direction, and in a few days they knew each
+other without having spoken. He gave up his place to her when the
+omnibus was full, and got outside, though he was very sorry to do it. By
+this time, she had got so far as to greet him with a little smile; and
+although she always dropped her eyes under his looks, which she felt
+were too ardent, yet she did not appear offended at being looked at in
+such a manner.
+
+They ended by speaking. A kind of rapid intimacy had become established
+between them, a daily intimacy of half an hour, and that was certainly
+one of the most charming half hours in his life, to him. He thought of
+her all the rest of the time, saw her continually during the long office
+hours, for he was haunted and bewitched by that floating and yet
+tenacious recollection which the image of a beloved woman leaves in us,
+and it seemed to him that the entire possession of that little person
+would be maddening happiness to him, almost above human realization.
+
+Every morning now she shook hands with him, and he preserved the feeling
+of that touch, and the recollection of the gentle pressure of her little
+fingers, until the next day, and he almost fancied that he preserved the
+imprint of it, on his skin, and he anxiously waited for this short
+omnibus ride, all the rest of the time, while Sundays seemed to him
+heart-breaking days. However, there was no doubt that she loved him, for
+one Saturday, in spring, she promised to go and lunch with him at
+Maisons-Laffitte the next day.
+
+
+II
+
+She was at the railway station first, which surprised him, but she said:
+"Before going, I want to speak to you. We have twenty minutes, and that
+is more than I shall take for what I have to say."
+
+She trembled as she hung onto his arm, and she looked down, while her
+cheeks were pale, but she continued: "I do not want to be deceived in
+you, and I shall not go there with you, unless you promise, unless
+you swear ... not to do ... not to do anything ... that is at all
+improper ..."
+
+She had suddenly become as red as a poppy, and said no more. He did not
+know what to reply, for he was happy and disappointed at the same time.
+At the bottom of his heart, he perhaps preferred that it should be so,
+and yet ... yet during the night he had indulged in anticipations that
+sent the hot blood flowing through his veins. He should love her less,
+certainly, if he knew that her conduct was light, but then it would be
+so charming, so delicious for him! And he made all a man's usual selfish
+calculations in love affairs.
+
+As he did not say anything, she began to speak again in an agitated
+voice, and with tears in her eyes. "If you do not promise to respect me
+altogether, I shall return home." And so he squeezed her arm tenderly
+and replied: "I promise, you shall only do what you like." She appeared
+relieved in mind, and asked with a smile: "Do you really mean it?" And
+he looked into her eyes and replied: "I swear it." "Now you may take the
+tickets," she said.
+
+During the journey they could hardly speak, as the carriage was full,
+and when they got to Maison-Laffitte they went towards the Seine. The
+sun, which shone full onto the river, onto the leaves and onto the turf
+seemed to be reflected in them in his brightness, and they went, hand
+in hand, along the bank, looking at the shoals of little fish swimming
+near the bank, and they went on brimming over with happiness, as if they
+were raised from the earth in their lightness of heart.
+
+At last she said: "How foolish you must think me!"
+
+"Why?" he asked. "To come out like this, all alone with you?" "Certainly
+not; it is quite natural." "No, no; it is not natural for me--because I
+do not wish to commit a fault, and yet this is how girls fall. But if
+you only knew how wretched it is, every day the same thing, every day in
+the month, and every month in the year. I live quite alone with Mamma,
+and as she has had a great deal of trouble, she is not very cheerful. I
+do the best I can, and try to laugh in spite of everything, but I do not
+always succeed. But all the same, it was wrong in me to come, though
+you, at any rate, will not be sorry."
+
+By way of an answer he kissed her ardently on her ear that was nearest
+him, but she moved from him with an abrupt movement, and getting
+suddenly angry, she exclaimed: "Oh! Monsieur Francois, after what you
+swore to me!" And they went back to Maison-Laffitte.
+
+They had lunch at the _Petit-Havre_, a low house, buried under four
+enormous poplar trees, by the side of the river. The air, the heat, the
+light wine, and the sensation of being so close together, made them red
+and silent, with a feeling of oppression, but after the coffee, they
+regained all their high spirits, and having crossed the Seine, they
+started off along the bank, towards the village of La Frette, and
+suddenly he asked: "What is your name?" "Louise." "Louise," he
+repeated, and said nothing more.
+
+The river, which described a long curve, bathed a row of white houses in
+the distance, which were reflected in the water. The girl picked the
+daisies and made them into a great bunch, whilst he sang vigorously, as
+intoxicated as a colt that has been turned into a meadow. On their left,
+a vine-covered slope followed the river, but suddenly Francois stopped
+motionless with astonishment: "Oh! look there!" he said.
+
+The vines had come to an end, and the whole slope was covered with lilac
+bushes in flower. It was a violet colored wood! A kind of great carpet
+stretched over the earth, reaching as far as the village, more than two
+miles off. She also stood, surprised and delighted, and murmured: "Oh!
+how pretty!" And crossing a meadow they ran towards that curious low
+hill, which every year furnishes all the lilac which is drawn through
+Paris on the carts of the street sellers.
+
+A narrow path went beneath the trees, so they took it, and when they
+came to a small clearing, they sat down.
+
+Swarms of flies were buzzing around them and making a continuous, gentle
+sound, and the sun, the bright sun of a perfectly still day, shone over
+the bright slopes, and from that wood of flowers, a powerful aroma was
+borne towards them, a breath of perfume, of that sweat of the flowers.
+
+A church clock struck in the distance, and they embraced gently, then
+clasped each other close, lying on the grass, without the knowledge of
+anything except of that kiss. She had closed her eyes and held him in
+her arms, pressing him to her closely, without a thought, with her
+reason bewildered, and from head to foot in passionate expectation. And
+she surrendered herself altogether, without knowing that she had given
+herself to him. But she soon came to herself with the feeling of a great
+misfortune, and she began to cry and sob with grief, with her face
+buried in her hands.
+
+He tried to console her, but she wanted to start, to return, and to go
+home immediately, and she kept saying as she walked along quickly: "Good
+heavens! good heavens!" He said to her: "Louise! Louise! Please let us
+stop here." But now her cheeks were red and her eyes hollow, and as
+soon as they got to the railway station in Paris, she left him, without
+even saying good-bye.
+
+
+III
+
+When he met her in the omnibus next day, she appeared to him to be
+changed and thinner, and she said to him: "I want to speak to you; we
+will get down at the Boulevard."
+
+As soon as they were on the pavement, she said: "We must bid each other
+good-bye; I cannot meet you again after what has happened." "But why?"
+he asked. "Because I cannot; I have been culpable, and I will not be so
+again."
+
+Then he implored her, tortured by desire, maddened by the wish of having
+her entirely, in the absolute freedom of nights of love, but she replied
+firmly: "No, I cannot, I cannot." He, however, only grew all the more
+excited, and promised to marry her, but she said again: "No." And left
+him.
+
+For a week he did not see her. He could not manage to meet her, and as
+he did not know her address, he thought that he had lost her altogether.
+On the ninth day, however, there was a ring at his bell, and when he
+opened it, she was there. She threw herself into his arms, and did not
+resist any longer, and for three months she was his mistress. He was
+beginning to grow tired of her, when she told him she was pregnant, and
+then he had one idea and wish: To break with her at any price. As,
+however, he could not do that, not knowing how to begin or what to say,
+full of anxiety through the fear of that child which was growing, he
+took a decisive step: One night he changed his lodgings, and
+disappeared.
+
+The blow was so heavy that she did not look for the man who had
+abandoned her, but threw herself at her mother's knees and confessed her
+misfortune, and some months after, she gave birth to a boy.
+
+
+IV
+
+Years passed, and Francois Tessier grew old without there having been
+any alteration in his life. He led the dull, monotonous life of
+_bureaucrates_, without hopes and without expectations. Every day he got
+up at the same time, went through the same streets, went through the
+same door, passed the same porter, went into the same office, sat in the
+same chair, and did the same work. He was alone in the world, alone,
+during the day in the midst of his colleagues, and alone at night in his
+bachelor's lodgings, and he laid by a hundred francs a month, against
+old age.
+
+Every Sunday he went to the _Champs-Elysees_, to watch the elegant
+people, the carriages and the pretty women, and the next day he used to
+say to one of his colleagues: "The return of the carriages from the
+_Bois de Boulogne_ was very brilliant yesterday." One fine Sunday
+morning, however, he went into the _Parc Monceau_, where the mothers and
+nurses, sitting on the sides of the walks, watched the children playing,
+and suddenly Francois Tessier started. A woman passed by, holding two
+children by the hand; a little boy of about ten and a little girl of
+four. It was she.
+
+He walked another hundred yards, and then fell into a chair, choking
+with emotion. She had not recognized him, and so he came back, wishing
+to see her again. She was sitting down now, and the boy was standing by
+her side very quietly, while the little girl was making sand castles. It
+was she, it was certainly she, but she had the serious looks of a lady,
+was dressed simply, and looked self-possessed and dignified. He looked
+at her from a distance, for he did not venture to go near, but the
+little boy raised his head, and Francois Tessier felt himself tremble.
+It was his own son, there could be no doubt of that. And as he looked at
+him, he thought he could recognize himself as he appeared in an old
+photograph taken years ago. He remained hidden behind a tree, waiting
+for her to go, that he might follow her.
+
+He did not sleep that night. The idea of the child especially harrassed
+him. His son! Oh! If he could only have known, have been sure? But what
+could he have done? However, he went to the house where she had lived,
+and asked about her. He was told that a neighbor, an honorable man of
+strict morals, had been touched by her distress, and had married her;
+he knew the fault she had committed and had married her, and had even
+recognized the child, his, Francois Tessier's child, as his own.
+
+He returned to the _Parc Monceau_ every Sunday, for then he always saw
+her, and each time he was seized with a mad, an irresistible longing, to
+take his son into his arms, cover him with kisses and to steal him, to
+carry him off.
+
+He suffered horribly in his wretched isolation as an old bachelor, with
+nobody to care for him, and he also suffered atrocious mental torture,
+torn by paternal tenderness springing from remorse, longing and
+jealousy, and from that need of loving one's own children, which nature
+has implanted into all, and so at last he determined to make a
+despairing attempt, and going up to her, as she entered the park, he
+said, standing in the middle of the path, pale and with trembling lips:
+"You do not recognize me." She raised her eyes, looked at him, uttered
+an exclamation of horror, of terror, and, taking the two children by the
+hand she rushed away, dragging them after her, whilst he went home and
+wept, inconsolably.
+
+Months passed without his seeing her again, but he suffered, day and
+night, for he was a prey to his paternal love. He would gladly have
+died, if he could only have kissed his son, he would have committed
+murder, performed any task, braved any danger, ventured anything. He
+wrote to her, but she did not reply, and after writing her some twenty
+letters he saw that there was no hope of altering her determination, and
+then he formed the desperate resolution of writing to her husband,
+being quite prepared to receive a bullet from a revolver, if need be.
+His letter only consisted of a few lines, as follows:
+
+     "Monsieur,
+
+     "You must have a perfect horror of my name, but I am so miserable,
+     so overcome by misery, that my only hope is in you, and therefore I
+     venture to request you to grant me an interview of only five
+     minutes."
+
+     "I have the honor, etc."
+
+The next day he received the reply:
+
+     "Monsieur,
+
+     "I shall expect you to-morrow, Tuesday, at five o'clock."
+
+
+V
+
+As he went up the staircase, Francois Tessier's heart beat so violently
+that he had to stop several times. There was a dull and violent noise in
+his breast, the noise as of some animal galloping, and he could only
+breathe with difficulty, and had to hold on to the banisters in order
+not to fall.
+
+He rang the bell on the third floor, and when a maidservant had opened
+the door, he asked "Does Monsieur Flamel live here?" "Yes. Monsieur.
+Kindly come in."
+
+He was shown into the drawing-room; he was alone and waited, feeling
+bewildered, as in the midst of a catastrophe, until a door opened and a
+man came in. He was tall, serious, and rather stout, and wore a black
+frock-coat, and pointed to a chair with his hand. Francois Tessier sat
+down, and then said, panting: "Monsieur ... Monsieur ... I do not know
+whether you know my name ... whether you know ..."
+
+Monsieur Flamel interrupted him. "You need not tell it me, Monsieur, I
+know it. My wife has spoken to me about you." He spoke in the dignified
+tone of voice of a good man who wishes to be severe, and with the
+common-place stateliness of an honorable man, and Francois Tessier
+continued: "Well, Monsieur, I want to say this: I am dying of grief, of
+remorse, of shame, and I would like once, only once to kiss ... the
+child ..."
+
+Monsieur Flamel got up and rang the bell, and when the servant came in,
+he said: "Will you bring Louis here." When she had gone out, they
+remained face to face, without speaking, as they had nothing more to say
+to one another, and waited. Then, suddenly, a little boy of ten rushed
+into the room, and ran up to the man whom he believed to be his father,
+but he stopped when he saw a stranger, and Monsieur Flamel kissed him
+and said: "Now go and kiss that gentleman, my dear." And the child went
+up to him nicely, and looked at the stranger.
+
+Francois Tessier had risen, he let his hat fall, and was ready to fall
+himself as he looked at his son, while Monsieur Flamel had turned away,
+from a feeling of delicacy, and was looking out of the window.
+
+The child waited in surprise, but he picked up the hat and gave it to
+the stranger. Then Francois, taking the child up in his arms, began to
+kiss him wildly all over his face, on his eyes, his cheeks, on his
+mouth, on his hair, and the youngster, frightened at the shower of
+kisses tried to avoid them, turned away his head and pushed away the
+man's face with his little hands. But suddenly, Francois Tessier put him
+down, and cried: "Good-bye! Good-bye!" And he rushed out of the room as
+if he had been a thief.
+
+
+
+
+A VAGABOND
+
+
+For more than a month he had been walking, seeking for work everywhere.
+He had left his native place, Ville-Avary, in the department of la
+Manche, because there was no work to be had. He was a journeyman
+carpenter, twenty-seven years old, a steady fellow and good workman, but
+for two months, he, the eldest son, had been obliged to live on his
+family, with nothing to do but to cross his arms in the general stoppage
+of work. Bread was getting scarce with them; the two sisters went out as
+charwomen, but earned little, and he, Jacques Randel, the strongest of
+them all, did nothing because he had nothing to do, and ate the others'
+soup.
+
+Then he went and inquired at the town-hall, and the mayor's secretary
+told him that he would find work at the Labor-center, and so he started,
+well provided with papers and certificates, and carrying another pair of
+shoes, a pair of trousers and a shirt, in a blue handkerchief at the end
+of his stick.
+
+And he had walked almost without stopping, day and night, along
+interminable roads, in the sun and rain, without ever reaching that
+mysterious country where workmen find work. At first he had the fixed
+idea that he must only work because he was a carpenter, but at every
+carpenter's shop where he applied he was told that they had just
+dismissed men on account of work being so slack, and finding himself at
+the end of his resources, he made up his mind to undertake any job that
+he might come across on the road. And so by turns he was a navvy,
+stableman, stone sawer; he split wood, lopped the branches of trees, dug
+wells, mixed mortar, tied up faggots, tended goats on a mountain, and
+all for a few pence, for he only obtained two or three days work
+occasionally, by offering himself at a shamefully low price, in order to
+tempt the avarice of employers and peasants.
+
+And now, for a week he had found nothing, and he had no money left, and
+was eating a piece of bread, thanks to the charity of some women from
+whom he had begged at house doors, on the road. It was getting dark, and
+Jacques Randel, jaded, his legs failing him, his stomach empty, and with
+despair in his heart, was walking barefoot on the grass by the side of
+the road, for he was taking care of his last pair of shoes, as the other
+pair had already ceased to exist for a long time. It was a Saturday,
+towards the end of autumn. The heavy gray clouds were being driven
+rapidly through the sky by the gusts of wind which whistled among the
+trees, and one felt that it would rain soon. The country was deserted at
+that time of the evening, and on the eve of Sunday. Here and there in
+the fields there rose up stacks of thrashed out corn, like huge yellow
+mushrooms, and the fields looked bare, as they had already been sown for
+the next year.
+
+Randel was hungry, with the hunger of some wild animal, such a hunger as
+drives wolves to attack men. Worn out and weakened with fatigue, he took
+longer strides, so as not to take so many steps, and with heavy head,
+the blood throbbing in his temples, with red eyes and dry mouth, he
+grasped his stick tightly in his hand, with a longing to strike the
+first passer-by whom he should meet, and who might be going home to
+supper, with all his force.
+
+He looked at the sides of the road with the image of potatoes dug up and
+lying on the ground before his eyes; if he had found any, he would have
+gathered some dead wood, made a fire in the ditch, and have had a
+capital supper off the warm, round vegetables, which he would first of
+all have held burning hot, in his cold hands. But it was too late in the
+year, and he would have to gnaw a raw beetroot, as he had done the day
+before, which he picked up in a field.
+
+For the last two days he had spoken aloud as he quickened his steps,
+under the influence of his thoughts. He had never thought, hitherto, as
+he had given all his mind, all his simple faculties, to his industrial
+requirements. But now, fatigue, and this desperate search for work which
+he could not get, refusals and rebuffs, nights spent in the open-air,
+lying on the grass, long fasting, the contempt which he knew people with
+a settled abode felt for a vagabond, and that question which he was
+continually asked: "Why do you not remain at home?" Now, distress at not
+being able to use his strong arms which he felt so full of vigor, the
+recollection of his relations who had remained at home and who also had
+not a half-penny, filled him by degrees with rage, which had been
+accumulating every day, every hour, every minute, and which now escaped
+his lips in spite of himself in short growling sentences.
+
+As he stumbled over the stones which rolled beneath his bare feet, he
+grumbled, "How wretched! how miserable!... A set of hogs ... to let a
+man die of hunger ... a carpenter ... a set of hogs ... not two
+pence ... not two pence ... and now it is raining ... a set of hogs!..."
+
+He was indignant at the injustice of fate, and cast the blame on men, on
+all men, because nature, that great, blind mother, is unjust, cruel and
+perfidious, and he repeated through his clenched teeth: "A set of hogs,"
+as he looked at the thin gray smoke which rose from the roofs, for it
+was the dinner hour. And without thinking about that other injustice,
+which is human, and which is called robbery and violence, he felt
+inclined to go into one of those houses to murder the inhabitants, and
+to sit down to table, in their stead.
+
+He said to himself: "I have a right to live, now ... as they are letting
+me die of hunger ... and yet I only ask for work ... a set of hogs!" And
+the pain in his limbs, the gnawing in his heart rose to his head like
+terrible intoxication, and gave rise to this simple thought in his
+brain: "I have the right to live because I breathe, and because the air
+is the common property of everybody, and so nobody has a right to leave
+me without bread!"
+
+A fine, thick, icy cold rain was coming down and he stopped and
+murmured: "How miserable!... another month of walking before I get
+home...." He was indeed returning home then; for he saw that he should
+more easily find work in his native town where he was known,--and he did
+not mind what he did,--than on the high roads, where everybody suspected
+him. As the carpentering business was not going well he would turn
+day-laborer, be a mason's hodman, ditcher, break stones on the road. If
+he only earned tenpence a day, that would at any rate find him something
+to eat.
+
+He tied the remains of his last pocket handkerchief round his neck, to
+prevent the cold water from running down his back and chest; but he soon
+found that it was penetrating the thin material of which his clothes
+were made, and he glanced round him with the agonized look of a man who
+does not know where to hide his body and to rest his head, and has no
+place of shelter in the whole world.
+
+Night came on, and wrapped the country in obscurity, and in the
+distance, in a meadow, he saw a dark spot on the grass; it was a cow,
+and so he got over the ditch by the roadside and went up to her, without
+exactly knowing what he was doing. When he got close to her, she raised
+her great head to him, and he thought: "If I only had a jug, I could get
+a little milk." He looked at the cow, and the cow looked at him, and
+then suddenly giving her a violent kick in the side, he said: "Get up!"
+
+The animal got up slowly, letting her heavy udders hang down below her;
+then the man lay down on his back between the animal's legs, and he
+drank for a long time, squeezing her warm swollen teats which tasted of
+the cow stall, with both hands, and he drank as long as any milk
+remained in that living well. But the icy rain began to fall more
+heavily, and he saw no place of shelter on the whole of that bare plain.
+He was cold, and he looked set a light which was shining among the
+trees, in the window of a house.
+
+The cow had lain down again, heavily, and he sat down by her side and
+stroked her head, grateful for the nourishment she had given him. The
+animal's strong, thick breath, which came out of her nostrils like two
+jets of steam in the evening air, blew onto the workman's face, who
+said: "You are not cold, inside there!" He put his hands onto her chest
+and under her legs to find some warmth there, and then the idea struck
+him, that he might pass the night against that large, warm stomach. So
+he found a comfortable place and laid his forehead against the great
+udder which had quenched his thirst just previously, and then, as he was
+worn-out with fatigue, he fell asleep immediately.
+
+He woke up, however, several times, with his back or his stomach half
+frozen, according as he put one or the other to the animal's flank. Then
+he turned over to warm and dry that part of his body which had remained
+exposed to the night air, and he soon went soundly to sleep again.
+
+The crowing of a cock woke him; the day was breaking, it was no longer
+raining and the sky was bright. The cow was resting, with her muzzle on
+the ground, and he stooped down, resting on his hands, to kiss those
+wide nostrils of moist flesh, and said: "Good-bye, my beauty ... until
+next time ... you are a nice animal ... Good-bye ..." Then he put on his
+shoes and went off, and for two hours he walked straight on before him,
+always following the same road, and then he felt so tired that he sat
+down on the grass. It was broad daylight by that time, and the church
+bells were ringing; men in blue blouses, women in white caps, some on
+foot, some in carts, began to pass along the road, going to the
+neighboring villages to spend Sunday with friends or relations.
+
+A stout peasant came in sight, drawing a score of frightened, bleating
+sheep in front of him, whom an active dog kept together, so Randel got
+up and raising his cap, he said: "You do not happen to have any work
+for a man who is dying of hunger?" But the other giving an angry look at
+the vagabond, replied: "I have no work for fellows whom I meet on the
+road."
+
+And the carpenter went back, and sat down by the side of the ditch
+again. He waited there for a long time, watching the country people
+pass, and looking for a kind compassionate face, before he renewed his
+request, and finally selected a man in an overcoat, whose stomach was
+adorned with a gold chain. "I have been looking for work," he said, "for
+the last two months and cannot find any, and I have not a half-penny in
+my pocket." But the semi-gentleman replied: "You should have read the
+notice which is stuck up at the beginning of the village: _Begging is
+prohibited within the boundaries of this parish._ Let me tell you I am
+the mayor, and if you do not get out of here pretty quickly, I shall
+have you arrested."
+
+Randel, who was getting angry, replied: "Have me arrested if you like; I
+should prefer it, for at any rate I should not die of hunger." And he
+went back and sat down by the side of his ditch again, and in about a
+quarter of an hour two gendarmes appeared on the road. They were walking
+slowly, side by side, well in sight, glittering in the sun with their
+shining hats, their yellow accouterments and their metal buttons, as if
+to frighten evildoers, and to put them to flight at a distance. He knew
+that they were coming after him, but he did not move, for he was seized
+with a sudden desire to defy them, to be arrested by them, and to have
+his revenge later.
+
+They came on without appearing to have seen him, walking with military
+steps, heavily and balancing themselves as if they were doing _the
+goose_ steps; and then suddenly as they passed him, they appeared to
+have noticed him, and stopped and looked at him angrily and
+threateningly, and the brigadier came up to him and asked: "What are you
+doing here?" "I am resting," the man replied, calmly. "Where do you come
+from?" "If I had to tell you all the places I have been to, it would
+take me more than an hour." "Where are you going to?" "To Ville-Avary."
+"Where is that?" "In La Manche." "Is that where you belong to?" "It is."
+"Why did you leave it?" "To try for work."
+
+The brigadier turned to his gendarme, and said, in the angry voice of a
+man who is exasperated at last by the same trick: "They all say that,
+these scamps. I know all about it." And then he continued: "Have you any
+papers?" "Yes, I have some." "Give them to me."
+
+Randel took his papers out of his pockets; his certificates, those poor
+worn-out, dirty papers which were falling to pieces, and gave them to
+the soldier, who spelled them through, hemming and hawing and then
+having seen that they were all in order, he gave them back to Randel
+with the dissatisfied look of a man whom someone cleverer than himself
+has tricked.
+
+After a few moments' further reflection, he asked him: "Have you any
+money on you?" "No." "None whatever?" "None." "Not even a sou?" "Not
+even a sou!" "How do you live then?" "On what people give me." "Then you
+beg?" And Randel answered resolutely: "Yes, when I can."
+
+Then the gendarme said: "I have caught you on the highroad in the act of
+vagabondage and begging, without any resources or trade, and so I
+command you to come with me." The carpenter got up and said: "Wherever
+you please." And placing himself between the two soldiers, even before
+he had received the order to do so, he added: "Come, lock me up; that
+will at any rate put a roof over my head when it rains."
+
+And they set off towards the village, whose red tiles could be seen
+through the leafless trees a quarter of a league off. Service was just
+going to begin when they went through the village. The square was full
+of people, who immediately formed two hedges to see the criminal, who
+was being followed by a crowd of excited children, pass. Male and female
+peasants looked at the prisoner between the two gendarmes, with hatred
+in their eyes, and a longing to throw stones at him, to tear his skin
+with their nails, to trample him under their feet. They asked each other
+whether he had committed murder or robbery. The butcher, who was an
+ex-Spahl, declared that he was a deserter. The tobacconist thought that
+he recognized him as the man who had that very morning passed a bad half
+franc piece off on him, and the ironmonger declared that he was the
+murderer of widow Malet, whom the police had been looking for, for six
+months.
+
+In the hall of the municipal council, into which his custodians took
+him, Randel saw the mayor again, sitting on the magisterial bench, with
+the schoolmaster by his side. "Ah! ah!" the magistrate exclaimed, "so
+here you are again, my fine fellow. I told you I should have you locked
+up. Well, brigadier, what is he charged with?"
+
+"He is a vagabond without house or home, Monsieur le Maire, without any
+resources or money, so he says, who was arrested in the act of begging,
+but he is provided with good testimonials, and his papers are all in
+order."
+
+"Show me his papers," the mayor said. He took them, read them, reread,
+returned them, and then said: "Search him;" so they searched him, but
+found nothing, and the Mayor seemed perplexed, and asked the workman:
+
+"What were you doing on the road this morning?" "I was looking for
+work." "Work?... On the highroad?" "How do you expect me to find any, if
+I hid in the woods?"
+
+They looked at each other, with the hatred of two wild beasts which
+belong to different, hostile species, and the magistrate continued: "I
+am going to have you set at liberty but do not be brought up before me
+again." To which the carpenter replied: "I would rather you locked me
+up; I have had enough running about the country." But the magistrate
+replied severely: "Be silent." And then he said to the two gendarmes:
+"You will conduct this man two hundred yards from the village, and let
+him continue his journey."
+
+"At any rate, give me something to eat," the workman said; but the other
+grew indignant: "It only remains for us to feed you! Ah! ah! ah! that is
+rather strong!" But Randel went on firmly: "If you let me nearly die of
+hunger again, you will force me to commit a crime, and then, so much the
+worse for you other fat fellows."
+
+The Mayor had risen, and he repeated: "Take him away immediately, or I
+shall end by getting angry."
+
+The two gendarmes thereupon seized the carpenter by the arms and
+dragged him out. He allowed them to do it without resistance, passed
+through the village again, and found himself on the highroad once more;
+and when the men had accompanied him two hundred yards beyond the
+village, the brigadier said: "Now off with you, and do not let me catch
+you about here again, for if I do you will know it."
+
+Randel went off without replying, or knowing where he was going. He
+walked on for a quarter of an hour or twenty minutes, so stupefied that
+he no longer thought of anything. But suddenly, as he was passing a
+small house, where the window was half open, the smell of the soup and
+boiled meat stopped him suddenly in front of it, and hunger, fierce,
+devouring, maddening hunger seized him, and almost drove him against the
+walls of the house, like a wild beast.
+
+He said aloud, in a grumbling voice: "In heaven's name! they must give
+me some, this time." And he began to knock at the door vigorously with
+his stick, and as nobody came he knocked louder and called out: "He! he!
+you people in there, open the door!" And then, as nothing moved, he went
+up to the window, and pushed it open with his hand, and the close warm
+air of the kitchen, full of the smell of hot soup, meat and cabbage
+escaped into the cold, outer air, and with a bound the carpenter was in
+the house. Two covers were laid on the table, and no doubt the
+proprietors of the house, on going to church, had left their dinner on
+the fire, their nice, Sunday boiled beef and vegetable soup, while there
+was a loaf of new bread on the chimney-piece, between two bottles which
+seemed full.
+
+Randel seized the bread first of all, and broke it with as much violence
+as if he were strangling a man, and then he began to eat it
+voraciously, swallowing great mouthfuls quickly. But almost immediately
+the smell of the meat attracted him to the fire-place, and having taken
+off the lid of the saucepan, he plunged a fork into it and brought out a
+large piece of beef tied with a string. Then he took more cabbage,
+carrots and onions until his plate was full, and having put it onto the
+table, he sat down before it, cut the meat into four pieces, and dined
+as if he had been at home. When he had eaten nearly all the meat besides
+a quantity of vegetables, he felt thirsty, and took one of the bottles
+off the mantel-piece.
+
+Scarcely had he poured the liquor into his glass, than he saw it was
+brandy. So much the better; it was warming and would instill some fire
+into his veins, and that would be all right, after being so cold; and he
+drank some. He found it very good, certainly, for he had grown
+unaccustomed to it, and he poured himself out another glassful, which he
+drank at two gulps. And then, almost immediately he felt quite merry and
+light-hearted from the effect of the alcohol, just as if some great
+happiness were flowing through his system.
+
+He continued to eat, but more slowly, and dipping his bread into the
+soup. His skin had become burning, and especially his forehead, where
+the veins were throbbing. But suddenly the church bells began to ring;
+Mass was over, and instinct rather than fear, the instinct of prudence
+which guides all beings, and makes them clear-sighted in danger, made
+the carpenter get up. He put the remains of the loaf into one pocket,
+and the brandy bottle into the other, and he furtively went to the
+window and looked out into the road. It was still deserted, so he jumped
+out and set off walking again, but instead of following the highroad,
+he ran across the fields towards a wood which he saw a little way off.
+
+He felt alert, strong, light-hearted, glad of what he had done, and so
+nimble that he sprang over the enclosures of the fields at a single
+bound and as soon as he was under the trees, he took the bottle out of
+his pocket again and began to drink once more, swallowing it down as he
+walked, and then his ideas began to get confused, his eyes grew dim and
+his legs as elastic as springs and he started singing the old popular
+song.
+
+    _Oh! how nice, how nice it is,
+    To pick the sweet, wild strawberries._
+
+He was now walking on thick, damp, cool moss and that soft carpet under
+his feet made him feel absurdly inclined to turn head over heels, like
+he used to do as a child, so he took a run, turned a somersault, got up
+and began over again. And between each time, he began to sing again:
+
+    _Oh! how nice, how nice it is,
+    To pick the sweet, wild strawberries._
+
+Suddenly he found himself on the edge of a deep road and in the road he
+saw a tall girl, a servant who was returning to the village with two
+pails of milk. He watched, stooping down and with his eyes as bright as
+those of a dog who scents a quail, but she saw him, raised her head and
+said: "Was that you singing like that?" He did not reply, however, but
+jumped down into the road, although it was at least six feet down, and
+when she saw him suddenly standing in front of her, she exclaimed: "Oh!
+dear, how you frightened me!"
+
+But he did not hear her for he was drunk, he was mad, excited by another
+requirement which was more imperative than hunger, more feverish than
+alcohol; by the irresistible fury of the man who has been in want of
+everything for two months, and who is drunk; who is young, ardent and
+inflamed by all the appetites which nature has implanted in the vigorous
+flesh of men.
+
+The girl started back from him, frightened at his face, his eyes, his
+half open mouth, his outstretched hands, but he seized her by the
+shoulders, and without a word, threw her down in the road.
+
+She let her two pails fall and they rolled over noisily, all the milk
+was spilt and then she screamed, but comprehending that it would be of
+no use to call for help in that lonely spot and seeing that he was not
+going to make an attempt on her life, she yielded without much
+difficulty, and not very angry neither, for he was a strong young
+fellow, but really not too rough.
+
+When she got up, the thought of her overturned pails suddenly filled
+her with fury and taking off one of her wooden clogs, she threw it, in
+her turn, at the man to break his head, if he did not pay her for her
+milk.
+
+But he, mistaking the reason for this sudden violent attack, somewhat
+sobered, and frightened at what he had done, ran off as fast as he could
+while she threw stones at him, some of which hit him in the back.
+
+He ran for a long time, very long, until he felt more tired than he had
+ever done before. His legs were so weak that they could scarcely carry
+him; all his ideas were confused, he lost the recollection of
+everything, and could no longer think about anything; and so he sat
+down at the foot of a tree, and in five minutes was fast asleep. He was
+soon awakened, however, by a rough shake and on opening his eyes he saw
+two cocked hats of polished leather bending over him, and the two
+gendarmes of the morning, who were holding him and binding his arms.
+
+"I knew I should catch you again," said the brigadier, jeeringly. But
+Randel got up without replying. The two men shook him, quite ready to
+ill treat him if he made a movement, for he was their prey now, he had
+become a jail-bird, caught by those hunters of criminals who would not
+let him go again.
+
+"Now start!" the brigadier said, and they set off, It was getting
+evening and the autumn twilight was settling heavy and dark over the
+land, and in half an hour they reached the village, where every door was
+open, for the people had heard what had happened. Peasants and peasant
+women and girls, excited with anger as if every man had been robbed and
+every woman violated, wished to see the wretch brought back so that they
+might overwhelm him with abuse. They hooted him from the first house in
+the village until they reached the Mansion-house, where the Mayor was
+waiting for him, being himself avenged on this vagabond and as soon as
+he saw him, he cried from far:
+
+"Ah! my fine fellow! here we are!" And he rubbed his hands, more pleased
+than he usually was and he continued: "I said so. I said so the moment I
+saw him in the road."
+
+And then with increased satisfaction:
+
+"Oh! you blackguard! Oh! you dirty blackguard! You will get your twenty
+years, my fine fellow!"
+
+
+
+
+USELESS BEAUTY
+
+
+I
+
+A very elegant victoria with two beautiful black horses was drawn up in
+front of the mansion. It was the end of June at about half past five in
+the afternoon, and the sun shone warm and bright into the large
+courtyard.
+
+The Countess de Mascaret came down just as her husband, who was coming
+home, appeared in the carriage entrance. He stopped for a few moments to
+look at his wife and grew rather pale. She was very beautiful, graceful
+and distinguished looking, with her long oval face, her complexion like
+gilt ivory, her large gray eyes and her black hair; and she got into her
+carriage without looking at him, without even seeming to have noticed
+him, with such a particularly high-bred air, that the furious jealousy
+by which he had been devoured for so long, again gnawed at his heart. He
+went up to her and said: "You are going for a drive?" She merely replied
+disdainfully: "You see I am!" "In the Bois de Boulogne?" "Most
+probably." "May I come with you?" "The carriage belongs to you."
+
+Without being surprised at the tone of voice in which she answered him,
+he got in and sat down by his wife's side, and said: "Bois de Boulonge."
+The footman jumped up by the coachman's side, and the horses as usual
+pawed the ground and shook their heads until they were in the street.
+Husband and wife sat side by side, without speaking. He was thinking how
+to begin a conversation, but she maintained such an obstinately hard
+look, that he did not venture to make the attempt. At last, however, he
+cunningly, accidentally as it were, touched the Countess's gloved hand
+with his own, but she drew her arm away with a movement which was so
+expressive of disgust, that he remained thoughtful, in spite of his
+usual authoritative and despotic character, and he said: "Gabrielle!"
+"What do you want?" "I think you are looking adorable."
+
+She did not reply, but remained lying back in the carriage, looking like
+an irritated queen. By that time they were driving up the _Champs
+Elysees_, towards the _Arc de Triomphe_. That immense monument, at the
+end of the long avenue, raised its colossal arch against the red sky,
+and the sun seemed to be descending onto it, showering fiery dust on it
+from the sky.
+
+The stream of carriages, with the sun reflecting from the bright, plated
+harness and the shining lamps, caused a double current to flow towards
+the town and towards the wood, and the Count de Mascaret continued: "My
+dear Gabrielle!"
+
+But then, unable to bear it any longer, she replied in an exasperated
+voice: "Oh! do leave me in peace, pray; I am not even at liberty to have
+my carriage to myself, now." He, however, pretended not to hear her, and
+continued: "You have never looked so pretty as you do to-day."
+
+Her patience was decidedly at an end, and she replied with irrepressible
+anger: "You are wrong to notice it, for I swear to you, that I will
+never have anything to do with you in that way again." He was decidedly
+stupefied and agitated, and his violent nature gaining the upper hand,
+he exclaimed: "What do you mean by that?" in such a manner as revealed
+rather the brutal master, than the amorous man. But she replied in a
+low voice, so that the servants might not hear amidst the deafening
+noise of the wheels: "Ah! What do I mean by that? What do I mean by
+that? Now I recognize you again! Do you want me to tell everything?"
+"Yes." "Everything that has been on my heart, since I have been the
+victim of your terrible selfishness?"
+
+He had grown red with surprise and anger, and he growled between his
+closed teeth: "Yes, tell me everything."
+
+He was a tall, broad-shouldered man, with a big, red beard, a handsome
+man, a nobleman, a man of the world, who passed as a perfect husband and
+an excellent father, and now for the first time since they had started
+she turned towards him, and looked him full in the face: "Ah! You will
+hear some disagreeable things, but you must know that I am prepared for
+everything, that I fear nothing, and you less than anyone, to-day."
+
+He also was looking into her eyes, and already he was shaking with
+passion, and he said in a low voice: "You are mad." "No, but I will no
+longer be the victim of the hateful penalty of maternity, which you have
+inflicted on me for eleven years! I wish to live like a woman of the
+world, as I have a right to do, as all women have the right to do."
+
+He suddenly grew pale again, and stammered: "I do not understand you."
+"Oh! yes; you understand me well enough. It is now three months since I
+had my last child, and as I am still very beautiful, and as, in spite of
+all your efforts you cannot spoil my figure, as you just now perceived,
+when you saw me on the outside flight of steps, you think it is time
+that I should become pregnant again." "But you are talking nonsense!"
+"No, I am not. I am thirty, and I have had seven children, and we have
+been married eleven years, and you hope that this will go on for ten
+years longer, after which you will leave off being jealous."
+
+He seized her arm and squeezed it, saying: "I will not allow you to talk
+to me like that, for long." "And I shall talk to you till the end, until
+I have finished all I have to say to you, and if you try to prevent me,
+I shall raise my voice so that the two servants, who are on the box, may
+hear. I only allowed you to come with me for that object, for I have
+these witnesses who will oblige you to listen to me, and to contain
+yourself; so now, pay attention to what I say. I have always felt an
+antipathy for you, and I have always let you see it, for I have never
+lied, Monsieur. You married me in spite of myself; you forced my
+parents, who were in embarrassed circumstances, to give me to you,
+because you were rich, and they obliged me to marry you, in spite of my
+tears.
+
+"So you bought me, and as soon as I was in your power, as soon as I had
+become your companion, ready to attach myself to you, to forget your
+coercive and threatening proceedings, in order that I might only
+remember that I ought to be a devoted wife and to love you as much as it
+might be possible for me to love you, you became jealous, you, as no man
+has ever been before, with the base, ignoble jealousy of a spy, which
+was as degrading for you as it was for me. I had not been married eight
+months, when you suspected me of every perfidiousness, and you even told
+me so. What a disgrace! And as you could not prevent me from being
+beautiful, and from pleasing people, from being called in drawing-rooms,
+and also in the newspapers, one of the most beautiful women in Paris,
+you tried everything you could think of to keep admirers from me, and
+you hit upon the abominable idea of making me spend my life in a
+constant state of pregnancy, until the time when I should disgust every
+man. Oh! do not deny it! I did not understand it for some time, but then
+I guessed it. You even boasted about it to your sister, who told me of
+it, for she is fond of me and was disgusted at your boorish coarseness.
+
+"Ah! Remember our struggles, doors smashed in, and locks forced! For
+eleven years you have condemned me to the existence of a brood mare on a
+studfarm. Then as soon as I was pregnant, you grew disgusted with me,
+and I saw nothing of you for months, and I was sent into the country, to
+the family mansion, among fields and meadows, to bring forth my child.
+And when I reappeared, fresh, pretty and indestructible, still seductive
+and constantly surrounded by admirers, hoping that at last I should live
+a little like a young rich woman who belongs to society, you were seized
+by jealousy again, and you recommenced to persecute me with that
+infamous and hateful desire from which you are suffering at this moment,
+by my side. And it is not desire of possessing me, for I should never
+have refused myself to you, but it is the wish to make me unsightly.
+
+"Besides this, that abominable and mysterious circumstance took place,
+which I was a long time in penetrating (but I grew acute by dint of
+watching your thoughts and actions): You attached yourself to your
+children with all the security which they gave you while I bore them in
+my womb. You felt affection for them, with all your aversion for me, and
+in spite of your ignoble fears, which were momentarily allayed by your
+pleasure in seeing me grow stouter.
+
+"Oh! How often have I noticed that joy in you! I have seen it in your
+eyes and guessed it. You loved your children as victories, and not
+because they were of your own blood. They were victories over me, over
+my youth, over my beauty, over my charms, over the compliments which
+were paid me, and over those who whispered round me, without paying them
+to me. And you are proud of them, you make a parade of them, you take
+them out for drives in your break in the Bois de Boulogne, and you give
+them donkey rides at Montmorency. You take them to theatrical matinees
+so that you may be seen in the midst of them, so that people may say:
+'What a kind father,' and that it may be repeated...."
+
+He had seized her wrist with savage brutality, and he squeezed it so
+violently that she was quiet, and nearly cried out with the pain, and he
+said to her in a whisper:
+
+"I love my children. Do you hear? What you have just told me is
+disgraceful in a mother. But you belong to me; I am master ... your
+master ... I can exact from you what I like and when I like ... and I
+have the law ... on my side."
+
+He was trying to crush her fingers in the strong grip of his large,
+muscular hand, and she, livid with pain, tried in vain to free them from
+that vice which was crushing them; the agony made her pant, and the
+tears came into her eyes. "You see that I am the master, and the
+stronger," he said. And when he somewhat loosened his grasp, she asked
+him: "Do you think that I am a religious woman?"
+
+He was surprised and stammered: "Yes." "Do you think that I could lie if
+I swore to the truth of anything to you, before an altar on which
+Christ's body is?" "No." "Will you go with me to some church?" "What
+for?" "You shall see. Will you?" "If you absolutely wish it, yes."
+
+She raised her voice and said: "Philip!" And the coachman, bending down
+a little, without taking his eyes from his horses, seemed to turn his
+ear alone towards his mistress, who went on: "Drive to St.
+Philip-du-Roule's." And the victoria, which had got to the entrance of
+the Bois de Boulogne, returned to Paris.
+
+Husband and wife did not exchange a word during the drive, and when the
+carriage stopped before the church, Madame de Mascaret jumped out, and
+entered it, followed by the count, a few yards behind her. She went,
+without stopping, as far as the choir-screen, and falling on her knees
+at a chair, she buried her face in her hands. She prayed for a long
+time, and he, standing behind her, could see that she was crying. She
+wept noiselessly, like women do weep when they are in great, poignant
+grief. There was a kind of undulation in her body, which ended in a
+little sob, which was hidden and stifled by her fingers.
+
+But Count de Mascaret thought that the situation was lasting too long,
+and he touched her on the shoulder. That contact recalled her to
+herself, as if she had been burnt, and getting up, she looked straight
+into his eyes. "This is what I have to say to you. I am afraid of
+nothing, whatever you may do to me. You may kill me if you like. One of
+your children is not yours, and one only; that I swear to you before
+God, who hears me here. That is the only revenge which was possible for
+me, in return for all your abominable tyrannies of the male, in return
+for the penal servitude of childbearing to which you have condemned me.
+Who was my lover? That you will never know! You may suspect everyone,
+but you will never find out. I gave myself up to him, without love and
+without pleasure, only for the sake of betraying you, and he also made
+me a mother. Which is his child? That also you will never know. I have
+seven; try and find out! I intended to tell you this later, for one has
+not avenged oneself on a man by deceiving him, unless he knows it. You
+have driven me to confess it to-day. I now have finished."
+
+She hurried through the church, towards the open door, expecting to hear
+behind her the quick steps of her husband whom she had defied, and to be
+knocked to the ground by a blow of his fist, but she heard nothing, and
+reached her carriage. She jumped into it at a bound, overwhelmed with
+anguish, and breathless with fear; so she called out to the coachman:
+"Home!" and the horses set off at a quick trot.
+
+
+II
+
+Countess de Mascaret was waiting in her room for dinner time, like a
+criminal sentenced to death, awaits the hour of his execution. What was
+he going to do? Had he come home? Despotic, passionate, ready for any
+violence as he was, what was he meditating, what had he made up his
+mind to do? There was no sound in the house, and every moment she looked
+at the clock. Her lady's maid had come and dressed her for the evening,
+and had then left the room again. Eight o'clock struck and almost at the
+same moment there were two knocks at the door, and the butler came in
+and told her that dinner was ready.
+
+"Has the Count come in?" "Yes, Madame la Comtesse; he is in the
+dining-room."
+
+For a little moment she felt inclined to arm herself with a small
+revolver which she had bought some time previously, foreseeing the
+tragedy which was being rehearsed in her heart. But she remembered that
+all the children would be there, and she took nothing except a smelling
+bottle. He rose somewhat ceremoniously from his chair. They exchanged a
+slight bow, and sat down. The three boys, with their tutor, Abbe Martin,
+were on her right, and the three girls, with Miss Smith, their English
+governess, were on her left. The youngest child, who was only three
+months old, remained upstairs with his nurse.
+
+The Abbe said grace as usual, when there was no company, for the
+children did not come down to dinner when there were guests present;
+then they began dinner. The Countess, suffering from emotion, which she
+had not at all calculated upon, remained with her eyes cast down, while
+the Count scrutinized, now the three boys, and now the three girls, with
+uncertain, unhappy looks, which traveled from one to the other.
+Suddenly, pushing his wine-glass from him, it broke, and the wine was
+spilt on the tablecloth, and at the slight noise caused by this little
+accident, the Countess started up from her chair, and for the first time
+they looked at each other. Then, almost every moment, in spite of
+themselves, in spite of the irritation of their nerves caused by every
+glance, they did not cease to exchange looks, rapid as pistol shots.
+
+The Abbe, who felt that there was some cause for embarrassment which he
+could not divine, tried to get up the conversation, and he started
+various subjects, but his useless efforts gave rise to no ideas and did
+not bring out a word. The Countess, with feminine tact and obeying her
+instincts of a woman of the world, tried to answer him two or three
+times, but in vain. She could not find words, in the perplexity of her
+mind, and her own voice almost frightened her in the silence of the
+large room, where nothing else was heard except the slight sound of
+plates and knives and forks.
+
+Suddenly, her husband said to her, bending forward: "Here, amidst your
+children, will you swear to me that what you told me just now, is true?"
+
+The hatred which was fermenting in her veins, suddenly roused her, and
+replying to that question with the same firmness with which she had
+replied to his looks, she raised both her hands, the right pointing
+towards the boys and the left towards the girls, and said in a firm,
+resolute voice, and without any hesitation: "On the head of my children,
+I swear that I have told you the truth."
+
+He got up, and throwing his table napkin onto the table with an
+exasperated movement, he turned round and flung his chair against the
+wall, and then went out without another word, while she, uttering a deep
+sigh, as if after a first victory, went on in a calm voice: "You must
+not pay any attention to what your father has just said, my darlings; he
+was very much upset a short time ago, but he will be all right again,
+in a few days."
+
+Then she talked with the Abbe and with Miss Smith, and had tender,
+pretty words for all her children; those sweet spoiling mother's ways
+which unfold little hearts.
+
+When dinner was over, she went into the drawing-room with all her little
+following. She made the elder ones chatter, and when their bedtime came
+she kissed them for a long time, and then went alone into her room.
+
+She waited, for she had no doubt that he would come, and she made up her
+mind then, as her children were not with her, to defend her human skin,
+as she defended her life as a woman of the world; and in the pocket of
+her dress she put the little loaded revolver, which she had bought a few
+days previously. The hours went by, the hours struck, and every sound
+was hushed in the house. Only the cabs continued to rumble through the
+streets, but their noise was only heard vaguely through the shuttered
+and curtained windows.
+
+She waited, energetic and nervous, without any fear of him now, ready
+for anything, and almost triumphant, for she had found means of
+torturing him continually, during every moment of his life.
+
+But the first gleams of dawn came in through the fringe at the bottom of
+her curtains, without his having come into her room, and then she awoke
+to the fact, much to her stupefaction, that he was not coming. Having
+locked and bolted her door, for greater security, she went to bed at
+last, and remained there, with her eyes open, thinking, and barely
+understanding it all, without being able to guess what he was going to
+do.
+
+When her maid brought her tea, she at the same time gave her a letter
+from her husband. He told her that he was going to undertake a long
+journey, and in a postscript he added that his lawyer would provide her
+with any sums of money she might require for all her expenses.
+
+
+III
+
+It was at the Opera, between two of the acts in _Robert the Devil_. In
+the stalls, the men were standing up, with their hats on, their
+waistcoats cut very low so as to show a large amount of white shirt
+front, in which the gold and precious stones of their studs glistened,
+and were looking at the boxes full of ladies in low dresses, covered
+with diamonds and pearls, and who were expanding like flowers in that
+illuminated hothouse, where the beauty of the faces and the whiteness of
+their shoulders seemed to bloom in order to be looked at, in the midst
+of the music and of human voices.
+
+Two friends, with their backs to the orchestra were scanning those rows
+of elegance, that exhibition of real or false charms, of jewels, of
+luxury and of pretensions which showed itself off all round the
+Grand-Theatre, and one of them Roger de Salnis, said to his companion,
+Bernard Grandin: "Just look how beautiful Countess de Mascaret still
+is."
+
+Then the older, in turn, looked through his opera glasses at a tall lady
+in a box opposite, who appeared to be still very young, and whose
+striking beauty seemed to appeal to the eyes in every corner of the
+house. Her pale complexion, of an ivory tint, gave her the appearance
+of a statue, while a small, diamond coronet glistened on her black hair
+like a milky way.
+
+When he had looked at her for some time, Bernard Grandin replied with a
+jocular accent of sincere conviction: "You may well call her beautiful."
+"How old do you think she is?" "Wait a moment. I can tell you exactly,
+for I have known her since she was a child, and I saw her make her
+_debut_ into society when she was quite a girl. She is ... she is ...
+thirty ... thirty-six." "Impossible!" "I am sure of it." "She looks
+twenty-five." "She has had seven children." "It is incredible." "And
+what is more, they are all seven alive, as she is a very good mother. I
+go to the house, which is a very quiet and pleasant one, occasionally,
+and she realizes the phenomenon of the family in the midst of the
+world." "How very strange! And have there never been any reports about
+her?" "Never." "But what about her husband? He is peculiar, is he not?"
+
+"Yes, and no. Very likely there has been a little drama between them,
+one of those little domestic dramas which one suspects, which one never
+finds out exactly, but which one guesses pretty nearly." "What is it?"
+"I do not know anything about it. Mascaret leads a very fast life now,
+after having been a model husband. As long as he remained a good spouse,
+he had a shocking temper and was crabbed and easily took offense, but
+since he has been leading his present, rackety life, he has become quite
+indifferent; but one would guess that he has some trouble, a worm
+gnawing somewhere, for he has aged very much."
+
+Thereupon the two friends talked philosophically for some minutes about
+the secret, unknowable troubles, which differences of character or
+perhaps physical antipathies, which were not perceived at first, give
+rise to in families, and then Roger de Salnis, who was still looking at
+Madame de Mascaret through his opera-glasses, said: "It is almost
+incredible that that woman has had seven children!" "Yes, in eleven
+years; after which, when she was thirty, she put a stop to her period of
+production in order to enter into the brilliant period of
+representation, which does not seem near coming to an end." "Poor
+women!" "Why do you pity them?"
+
+"Why? Ah! my dear fellow, just consider! eleven years of pregnancy, for
+such a woman! What a hell! All her youth, all her beauty, every hope of
+success, every poetical ideal of a bright life, sacrificed to that
+abominable law of reproduction which turns the normal woman into a mere
+machine for reproduction." "What would you have? It is only nature!"
+
+"Yes, but I say that nature is our enemy, that we must always fight
+against nature, for she is continually bringing us back to an animal
+state. You may be sure that God has not put anything onto this earth
+that is clean, pretty, elegant, or accessory to our ideal, but the human
+brain has done it. It is we who have introduced a little grace, beauty,
+unknown charm and mystery into creation by singing about it,
+interpreting it, by admiring it as poets, idealizing it as artists, and
+by explaining it as learned men who make mistakes, but who find
+ingenious reasons, some grace and beauty, some unknown charm and mystery
+in the various phenomena of nature. God only created coarse beings, full
+of the germs of disease, and who, after a few years of bestial
+enjoyment, grow old and infirm, with all the ugliness and all the want
+of power of human decrepitude. He only seems to have made them in order
+that they may reproduce their species in a dirty manner, and then die
+like ephemeral insects. I said, _reproduce their species in a dirty
+manner_, and I adhere to that expression. What is there, as a matter of
+fact, more ignoble and more repugnant than that filthy and ridiculous
+act of the reproduction of living beings, against which all delicate
+minds always have revolted, and always will revolt? Since all the organs
+which have been invented by this economical and malicious Creator serve
+two purposes, why did he not choose others that were not dirty and
+sullied, in order to entrust them with that sacred mission, which is the
+noblest and the most exalted of all human functions? The mouth, which
+nourishes the body by means of material food, also diffuses abroad
+speech and thought. Our flesh revives itself by means of itself, and at
+the same time, ideas are communicated by it. The sense of smell, which
+gives the vital air to the lungs, imparts all the perfumes of the world
+to the brain: the smell of flowers, of woods, of trees, of the sea. The
+ear, which enables us to communicate with our fellow men, has also
+allowed us to invent music, to create dreams, happiness, the infinite
+and even physical pleasure, by means of sounds! But one might say that
+the cynical and cunning Creator wished to prohibit man from ever
+ennobling and idealizing his commerce with women. Nevertheless, man has
+found love, which is not a bad reply to that sly Deity, and he has
+ornamented it so much with literary poetry, that woman often forgets the
+contact she is obliged to submit to. Those among us who are powerless to
+deceive themselves, have invented vice and refined debauchery, which is
+another way of laughing at God, and of paying homage, immodest homage,
+to beauty.
+
+"But the normal man makes children; just a beast that is coupled with
+another by law.
+
+"Look at that woman! Is it not abominable to think that such a jewel,
+such a pearl, born to be beautiful, admired, feted and adored, has spent
+eleven years of her life in providing heirs for the Count de Mascaret?"
+
+Bernard Grandin replied with a laugh: "There is a great deal of truth in
+all that, but very few people would understand you."
+
+Salnis got more and more animated. "Do you know how I picture God
+myself?" he said. "As am enormous creative organ, unknown to us, who
+scatters millions of worlds into space, just as one single fish would
+deposit its spawn in the sea. He creates, because it is His function as
+God to do so, but He does not know what He is doing, and is stupidly
+prolific in His work, and is ignorant of the combinations of all kinds
+which are produced by his scattered germs. Human thought is a lucky
+little local, passing accident, which was totally unforeseen and
+condemned to disappear with this earth, and to recommence perhaps here
+or elsewhere, the same or different, with fresh combinations of
+eternally new beginnings. We owe it to this slight accident which has
+happened to His intellect, that we are very uncomfortable in this world,
+which was not made for us, which had not been prepared to receive us, to
+lodge and feed us or to satisfy reflecting beings, and we owe it to Him
+also that we have to struggle without ceasing against what are still
+called the designs of Providence, when we are really refined and
+civilized beings."
+
+Grandin, who was listening to him attentively, as he had long known the
+surprising outbursts of his fancy, asked him: "Then you believe that
+human thought is the spontaneous product of blind, divine parturition?"
+"Naturally? A fortuitous function of the nerve-centers of our brain,
+like some unforeseen chemical action which is due to new mixtures, and
+which also resemble a product of electricity, caused by friction, or the
+unexpected proximity of some substance, which lastly resemble the
+phenomena caused by the infinite and fruitful fermentations of living
+matter.
+
+"But, my dear fellow, the truth of this must be evident to any one who
+looks about him. If human thought, ordained by an omniscient Creator,
+had been intended to be what it has become, altogether different from
+mechanical thoughts and resignation, so exacting, inquiring, agitated,
+tormented, would the world which was created to receive the beings which
+we now are, have been this unpleasant little dwelling place for poor
+fools, this salad plot, this rocky wooded and spherical kitchen garden
+where your improvident Providence had destined us to live naked, in
+caves or under trees, nourished on the flesh of slaughtered animals, our
+brethren, or on raw vegetables nourished by the sun and the rain?
+
+"But it is sufficient to reflect for a moment, in order to understand
+that this world was not made for such creatures as we are. Thought,
+which is developed by a miracle in the nerves of the cells in our brain,
+powerless, ignorant and confused as it is, and as it will always remain,
+makes all of us, who are intellectual beings, eternal and wretched
+exiles on earth.
+
+"Look at this earth, as God has given it to those who inhabit it. Is it
+not visibly and solely made, planted and covered with forests, for the
+sake of animals? What is there for us? Nothing. And for them,
+everything, and they have nothing to do but to eat, or go hunting and
+eat each other, according to their instincts, for God never foresaw
+gentleness and peaceable manners; He only foresaw the death of creatures
+which were bent on destroying and devouring each other. Are not the
+quail, the pigeon and the partridge the natural prey of the hawk? the
+sheep, the stag and the ox that of the great flesh-eating animals,
+rather than meat that has been fattened to be served up to us with
+truffles, which have been unearthed by pigs, for our special benefit?
+
+"As to ourselves, the more civilized, intellectual and refined we are,
+the more we ought to conquer and subdue that animal instinct, which
+represents the will of God in us. And so, in order to mitigate our lot
+as brutes, we have discovered and made everything, beginning with
+houses, then exquisite food, sauces, sweetmeats, pastry, drink, stuffs,
+clothes, ornaments, beds, mattresses, carriages, railways, and
+innumerable machines, besides arts and sciences, writing and poetry.
+Every ideal comes from us and all the amenities of life, in order to
+make our existence as simple reproducers, for which divine Providence
+solely intended us, less monotonous and less hard.
+
+"Look at this theater. Is there not here a human world created by us,
+unforeseen and unknown by Eternal destinies, comprehensible by our minds
+alone, a sensual and intellectual distraction, which has been invented
+solely by and for that discontented and restless little animal that we
+are.
+
+"Look at that woman, Madame de Mascaret. God intended her to live in a
+cave naked, or wrapped up in the skins of wild animals, but is she not
+better as she is? But, speaking of her, does anyone know why and how her
+brute of a husband, having such a companion by his side, and especially
+after having been boorish enough to make her a mother seven times, has
+suddenly left her, to run after bad women?"
+
+Grandin replied: "Oh! my dear fellow, this is probably the only reason.
+He found that always sleeping with her was becoming too expensive in the
+end, and from reasons of domestic economy, he has arrived at the same
+principles which you lay down as a philosopher."
+
+Just then the curtain rose for the third act, and they turned round,
+took off their hats, and sat down.
+
+
+IV
+
+The Count and Countess Mascaret were sitting side by side in the
+carriage which was taking them home from the opera, without speaking.
+But suddenly the husband said to his wife: "Gabrielle!" "What do you
+want?" "Don't you think that this has lasted long enough?" "What?" "The
+horrible punishment to which you have condemned me for the last six
+years." "What do you want? I cannot help it." "Then tell me which of
+them it is!" "Never!" "Think that I can no longer see my children or
+feel them round me, without having my heart burdened with this doubt.
+Tell me which of them it is, and I swear that I will forgive you, and
+treat it like the others." "I have not the right to." "You do not see
+that I can no longer endure this life, this thought which is wearing me
+out, or this question which I am constantly asking myself, this question
+which tortures me each time I look at them. It is driving me mad."
+
+"Then you have suffered a great deal?" she said.
+
+"Terribly. Should I, without that, have accepted the horror of living by
+your side, and the still greater horror of feeling and knowing that
+there is one among them whom I cannot recognize, and who prevents me
+from loving the others." She repeated: "Then you have really suffered
+very much?" And he replied in a constrained and sorrowful voice:
+
+"Yes, for do I not tell you every day that it is intolerable torture for
+me? Should I have remained in that house, near you and them, if I did
+not love them? Oh! You have behaved abominably towards me. All the
+affection of my heart I have bestowed upon my children, and that you
+know. I am for them a father of the olden time, as I was for you a
+husband of one of the families of old, for by instinct I have remained a
+natural man, a man of former days. Yes, I will confess it, you have made
+me terribly jealous, because you are a woman of another race, of another
+soul, with other requirements. Oh! I shall never forget the things that
+you told me, but from that day, I troubled myself no more about you. I
+did not kill you, because then I should have had no means on earth of
+ever discovering which of our ... of your children is not mine. I have
+waited, but I have suffered more than you would believe, for I can no
+longer venture to love them, except, perhaps, the two eldest; I no
+longer venture to look at them, to call them to me, to kiss them; I
+cannot take them onto my knee without asking myself: 'Can it be this
+one?' I have been correct in my behavior towards you for six years, and
+even kind and complaisant; tell me the truth, and I swear that I will do
+nothing unkind."
+
+He thought, in spite of the darkness of the carriage, that he could
+perceive that she was moved, and feeling certain that she was going to
+speak at last, he said: "I beg you, I beseech you to tell me...." "I
+have been more guilty than you think, perhaps," she replied; "but I
+could no longer endure that life of continual pregnancy, and I had only
+one means of driving you from my bed. I lied before God, and I lied,
+with my hand raised to my children's head, for I have never wronged
+you."
+
+He seized her arm in the darkness, and squeezing it as he had done on
+that terrible day of their drive in the Bois de Boulogne, he stammered:
+"Is that true?" "It is true." But he, in terrible grief, said with a
+groan: "I shall have fresh doubts that will never end! When did you lie,
+the last time or now? How am I to believe you at present? How can one
+believe a woman after that? I shall never again know what I am to think.
+I would rather you had said to me: 'It is Jacques, or, it is Jeanne.'"
+
+The carriage drove them into the courtyard of their mansion, and when it
+had drawn up in front of the steps, the Count got down first, as usual,
+and offered his wife his arm, to help her up. And then, as soon as they
+had reached the first floor, he said: "Can I speak to you for a few
+moments longer?" And she replied: "I am quite willing."
+
+They went into a small drawing-room, while a footman in some surprise,
+lit the wax candles. As soon as he had left the room and they were
+alone, he continued: "How am I to know the truth? I have begged you a
+thousand times to speak, but you have remained dumb, impenetrable,
+inflexible, inexorable, and now to-day, you tell me that you have been
+lying. For six years you have actually allowed me to believe such a
+thing! No, you are lying now; I do not know why, but out of pity for me,
+perhaps!"
+
+She replied in a sincere and convincing manner: "If I had not done so, I
+should have had four more children in the last six years!" And he
+exclaimed: "Can a mother speak like that?" "Oh!" she replied, "I do not
+at all feel that I am the mother of children who have never been born.
+It is enough for me to be the mother of those that I have, and to love
+them with all my heart. I am, we are women who belong to the civilized
+world, Monsieur, and we are no longer, and we refuse to be, mere females
+who restock the earth."
+
+She got up, but he seized her hands. "Only one word, Gabrielle. Tell me
+the truth!" "I have just told you. I have never dishonored you."
+
+He looked her full in the face, and how beautiful she was, with her gray
+eyes, like the cold sky. In her dark hair dress, on that opaque night of
+black hair, there shone the diamond coronet, like a milky way. Then he
+suddenly felt, felt by a kind of intuition, that this grand creature was
+not merely a being destined to perpetuate his race, but the strange and
+mysterious product of all our complicated desires which have been
+accumulating in us for centuries, but which have been turned aside from
+their primitive and divine object, and which have wandered after a
+mystic, imperfectly seen and intangible beauty. There are some women
+like that, who blossom only for our dreams, adorned with every poetical
+attribute of civilization, with that ideal luxury, coquetry and
+aesthetic charm which surrounds woman, that living statue who brightens
+our life, like sensual fevers and immaterial appetites.
+
+Her husband remained standing before her, stupefied at that tardy and
+obscure discovery, confusedly hitting on the cause of his former
+jealousy, and understanding it all very imperfectly; and at last he
+said: "I believe you, for I feel at this moment that you are not lying,
+and formerly, I really thought that you were." She put out her hand to
+him: "We are friends, then?" He took her hand and kissed it, and
+replied: "We are friends. Thank you, Gabrielle."
+
+Then he went out, still looking at her, and surprised that she was still
+so beautiful, and feeling a strange emotion arising in him, which was,
+perhaps, more formidable than antique and simple love.
+
+
+
+
+FLY
+
+RECOLLECTIONS OF A BOATMAN
+
+
+He said to us: "I saw some very funny things and some funny girls when I
+was a boatman, and I have often been tempted to write a little book to
+be called _On the Seine_, telling all about that careless and vigorous,
+that merry and poor life, a life of robust and noisy enjoyment, which I
+led from the time I was twenty until I was thirty.
+
+"I was a mere understrapper without a half-penny, and now I am a man who
+has made his money, who has spent large sums on a momentary caprice. In
+my heart, I had a thousand modest and unrealizable desires which gilded
+my existence with imaginary hopes, though now, I really do not know that
+any fancy would make me get out of my armchair where I am dozing. How
+simple and nice and good it is to live like this, between my office in
+Paris, and the river at Argenteuil. For ten years, the Seine was my
+only, my absorbing passion. Ah! that beautiful, calm, diversified and
+stinking river, full of mirage and filth. I think I loved it so much
+because it seemed to give me a sense of life. Oh! what walks I had along
+the grassy banks, where my friends the frogs were dreaming on the leaf
+of a nenuphar, and where the coquettish and delicate water lilies
+suddenly opened to me, behind a willow, a leaf of a Japanese album, and
+when the kingfisher flashed past me like a blue flame! How I loved it
+all, with the instinctive love of eyes which seemed to be all over my
+body, and with a natural and profound joy.
+
+"Just as other men keep the recollection of sweet and tender nights, so I
+remember sunrises in the morning mist, floating, wandering vapors, which
+were as pale as death, before the sun rose, and then as its first rays
+glided over the meadows, lighted up with a rosy tint, which delighted
+the heart. And then again, I have recollections of the moon silvering
+the running, trembling water, with a brightness which made dreams
+flourish. And all this, the symbol of eternal illusions, rose up in me
+on that turbid water, which was carrying all the filth of Paris towards
+the sea.
+
+"And then, what a merry life it was, with my companions. There were five
+of us, a band of grave men we are now; and as we were all poor, we had
+founded an inexpressible colony in a horrible eating house at
+Argenteuil, and which possessed only one bedroom, where I have
+certainly spent some of the maddest nights of my life. We cared for
+nothing except for amusing ourselves and rowing, for we all worshiped
+the oar, with one exception. I remember such singular adventures, such
+unlikely tricks invented by those five rascals, that no one would
+believe them at present. People do not live like that any longer, even
+on the Seine, for our mad fancies which we kept up, have died out now.
+
+"We five only possessed one boat, which we had bought with great
+difficulty, and on which we laughed, as we shall never laugh again. It
+was a large yawl, called _The Leaf Turned Upside Down_, rather heavy,
+but spacious and comfortable. I shall not describe my companions to you.
+There was one little fellow, called _Petit Bleu_, who was very sharp; a
+tall man, with a savage look, gray eyes and black hair, who was
+nick-named _Tomahawk_, the only one who never touched an oar, as he said
+he should upset the boat; a slender, elegant man, who was very careful
+about his person, and whom we called _Only-One-Eye_, in remembrance of a
+recent story about Cladel, and because he wore a single eyeglass, and,
+lastly, I, who had been baptized Joseph Prunier. We lived together in
+perfect harmony, and our only regret was that we had no boatwoman, for a
+woman's presence is almost indispensable on a boat, because it keeps the
+men's wits and hearts on the alert, because it animates them, and wakes
+them up and she looks well walking on the green banks with a red
+parasol. But we did not want an ordinary boatwoman for us five, for we
+were not very like the rest of the world. We wanted something
+unexpected, funny, ready for everything, something, in short, which it
+would be almost impossible to find. We had tried many without success,
+girls who had held the tiller, imbecile boatwomen who always preferred
+wine that intoxicates to water which flows and carries the yawls. We
+kept them for one Sunday, and then got rid of them in disgust.
+
+"Well, one Saturday afternoon, Only-One-Eye brought us a little thin,
+lively, jumping, chattering girl, full of drollery, of that drollery
+which is the substitute for wit among the youthful male and female
+workpeople who have developed in the streets of Paris. She was nice
+looking without being pretty, the outline of a woman who had some of
+everything, one of those silhouettes which draftsmen draw in three
+strokes on the table in a cafe after dinner, between a glass of brandy
+and a cigarette. Nature is like that, sometimes.
+
+"The first evening she surprised us, amused us, and we could not form
+any opinion about her, so unexpectedly had she come among us; but having
+fallen into this nest of men, who were all ready for any folly, she was
+soon mistress of the situation, and the very next day she made a
+conquest of each one of us. She was quite cracked, into the bargain, and
+must have been born with a glass of absinthe in her stomach, which her
+mother drank at the moment she was being delivered, and she never got
+sober since, for her wet nurse, so she said, recruited her strength with
+draughts of rum, and she never called the bottles which were standing in
+a line at the back of the wine merchant's shop anything but 'My holy
+family.'
+
+"I do not know which of us gave her the name of _Fly_, nor why it was
+given her, but it suited her very well, and stuck to her, and our yawl
+every week carried five merry, strong young fellows on the Seine between
+Asnieres and Maison Lafitte, who were ruled from under a parasol of
+colored paper, by a lively and madcap young person, who treated us like
+slaves whose business it was to row her about, and whom we were all very
+fond of.
+
+"We were all very fond of her, for a thousand reasons first of all, but
+for only one, afterwards. In the stern of our boat, she was a kind of
+small word mill, chattering to the wind which blew on the water. She
+chattered ceaselessly, with that slight, continuous noise of those
+pieces of winged mechanism which turn in the breeze, and she
+thoughtlessly said the most unexpected, the funniest, the most
+astonishing things. In that mind, all the parts of which seemed
+dissimilar, like rags of all kinds and of every color, not sewn, but
+merely tacked together, there appeared to be as much imagination as in
+a fairy tale, a good deal of coarseness, indecency, impudence and of the
+unexpected, and as much breeziness and landscapes as in a balloon
+voyage.
+
+"We put questions to her, in order to call forth answers which she had
+found, no one could tell where, and the one with which we teased her
+most frequently was: 'Why are you called Fly?' And she gave us such
+unlikely reasons that we left off rowing, in order to laugh. But she
+pleased us also as a woman; and La Toque, who never rowed, and who sat
+by her side at the tiller the whole day long, once replied to the usual
+question: 'Why are you called Fly?' 'Because she is a little Spanish
+fly.'
+
+"Yes, a little buzzing, exciting fly, not the classical, poisonous,
+brilliant and mantled Spanish fly, but a little Spanish fly with red
+wings, which began to disturb the whole crew of _The Leaf Turned Upside
+Down_. And what stupid jokes were also made about this leaf where this
+fly had alighted!
+
+"Since the arrival of Fly on our boat, Only-One-Eye had taken a leading,
+superior part among us, the part of a gentleman who has a wife, towards
+four others who have not got one, and he abused that privilege so far as
+to kiss Fly in our presence, when he put her on his knee after meals,
+and by other prerogatives, which were as humiliating as they were
+irritating.
+
+"They had been isolated in the sleeping-room by means of a curtain, but I
+soon perceived that my companions and I had the same arguments in our
+minds, in our solitude: 'Why, and in virtue of what law of exception, or
+of what unacceptable principle, should Fly, who does not appear
+troubled by any prejudices, remain faithful to her lover, while wives in
+the best are not faithful to their husbands.'
+
+"Our reflections were quite right, and we were soon convinced of it, and
+we ought only to have made them sooner, so as not to have needed to
+regret any lost time, for Fly deceived Only-One-Eye, with all the others
+of the crew of the _Leaf Turned Upside Down_, and she deceived him
+without making any difficulties, without any resistance, the first time
+any of us asked her.
+
+"Of course, modest people will be terribly shocked! But why? What
+courtesan who happens to be in the fashion, but has a dozen lovers, and
+which of those lovers is stupid enough not to know it? Is it not the
+correct thing to have an evening at the house of a celebrated and marked
+courtesan, just as one has an evening at the _Opera, the Theatre
+Francais or the Odeon_? Ten men subscribe together to keep a mistress
+just as they do to possess a race horse, which only one jockey mounts,
+and this is a correct picture of the favored lover who does not pay
+anything.
+
+"From delicacy they left Fly to Only-One-Eye from Saturday night to
+Monday morning, and we only deceived him during the week, in Paris, from
+the Seine, which, for boatmen like us, was hardly deceiving him at all.
+The situation had this peculiarity, that the four freebooters of Fly's
+favors were quite aware of this partition of her among themselves, and
+that they spoke of it to each other, and even then, with allusions that
+made her laugh very much. Only-One-Eye alone seemed to know nothing, and
+that peculiar position gave rise to some embarrassment between him and
+us, and seemed to separate him from us, to isolate him, to raise a
+barrier across our former confidence and our former intimacy. That gave
+him a difficult and a rather ridiculous part to play towards us, the
+part of a deceived lover, almost a husband's part.
+
+"As he was very clever and gifted with the special faculty of not showing
+what he felt, we sometimes asked each other whether he did not guess
+anything, and he took care to let us know, in a manner that was painful
+for us. We were going to breakfast at Bougival, and we were rowing
+vigorously, when La Toque, who had, that morning, the triumphant look of
+a man who was satisfied, and who, sitting by the steers-woman, seemed to
+squeeze himself rather too close to her, in our estimation, stopped the
+rowing by calling out: 'Stop!'
+
+"The four oars were drawn out of the water, and then, turning to his
+neighbor, he said to her: 'Why were you called Fly?' But before she
+could reply, the voice of Only-One-Eye, who was sitting in the bows,
+said dryly: 'Because she settles on all the carrion.'
+
+"There was a dead silence, and an embarrassed pause, which was followed
+by an inclination to laugh, while Fly herself looked very much confused,
+and La Toque gave the order: 'Row on, all;' and the boat started again.
+The incident was closed, and light let in upon the subject, and that
+little adventure made no difference in our habits, but it only
+re-established cordiality between Only-One-Eye and us. He once more
+became the honored proprietor of the Fly from Saturday night until
+Monday morning, as his superiority over all of us had been thoroughly
+established by that definition, which, moreover, closed one of the
+questions about the word Fly. For the future we were satisfied with
+playing the secondary part of grateful and polite friends who profited
+discreetly by the week days, without any contention of any kind among
+ourselves.
+
+"That answered very well for about three months, but then suddenly Fly
+assumed a strange attitude towards us. She was less merry, nervous,
+uneasy, and almost irritable, and we frequently asked her: 'What is the
+matter with you?' And she replied: 'Nothing; leave me alone.'
+
+"Only-One-Eye told us what was the matter with her, one Saturday evening.
+We had just sat down to table in the little dining-room which our eating
+house keeper, Barbichon, reserved for us at his inn, and, the soup being
+finished, we were waiting for the fried fish, when our friend, who also
+appeared thoughtful, took Fly's hand and said: 'My dear comrades, I have
+a very grave communication to make to you, and one that may, perhaps,
+give rise to a prolonged discussion, but we shall have to argue between
+the courses. Poor Fly has announced a piece of disastrous news to me,
+and at the same time has asked me to tell it to you: She is pregnant,
+and I will only add two words. This is not the moment to abandon her,
+and it is forbidden to try and find out who is the father.'[2]
+
+[Footnote 2: _La recherche de la paternite est interdite._ A celebrated
+clause in the Code Napoleon, whereby a man cannot be made chargeable for
+a bastard.--TRANSLATOR.]
+
+"At first we were stupefied, and felt as if some disaster had befallen
+us, and we looked at each other with the longing to accuse some one, but
+whom? Oh! Which of us? I have never felt as I did at that moment, the
+perfidy of that cruel joke of nature, which never allows a man to know
+for certainty whether he is the father of his child. Then, however, by
+degrees a sort of feeling of consolation came over us and gave us
+comfort, which sprung from a confused idea of joint responsibility.
+
+"Tomahawk, who spoke but little, formulated a beginning of reassurance by
+these words: 'Well, so much the worse, by Jove: _Union is Strength_,
+however.' At that moment a scullion brought in the fried gudgeons, but
+they did not fall to on them like they generally did, for they all had
+the same trouble on their mind, and Only-One-Eye continued: 'Under these
+circumstances she has had the delicacy to confess everything to me. My
+friends, we are all equally guilty, so let us shake hands and adopt the
+child.'
+
+"That was decided upon unanimously; they raised their hands to the dish
+of fried fish and swore: 'We will adopt it.' Then, when she was thus
+suddenly saved, and delivered from the weight of the terrible anxiety
+that had been tormenting her for a month, this pretty, crazy, poor child
+of love, Fly, exclaimed: 'Oh! my friends! my friends! You have kind,
+good hearts ... good hearts.... Thank you, all of you!' And she shed
+tears for the first time before us all.
+
+"From that time we spoke in the boat about the child, as if it were
+already born, and each of us took an exaggerated interest, because of
+our share in the matter, in the slow and regular development of our
+mistress's waist, and we stopped rowing in order to say: 'Fly?' 'Here I
+am,' she replied. 'Boy or girl?' 'Boy.' 'What will he be when he grows
+up?'
+
+"Then she indulged in the most fantastic flights of fancy. They were
+interminable stories, astounding inventions, from the day of his birth
+until his final triumph. In the unsophisticated, passionate and moving
+fancy of this extraordinary little creature, who now lived chastely in
+the midst of us five, whom she called 'her five papas.' She saw him as a
+sailor, and told us that he would discover another America; as a
+general, restoring Alsace and Lorraine to France, then as an emperor,
+founding a dynasty of wise and generous rulers who would bestow settled
+welfare on our country; then as a learned man and natural philosopher,
+revealing, first of all, the secret of the manufacture of gold, then
+that of living forever; then as an aeronaut, who invented the means of
+soaring up to the stars, and of making the skies an immense promenade
+for men; the realization of the most unforeseen and magnificent dreams.
+
+"How nice and how amusing she was, poor little girl, until the end of the
+summer, but the twentieth of September dissipated her dream. We had come
+back from breakfasting at the Maison Lafitte and were passing
+Saint-Germain, when she felt thirsty and asked us to stop at Pecq.
+
+"For some time past, she had been getting very heavy, and that
+inconvenienced her very much. She could not run about as she used to do,
+nor jump from the boat to the shore, as she had formerly done. She would
+try, in spite of our warnings and efforts to stop her, and she would
+have fallen a dozen times, had it not been that our restraining arms
+kept her back. On that day, she was imprudent enough to wish to land
+before the boat had stopped; it was one of those pieces of bravado by
+which athletes, who are ill or tired, sometimes kill themselves, and at
+the very moment when we were going to come alongside, she got up, took a
+spring and tried to jump onto the landing-stage. She was not strong
+enough, however, and only just touched the stones with her foot, struck
+the sharp angle with her stomach, uttered a cry and disappeared into the
+water.
+
+"We all five plunged in at the same moment, and pulled out the poor,
+fainting woman, who was as pale as death, and was already suffering
+terrible pain, and we carried her as quickly as possible to the nearest
+inn, and sent for a medical man. For the six hours that her miscarriage
+lasted, she suffered the most terrible pain with the courage of a
+heroine, while we were grieving round her, feverish with anxiety and
+fear. Then she was delivered of a dead child, and for some days we were
+in the greatest fear for her life; at last, however, the doctor said to
+us one morning: 'I think her life is saved. That girl is made of steel,'
+and we all of us went into her room, with radiant hearts, and
+Only-One-Eye, as spokesman for us all, said to her: 'The danger is all
+over, little Fly, and we are all happy again.'
+
+"Then, for the second time, she wept in our presence, and, with her eyes
+full of tears, she said, hesitatingly:
+
+"'Oh! If you only knew, if you only knew ... what a grief it is ... what
+a grief it is to me ... I shall never get over it.' 'Over what, little
+Fly?' 'Over having killed it, for I did kill it! Oh! Without intending
+to! Oh! how grieved I am!...'
+
+"She was sobbing, and we stood round, deeply touched, but without knowing
+what to say, and she went on: 'Have you seen it?' And we replied with
+one voice: 'Yes.' 'It was a boy, was it not?' 'Yes.' 'Beautiful, was it
+not?' We hesitated a good deal, but Petit-Bleu, who was less scrupulous
+than the rest of us, made up his mind to affirm it, and said: 'Very
+beautiful.'
+
+"He committed a mistake, however, for she began to sob, and almost to
+scream with grief, and Only-One-Eye, who perhaps loved her more than the
+rest of us did, had a happy thought. Kissing her eyes, that were dimmed
+with tears, he said: 'Console yourself, little Fly, console yourself; we
+will make another for you.'
+
+"Her innate sense of the ridiculous was suddenly excited, and
+half-convinced, and half-joking, still tearful and her heart sore with
+grief, she said, looking at us all: 'Do you really mean it?' And we
+replied all at once:
+
+"'We really mean it.'"
+
+
+
+
+THE MAD WOMAN
+
+
+"I can tell you a terrible story about the Franco-Prussian war,"
+Monsieur d'Endolin said to some friends assembled in the smoking-room of
+Baron de Ravot's chateau. "You know my house in the Faubourg de Cormeil.
+I was living there when the Prussians came, and I had for a neighbor a
+kind of a mad woman, who had lost her senses in consequence of a series
+of misfortunes, as at the age of seven and twenty she had lost her
+father, her husband and her newly born child, all in the space of a
+month.
+
+"When death has once entered into a house, it almost invariably returns
+immediately, as if it knew the way, and the young woman, overwhelmed
+with grief, took to her bed and was delirious for six weeks. Then, a
+species of calm lassitude succeeded that violent crisis, and she
+remained motionless, eating next to nothing, and only moving her eyes.
+Every time they tried to make her get up, she screamed as if they were
+about to kill her, and so they ended by leaving her continually in bed,
+and only taking her out to wash her, to change her linen and to turn her
+mattress.
+
+"An old servant remained with her, who gave her something to drink, or
+a little cold meat, from time to time. What passed in that despairing
+mind? No one ever knew, for she did not speak at all now. Was she
+thinking of the dead? Was she dreaming sadly, without any precise
+recollection of anything that had happened? Or was her memory as
+stagnant as water without any current? But however this may have been,
+for fifteen years she remained thus inert and secluded.
+
+"The war broke out, and in the beginning of December the Germans came to
+Cormeil. I can remember it as if it were but yesterday. It was freezing
+hard enough to split the stones, and I, myself, was lying back in an
+armchair, being unable to move on account of the gout, when I heard
+their heavy and regular tread; I could see them pass, from my window.
+
+"They defiled past interminably, with that peculiar motion of a puppet on
+wires, which belongs to them. Then the officers billeted their men on
+the inhabitants, and I had seventeen of them. My neighbor, the crazy
+woman, had a dozen, one of whom was the Commandant, a regular violent,
+surly swashbuckler.
+
+"During the first few days everything went on as usual. The officers next
+door had been told that the lady was ill, and they did not trouble
+themselves about that in the least, but soon, that woman whom they never
+saw, irritated them. They asked what her illness was, and were told that
+she had been in bed for fifteen years, in consequence of terrible grief.
+No doubt they did not believe it, and thought that the poor mad creature
+would not leave her bed out of pride, so that she might not come near
+the Prussians, not speak to them, nor even see them.
+
+"He insisted upon her receiving him, and he was shown into the room, and
+said to her roughly: 'I must beg you to get up, Madame, and to come
+downstairs so that we may all see you,' but she merely turned her vague
+eyes on him, without replying, and so he continued: 'I do not intend to
+tolerate any insolence, and if you do not get up of your own accord, I
+can easily find means to make you walk without any assistance.'
+
+"But she did not give any signs of having heard him, and remained quite
+motionless, and then he got furious, as he took that calm silence for a
+mark of supreme contempt, and so he added: 'If you do not come
+downstairs to-morrow....' And then he left the room."
+
+       *        *        *        *        *
+
+"The next day the terrified old servant wished to dress her, but the mad
+woman began to scream violently, and resisted with all her might. The
+officer ran upstairs quickly, and the servant threw herself at his feet
+and cried: 'She will not come down, Monsieur, she will not. Forgive her,
+for she is so unhappy.'
+
+"The soldier was embarrassed, as in spite of his anger, he did not
+venture to order his soldiers to drag her out, but suddenly he began to
+laugh, and gave some orders in German, and soon a party of soldiers was
+seen coming out supporting a mattress as if they were carrying a wounded
+man. On that bed, which had not been unmade, the mad woman, who was
+still silent, was lying quite quietly, for she was quite indifferent to
+anything that went on, as long as they let her lie. Behind her, a
+soldier was carrying a parcel of feminine attire, and the officer said,
+rubbing his hands: 'We will just see whether you cannot dress yourself
+alone, and take a little walk.'
+
+"And then the procession went off in the direction of the forest of
+Imauville; in two hours the soldiers came back alone, and nothing more
+was seen of the mad woman. What had they done with her? Where had they
+taken her to? No one knew.
+
+"The snow was falling day and night, and enveloped the plain and the
+woods in a shroud of frozen foam, and the wolves came and howled at our
+very doors.
+
+"The thought of that poor lost woman haunted me, and I made several
+applications to the Prussian authorities in order to obtain some
+information, and was nearly shot for doing so. When spring returned, the
+army of occupation withdrew, but my neighbor's house remained closed;
+the grass grew thick in the garden walks. The old servant had died
+during the winter, and nobody troubled himself any longer about the
+occurrence; I alone thought about it constantly. What had they done with
+the woman? Had she escaped through the forest? Had somebody found her,
+and taken her to a hospital, without being able to obtain any
+information from her? Nothing happened to relieve my doubts; but, by
+degrees, time assuaged my fears.
+
+"Well, in the following autumn the woodcock were very plentiful, and as
+my gout had left me for a time, I dragged myself as far as the forest. I
+had already killed four or five of the long-billed birds, when I knocked
+over one, which fell into a ditch full of branches, and I was obliged to
+get into it, in order to pick it up, and I found that it had fallen
+close to a dead human body, and immediately the recollection of the mad
+woman struck me, like a blow in the chest. Many other people had perhaps
+died in the wood during that disastrous year, but I do not know why, yet
+I was sure, sure, I tell you, that I should see the head of that
+wretched maniac.
+
+"And suddenly I understood, I guessed everything. They had abandoned her
+on that mattress in the cold, deserted wood; and, faithful to her fixed
+idea, she had allowed herself to perish under that thick and light
+counterpane of snow, without moving either arms or legs.
+
+"Then the wolves had devoured her, and the birds had built their nests
+with the wool from her torn bed, and I took charge of her remains, and I
+only pray that our sons may never see any wars again."
+
+
+
+
+THAT PIG OF A MORIN
+
+
+I
+
+"There, my friend," I said to Labarbe, "you have just repeated those
+five words, _that pig of a Morin_. Why on earth do I never hear Morin's
+name mentioned without his being called _a pig_?"
+
+Labarbe, who is a Deputy, looked at me with eyes like an owl's, and
+said: "Do you mean to say that you do not know Morin's story, and you
+come from La Rochelle?" I was obliged to declare that I did not know
+Morin's story, and then Labarbe rubbed his hands, and began his recital.
+
+"You knew Morin, did you not, and you remember his large linen-draper's
+shop on the _Quai de la Rochelle_?" "Yes, perfectly."
+
+"All right, then. You must know that in 1862 or 63 Morin went to spend a
+fortnight in Paris for pleasure, or for his pleasures, but under the
+pretext of renewing his stock, and you also know what a fortnight in
+Paris means for a country shopkeeper: it makes his blood grow hot. The
+theater every evening, women's dresses rustling up against you, and
+continual excitement; one goes almost mad with it. One sees nothing but
+dancers in skin-tights, actresses in very low dresses, round legs, fat
+shoulders, all nearly within reach of one's hands, without daring or
+being able, to touch it, and one scarcely tastes some inferior dish,
+once or twice. And one leaves it, one's heart still all in a flutter,
+and one's mind still exhilarated by a sort of longing for kisses which
+tickles one's lips."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Morin was in that state when he took his ticket for La Rochelle by the
+8:40 night express. And he was walking up and down the waiting-room at
+the station, when he stopped suddenly in front of a young lady who was
+kissing an old one. She had her veil up, and Morin murmured with
+delight: "By Jove, what a pretty woman!"
+
+When she had said "Good-bye" to the old lady, she went into the
+waiting-room, and Morin followed her; then she went onto the platform,
+and Morin still followed her; then she got into an empty carriage, and
+he again followed her. There were very few travelers by the express, the
+engine whistled, and the train started. They were alone. Morin devoured
+her with his eyes. She appeared to be about nineteen or twenty, and was
+fair, tall and with bold looks. She wrapped a railway rug round her
+legs, and stretched herself on the seat to sleep.
+
+Morin asked himself: "I wonder who she is?" And a thousand conjectures,
+a thousand projects went through his head. He said to himself: "So many
+adventures are told as happening on railway journeys that this may be
+one that is going to present itself to me. Who knows? A piece of good
+luck like that happens very quickly, and perhaps I need only be a little
+venturesome. Was it not Danton who said: _Audacity, more audacity, and
+always audacity_. If it was not Danton it was Mirabeau, but that does
+not matter. But then, I have no audacity, and that is the difficulty.
+Oh! If one only knew, if one could only read peoples' minds! I will bet
+that every day one passes by magnificent opportunities without knowing
+it, though a gesture would be enough to let me know that she did not ask
+for anything better...."
+
+Then he imagined to himself combinations which conducted him to triumph.
+He pictured some chivalrous deed, or merely some slight service which he
+rendered her, a lively, gallant conversation which ended in ... in what
+do you think.
+
+But he could find no opening; had no pretext, and he waited for some
+fortunate circumstance, with his heart ravaged, and his mind
+topsy-turvy. The night passed, and the pretty girl still slept, while
+Morin was meditating his own fall. The day broke and soon the first ray
+of sunlight appeared in the sky, a long, clear ray which shone on the
+face of the sleeping girl, and woke her, so she sat up, looked at the
+country, then at Morin and smiled. She smiled like a happy woman, with
+an engaging and bright look, and Morin trembled. Certainly that smile
+was intended for him, it was a discreet invitation, the signal which he
+was waiting for. That smile meant to say: "How stupid, what a ninny,
+what a dolt, what a donkey you are, to have sat there on your seat like
+a post all night.
+
+"Just look at me, am I not charming? And you have sat like that for the
+whole night, when you have been alone with a pretty woman, you great
+simpleton!"
+
+She was still smiling as she looked at him, she even began to laugh; and
+he lost his head, trying to find something suitable to say, no matter
+what. But he could think of nothing, nothing, and then, seized with a
+coward's courage, he said to himself: "So much the worse, I will risk
+everything," and suddenly, without the slightest warning, he went
+towards her, his arms extended, his lips protruding, and seizing her in
+his arms, he kissed her.
+
+She sprang up with a bound, crying out: "_Help! Help!_" and screaming
+with horror, and then she opened the carriage door, and waved her arm
+out, mad with terror, and trying to jump out, while Morin, who was
+almost distracted, and feeling sure that she would throw herself out,
+held her by the skirt and stammered: "Oh! Madame!... Oh! Madame!"
+
+The train slackened speed, and then stopped. Two guards rushed up at the
+young woman's frantic signals, who threw herself into their arms,
+stammering: "That man wanted ... wanted ... to ... to ..." And then she
+fainted.
+
+They were at Mauze station, and the gendarme on duty arrested Morin.
+When the victim of his brutality had regained her consciousness, she
+made her charge against him, and the police drew it up. The poor
+linen-draper did not reach home till night, with a prosecution hanging
+over him, for an outrage to morals in a public place.
+
+
+II
+
+At that time I was editor of the _Fanal des Charentes_, and I used to
+meet Morin every day at the _Cafe du Commerce_, and the day after his
+adventure he came to see me, as he did not know what to do. I did not
+hide my opinion from him, but said to him: "You are no better than a
+pig. No decent man behaves like that."
+
+He cried. His wife had given him a beating, and he foresaw his trade
+ruined, his name dragged through the mire and dishonored, his friends
+outraged and taking no more notice of him. In the end he excited my
+pity, and I sent for my colleague Rivet, a bantering, but very sensible
+little man, to give us his advice.
+
+He advised me to see the Public Prosecutor, who was a friend of mine,
+and so I sent Morin home, and went to call on the magistrate. He told me
+that the young woman who had been insulted was a young lady,
+Mademoiselle Henriette Bonnel, who had just received her certificate as
+governess in Paris, and spent her holidays with her uncle and aunt, who
+were very respectable tradespeople in Mauze, and what made Morin's case
+all the more serious was, that the uncle had lodged a complaint; for the
+public official had consented to let the matter drop if this complaint
+were withdrawn, so we must try and get him to do this.
+
+I went back to Morin's and found him in bed, ill with excitement and
+distress. His wife, a tall raw-boned woman with a beard, was abusing him
+continually, and she showed me into the room, shouting at me: "So you
+have come to see that pig of a Morin. Well, there he is, the darling!"
+And she planted herself in front of the bed, with her hands on her hips.
+I told him how matters stood, and he begged me to go and see her uncle
+and aunt. It was a delicate mission, but I undertook it, and the poor
+devil never ceased repeating: "I assure you I did not even kiss her, no,
+not even that. I will take my oath to it!"
+
+I replied: "It is all the same; you are nothing but a pig." And I took a
+thousand francs which he gave me, to employ them as I thought best, but
+as I did not care venturing to her uncle's house alone, I begged Rivet
+to go with me, which he agreed to do, on the condition that we went
+immediately, for he had some urgent business at La Rochelle that
+afternoon. So two hours later we rang at the door of a nice country
+house. A pretty girl came and opened the door to us, who was assuredly
+the young lady in question, and I said to Rivet in a low voice:
+"Confound it! I begin to understand Morin!"
+
+The uncle, Monsieur Tonnelet subscribed to _The Fanal_, and a fervent
+political co-religionist of ours, who received us with open arms and
+congratulated us and wished us joy; he was delighted at having the two
+editors in his house and Rivet whispered to me: "I think we shall be
+able to arrange the matter of that _Pig of a Morin_ for him."
+
+The niece had left the room, and I introduced the delicate object. I
+waved the scepter of scandal before his eyes: I accentuated the
+inevitable depreciation which the young lady would suffer if such an
+affair got known, for nobody would believe in a simple kiss, and the
+good man seemed undecided, but he could not make up his mind about
+anything without his wife, who would not be in until late that evening,
+but suddenly he uttered an exclamation of triumph: "Look here, I have an
+excellent idea. I will keep you here to dine and sleep, and when my wife
+comes home, I hope we shall be able to arrange matters."
+
+Rivet resisted at first, but the wish to extricate that _Pig of a
+Morin_, decided him, and we accepted the invitation, and so the uncle
+got up radiant, called his niece, and proposed that we should take a
+stroll in his grounds, saying: "We will leave serious matters until the
+morning." Rivet and he began to talk politics, while I soon found myself
+lagging a little behind with the girl, who was really charming!
+charming! and with the greatest precaution I began to speak to her about
+her adventure, and try to make her my ally. She did not, however, appear
+the least confused, and listened to me like a person who was enjoying
+the whole thing very much.
+
+I said to her: "Just think, Mademoiselle, how unpleasant it will be for
+you. You will have to appear in Court, to encounter malicious looks, to
+speak before everybody, and to recount that unfortunate occurrence in
+the railway carriage, in public. Do you not think, between ourselves,
+that it would have been much better for you to have put that dirty
+scoundrel back into his place without calling for assistance, and merely
+to have changed your carriage." She began to laugh, and replied: "What
+you say is quite true! but what could I do? I was frightened, and when
+one is frightened, one does not stop to reason with oneself. As soon as
+I realized the situation, I was very sorry that I had called out, but
+then it was too late. You must also remember that the idiot threw
+himself upon me like a madman, without saying a word and looking like a
+lunatic. I did not even know what he wanted of me."
+
+She looked me full in the face, without being nervous or intimidated,
+and I said to myself: "She is a funny sort of a girl, that; I can quite
+see how that pig Morin came to make a mistake," and I went on, jokingly:
+"Come, Mademoiselle, confess that he was excusable, for after all, a man
+cannot find himself opposite such a pretty girl as you are without
+feeling a legitimate desire to kiss her."
+
+She laughed more than ever, and showed her teeth, and said: "Between the
+desire and the act, Monsieur, there is room for respect." It was a funny
+expression to use, although it was not very clear, and I asked
+abruptly: "Well now, supposing I were to kiss you now, what would you
+do?" She stopped to look at me from head to foot, and then said calmly:
+"Oh! you? That is quite another matter."
+
+I knew perfectly well, by Jove, that it was not the same thing at all,
+as everybody in the neighborhood called me, _Handsome Labarbe_. I was
+thirty years old in those days, but I asked her: "And why, pray?" She
+shrugged her shoulders, and replied: "Well! because you are not so
+stupid as he is." And then she added, looking at me shyly: "Nor so ugly,
+either." And before she could make a movement to avoid me, I had
+implanted a hearty kiss on her cheek. She sprang aside, but it was too
+late, and then she said: "Well, you are not very bashful, either! But
+don't do that sort of thing again."
+
+I put on a humble look and said in a low voice: "Oh! Mademoiselle, as
+for me, if I long for one thing more than another, it is to be summoned
+before a magistrate for the same reason as Morin."
+
+"Why?" she asked. And looking steadily at her, I replied: "Because you
+are one of the most beautiful creatures living; because it would be an
+honor and a glory for me to have wished to offer you violence, and
+because people would have said, after seeing you: Well, Labarbe has
+richly deserved what he has got, but he is a lucky fellow, all the
+same."
+
+She began to laugh heartily again, and said: "How funny you are!" And
+she had not finished the word _funny_, before I had her in my arms, and
+was kissing her ardently wherever I could find a place, on her forehead,
+on her eyes, on her lips occasionally, on her cheeks, all over her
+head, some part of which she was obliged to leave exposed, in spite of
+herself, to defend others, but at last she managed to release herself,
+blushing and angry. "You are very unmannerly, Monsieur," she said, "and
+I am sorry I listened to you."
+
+I took her hand in some confusion, and stammered out: "I beg your
+pardon. I beg your pardon, Mademoiselle. I have offended you; I have
+acted like a brute! Do not be angry with me for what I have done. If you
+knew ..." I vainly sought for some excuse, and in a few moments she
+said: "There is nothing for me to know, Monsieur." But I had found
+something to say, and I cried: "Mademoiselle, I love you!"
+
+She was really surprised, and raised her eyes to look at me, and I went
+on: "Yes, Mademoiselle, and pray listen to me. I do not know Morin, and
+I do not care anything about him. It does not matter to me the least if
+he is committed for trial and locked up meanwhile. I saw you here last
+year, and I was so taken with you, that the thought of you has never
+left me since, and it does not matter to me whether you believe me or
+not. I thought you adorable, and the remembrance of you took such a hold
+on me that I longed to see you again, and so I made use of that fool
+Morin as a pretext, and here I am. Circumstances have made me exceed the
+due limits of respect, and I can only beg you to pardon me."
+
+She read the truth in my looks, and was ready to smile again; then she
+murmured; "You humbug!" But I raised my hand, and said in a sincere
+voice, (and I really believe that I was sincere): "I swear to you that
+I am speaking the truth," and she replied quite simply: "Really?"
+
+We were alone, quite alone, as Rivet and her uncle had disappeared in a
+sidewalk, and I made her a real declaration of love, while I squeezed
+and kissed her hands, and she listened to it as something new and
+agreeable, without exactly knowing how much of it she was to believe,
+while in the end I felt agitated, and at last really myself believed
+what I said: I was pale, anxious and trembling, and I gently put my arms
+round her waist, and spoke to her softly, whispering into the little
+curls over her ears. She seemed dead, so absorbed in thought was she.
+
+Then her hand touched mine, and she pressed it, and I gently squeezed
+her waist with a trembling, and gradually firmer, grasp. She did not
+move now, and I touched her cheeks with my lips, and suddenly without
+seeking them, mine met hers. It was a long, long kiss, and it would have
+lasted longer still, if I had not heard a _hum! hum!_ just behind me, at
+which she made her escape through the bushes, and turning round I saw
+Rivet coming towards me, and standing in the middle of the path, he said
+without even smiling: "So, that is the way in which you settle the
+affair of _that pig Morin_." And I replied, conceitedly: "One does what
+one can, my dear fellow. But what about the uncle? How have you got on
+with him? I will answer for the niece." "I have not been so fortunate
+with him," he replied.
+
+Whereupon I took his arm, and we went indoors.
+
+
+III
+
+Dinner made me lose my head altogether. I sat beside her, and my hand
+continually met hers under the table cloth, my foot touched hers, and
+our looks encountered each other.
+
+After dinner we took a walk by moonlight, and I whispered all the tender
+things I could think of, to her. I held her close to me, kissed her
+every moment, moistening my lips against hers, while her uncle and Rivet
+were disputing as they walked in front of us. They went in, and soon a
+messenger brought a telegram from her aunt, saying that she would not
+return until the next morning at seven o'clock, by the first train.
+
+"Very well, Henriette," her uncle said, "go and show the gentlemen their
+rooms." She showed Rivet his first, and he whispered to me: "There was
+no danger of her taking us into yours first." Then she took me to my
+room, and as soon as she was alone with me, I took her in my arms again,
+and tried to excite her senses and overcome her resistance, but when she
+felt that she was near succumbing, she escaped out of the room, and I
+got between the sheets, very much put out and excited and feeling rather
+foolish, for I knew that I should not sleep much, and I was wondering
+how I could have committed such a mistake, when there was a gentle knock
+at my door, and on my asking who was there, a low voice replied: "I."
+
+I dressed myself quickly, and opened the door, and she came in. "I
+forgot to ask you what you take in the morning," she said: "chocolate,
+tea or coffee?" I put my arms round her impetuously and said, devouring
+her with kisses: "I will take ... I will take...." But she freed
+herself from my arms, blew out my candle and disappeared, and left me
+alone in the dark, furious, trying to find some matches, and not able to
+do so. At last I got some and I went into the passage, feeling half mad,
+with my candlestick in my hand.
+
+What was I going to do? I did not stop to reason, I only wanted to find
+her, and I would. I went a few steps without reflecting, but then I
+suddenly thought to myself. "Supposing I should go into the uncle's
+room, what should I say?...." And I stood still, with my head a void,
+and my heart beating. But in a few moments, I thought of an answer: "Of
+course, I shall say that I am looking for Rivet's room, to speak to him
+about an important matter, and I began to inspect all the doors, trying
+to find hers, and at last I took hold of a handle at a venture, turned
+it and went in ... there was Henriette, sitting on her bed and looking
+at me in tears. So I gently turned the key, and going up to her on
+tip-toe, I said: "I forgot to ask you for something to read,
+Mademoiselle." She struggled and resisted, but I soon opened the book I
+was looking for. I will not tell you its title, but it is the most
+wonderful of romances, the most divine of poems. And when once I had
+turned the first page, she let me turn over as many leaves as I liked,
+and I got through so many chapters that our candles were quite burnt
+out. Then, after thanking her, I was stealthily returning to my room,
+when a rough hand seized me, and a voice, it was Rivet's, whispered in
+my ear: 'So you have not yet quite settled that affair of Morin's?'"
+
+At seven o'clock the next morning, she herself brought me a cup of
+chocolate. I have never drunk anything like it, soft, velvety,
+perfumed, delicious. I could scarcely take my lips away from the cup,
+and she had hardly left the room when Rivet came in. He seemed nervous
+and irritable, like a man who had not slept, and he said to me crossly:
+"If you go on like this, you will end by spoiling the affair of _that
+pig of a Morin_!"
+
+At eight o'clock the aunt arrived. Our discussion was very short, for
+they withdrew their complaint, and I left five hundred francs for the
+poor of the town. They wanted to keep us for the day, and they arranged
+an excursion to go and see some ruins. Henriette made signs to me to
+stay, behind her parents' back, and I accepted, but Rivet was determined
+to go, and though I took him aside, and begged and prayed him to do this
+for me, he appeared quite exasperated and kept saying to me: "I have had
+enough of that pig Morin's affair, do you hear?"
+
+Of course I was obliged to go also, and it was one of the hardest
+moments of my life. I could have gone on arranging that business as long
+as I lived, and when we were in the railway carriage, after shaking
+hands with her in silence, I said to Rivet: "You are a mere brute!" And
+he replied: "My dear fellow, you were beginning to excite me
+confoundedly."
+
+On getting to the _Fanal_ office, I saw a crowd waiting for us, and as
+soon as they saw us they all exclaimed: "Well, have you settled the
+affair of _that pig of a Morin_?" All La Rochelle was excited about it,
+and Rivet, who had got over his ill-humor on the journey, had great
+difficulty in keeping himself from laughing as he said: "Yes, we have
+managed it, thanks to Labarbe." And we went to Morin's.
+
+He was sitting in an easy chair, with mustard plasters on his legs, and
+cold bandages on his head, nearly dead with misery. He was coughing with
+the short cough of a dying man, without any one knowing how he had
+caught it, and his wife looked at him like a tigress ready to eat him,
+and as soon as he saw us he trembled so violently as to make his hands
+and knees shake, so I said to him immediately: "It is all settled, you
+dirty scamp, but don't do such a thing again."
+
+He got up, choking, took my hands and kissed them as if they had
+belonged to a prince, cried, nearly fainted, embraced Rivet and even
+kissed Madame Morin, who gave him such a push as to send him staggering
+back into his chair, but he never got over the blow: his mind had been
+too much upset. In all the country round, moreover, he was called
+nothing but, "that pig of a Morin," and that epithet went through him
+like a sword thrust every time he heard it. When a street boy called
+after him: "Pig!" he turned his head instinctively. His friends also
+overwhelmed him with horrible jokes, and used to ask him, whenever they
+were eating ham: "It's a bit of you?" He died two years later.
+
+As for myself, when I was a candidate for the Chamber of Deputies in
+1875, I called on the new notary at Fouserre, Monsieur Belloncle, to
+solicit his vote, and a tall, handsome and evidently wealthy lady
+received me. "You do not know me again?" she said. And I stammered out:
+"But ... no Madame." "Henriette Bonnel." "Ah!" And I felt myself turning
+pale, while she seemed perfectly at her ease, and looked at me with a
+smile.
+
+As soon as she had left me alone with her husband, he took both my
+hands, and squeezing them as if he meant to crush them, he said: "I have
+been intending to go and see you for a long time, my dear sir, for my
+wife has very often talked to me about you. I know ... yes, I know under
+what painful circumstances you made her acquaintance, and I know also
+how perfectly you behaved, how full of delicacy, tact and devotion you
+showed yourself in the affair...." He hesitated, and then said in a
+lower tone, as if he had been saying something low and coarse.... "In
+the affair of that pig of a Morin."
+
+
+
+
+THE WOODEN SHOES
+
+
+The old priest was sputtering out the last words of his sermon over the
+white caps of the peasant women, and the rough or pomatumed heads of the
+men. The large baskets of the farmer's wives who had come from a
+distance to attend mass, were on the ground beside them, and the heavy
+heat of a July day caused them all to exhale a smell like that of
+cattle, or of a flock of sheep, and the cocks could be heard crowing
+through the large west door, which was wide open, as well as the lowing
+of the cows in a neighboring field.... "As God wishes. Amen!" the priest
+said. Then he ceased, opened a book, and, as he did every week, he began
+to give notice of all the small parish events for the following week. He
+was an old man with white hair who had been in the parish for over forty
+years, and from the pulpit he was in the habit of discoursing familiarly
+to them all, and so he went on: "I recommend Desire Vallin, who is very
+ill, to your prayers, and also la Paumelle, who is not recovering from
+her confinement satisfactorily."
+
+He had forgotten the rest, and so he looked for the slips of paper which
+were put away in a breviary, and at last he found two and continued: "I
+will not have the lads and the girls come into the churchyard in the
+evening, as they do; otherwise I shall inform the rural policeman.
+Monsieur Cesaire Omont would like to find a respectable girl servant."
+He reflected for a few moments, and then added: "That is all, my
+brethren, and I wish that all of you may find the Divine mercy."
+
+And he came down from the pulpit, to finish mass.
+
+When the Malandains had returned to their cottage, which was the last in
+the village of La Sabliere, on the road to Fourville, the father, a
+thin, wrinkled old peasant, sat down at the table, while his wife took
+the saucepan off the fire, and Adelaide, the daughter, took the glasses
+and plates out of the sideboard, and he said: "I think that place at
+Maitre Omont's ought to be a good one, as he is a widower and his
+daughter-in-law does not like him. He is all alone and has money. I
+think it would be a good thing to send Adelaide there."
+
+His wife put the black saucepan onto the table, took the lid off, and
+while the steam, which smelt strongly of cabbage, rose into the air she
+reflected, and he presently continued: "He has got some money, that is
+certain, but any one going there ought to be very sharp, and Adelaide is
+not that at all." And his wife replied: "I might go and see, all the
+same," and turning to her daughter, a strapping, silly looking girl with
+yellow hair and fat red cheeks like apples, she said: "Do you hear, you
+great silly? You are to go to Maitre Omont's and offer yourself as his
+servant, and you will do whatever he tells you."
+
+The girl began to laugh in a foolish manner, without replying, and then
+all the three began their dinner. In ten minutes, the father continued:
+"Listen to me, girl, and try not to make a mistake about what I am going
+to say to you ..." And slowly and minutely he laid down for her her line
+of conduct, anticipating the minutest details, and preparing her for the
+conquest of an old widower who was on unfriendly terms with his family.
+The mother ceased eating to listen to him, and she sat there, with her
+fork in her hand, looking at her husband and her daughter by turns, and
+following every word with concentrated and silent attention, while
+Adelaide remained listless, docile and stupid, with vague and wandering
+eyes.
+
+As soon as their meal was over, her mother made her put her cap on, and
+they both started off to see Monsieur Cesaire Omont. He lived in a small
+brick house adjoining his tenants' cottages, for he had retired, and was
+living by subdividing and letting his land.
+
+He was about fifty-five years old, and was stout, jovial and rough
+mannered, as rich men often are. He laughed and shouted loud enough to
+make the walls fall down, drank brandy and cider by the glassful, and
+was still said to be of an amorous disposition, in spite of his age. He
+liked to walk about his fields with his hands behind his back, digging
+his wooden shoes into the fat soil, looking at the sprouting corn or the
+flowering colza with the eye of an amateur at his ease, who likes to see
+it, but does not trouble himself about it too much any longer, and they
+used to say of him: "There is a Mr. Merry-man, who does not get up in a
+good temper every day."
+
+He received the two women, with his fat stomach against the table, as he
+was finishing his coffee, and turning round he said: "What do you want?"
+
+The mother was spokeswoman. "This is our girl Adelaide, and I have come
+to ask you to take her as servant, as Monsieur le cure told us you
+wanted one." Maitre Omont looked at the girl, and then he said roughly:
+"How old is the great she-goat?" "Twenty last Michaelmas-Day, Monsieur
+Omont." "That is settled, she will have fifteen francs a month and her
+food. I shall expect her to-morrow, to make my soup in the morning."
+And he dismissed the two women.
+
+The next day Adelaide entered upon her duties, and began to work hard,
+without saying a word, as she was in the habit of doing at home, and at
+about nine o'clock, as she was scrubbing the kitchen floor, Monsieur
+Omont called her: "Adelaide!" She came immediately, saying: "Here I am,
+master." As soon as she was opposite him, with her red and neglected
+hands, and her troubled looks, he said: "Now just listen to me, so that
+there may be no mistake between us. You are my servant, but nothing
+else; you understand what I mean. We shall keep our shoes apart." "Yes,
+master." "Each in our own place, my girl, you in your kitchen; I in my
+dining room, and with that exception, everything will be for you just as
+it is for me. Is that settled?" "Yes, master." "Very well; that is all
+right, and now go to your work."
+
+And she went out to attend to her duties and at midday she served up her
+master's dinner in the little drawing-room with the flowered paper on
+the walls, and then, when the soup was on the table, she went to tell
+him. "Dinner is ready, master."
+
+He went in, and sat down, looked round, unfolded his table napkin,
+hesitated for a moment and then in a voice of thunder he shouted:
+"Adelaide!" She rushed in terribly frightened, for he had shouted as if
+he meant to murder her. "Well, in heaven's name, where is your place?"
+"But, ... master ..." "I do not like to eat alone," he roared; "you will
+sit there, or go to the devil, if you don't choose to do so. Go and get
+your plate and glass."
+
+She brought them in, feeling very frightened, and stammered: "Here I
+am, master," and then sat down opposite to him, and he grew jovial;
+clinked glasses with her, rapped the table, and told her stories to
+which she listened with downcast eyes, without daring to say a word, and
+from time to time she got up to fetch some bread, cider or plates. When
+she brought in the coffee she only put one cup before him, and then he
+grew angry again, and growled: "Well, what about yourself?" "I never
+take any, master." "Why not?" "Because I do not like it."
+
+Then he burst out afresh: "I am not fond of having my coffee by myself,
+confound it! If you will not take it here, you can go to the devil. Go
+and get a cup, and make haste about it."
+
+So she went and fetched a cup, sat down again, tasted the black liquor
+and made faces over it, but swallowed it to the last drop, under her
+master's furious looks. Then he made her also drink her first glass of
+brandy as an extra drop, the second as a livener and the third as a kick
+behind, and then he told her to go and wash up her plates and dishes,
+adding, that she was "a good sort of a girl."
+
+It was the same at dinner, and then she had to play dominoes with him,
+after which he sent her to bed, saying that he should come upstairs
+soon. And she went to her room, a garret under the roof, and after
+saying her prayers, she undressed and got into bed, but very soon she
+sprung up in a fright, for a furious shout had shaken the house.
+"Adelaide!" She opened her door, and replied from her attic: "Here I am,
+master." "Where are you?" "In bed, of course, master." Then he roared
+out: "Will you come downstairs, in heaven's name? I do not like to sleep
+alone, and by G---- and if you object, you can just go at once."
+
+Then in her terror, she replied from upstairs: "I will come, master," as
+she looked for her candle, and he heard her small clogs pattering down
+the stairs, and when she had got to the bottom steps, he seized her by
+the arm, and as soon as she had left her light wooden shoes by the side
+of her master's heavy boots, he pushed her into his room, growling out:
+"Quicker than that, confound it!"
+
+And she repeated continually, without knowing what she was saying: "Here
+I am, here I am, master."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Six months later, when she went to see her parents one Sunday, her
+father looked at her curiously, and then said: "Are you not in the
+family way?" She remained thunderstruck, and looked at her waist, and
+then said: "No, I do not think so."
+
+Then he asked her, for he wanted to know everything: "Just tell me,
+didn't you mix your clogs together, one night?" "Yes, I mixed them the
+first night, and then every other night." "Well, then you are full, you
+great tub!"
+
+On hearing that, she began to sob, and stammered: "How could I know? How
+was I to know?" Old Malandain looked at her knowingly, and appeared very
+pleased, and then he asked: "What did you not know?" And amid tears she
+replied: "How was I to know that children were made in that way?" And
+when her mother came back, the man said, without any anger: "There, she
+is in the family way, now."
+
+But the woman was furious, her woman's instinct revolted, and she called
+her daughter, who was in tears, every name she could think of, "a
+trollop" and "a strumpet." Then, however, the old man made her hold her
+tongue, and as he took up his cap to go and talk the matter over with
+Master Cesaire Omont, he remarked: "She is actually more stupid than I
+thought she was; she did not even know what he was doing, the fool!"
+
+On the next Sunday, after the sermon, the old _Cure_ published the banns
+between Monsieur Onufre-Cesaire Omont and Celeste-Adelaide Malandain.
+
+
+
+
+A NORMANDY JOKE
+
+
+The procession came in sight in the hollow road which was shaded by tall
+trees which grew on the slopes of the farms. The newly married couple
+came first, then the relations, then the invited guests, and lastly the
+poor of the neighborhood, while the village urchins, who hovered about
+the narrow road like flies, ran in and out of the ranks, or climbed onto
+the tree to see it better.
+
+The bridegroom was a good looking young fellow, Jean Patu, the richest
+farmer in the neighborhood, but he was, above all things, an ardent
+sportsman who seemed to lose all common sense in order to satisfy that
+passion, and who spent large sums on his dogs, his keepers, his ferrets
+and his guns. The bride, Rosalie Roussel, had been courted by all the
+likely young fellows in the district, for they all thought her
+prepossessing, and they knew that she would have a good dowry, but she
+had chosen Patu, partly, perhaps, because she liked him better than she
+did the others, but still more, like a careful Normandy girl, because he
+had more crown pieces.
+
+When they went in at the white gateway of the husband's farm, forty
+shots resounded without their seeing those who fired, as they were
+hidden in the ditches, and the noise seemed to please the men, who were
+sprawling about heavily in their best clothes, very much; and Patu left
+his wife, and running up to a farm servant whom he perceived behind a
+tree, he seized his gun and fired a shot himself, kicking his heels
+about like a colt. Then they went on, beneath the apple-trees which
+were heavy with fruit, through the high grass and through the midst of
+the calves, who looked at them with their great eyes, got up slowly and
+remained standing, with their muzzles turned towards the wedding party.
+
+The men became serious when they came within measurable distance of the
+wedding dinner. Some of them, the rich ones, had on tall, shining silk
+hats, which seemed altogether out of place there; others had old
+head-coverings with a long nap, which might have been taken for
+moleskin, while the humblest among them wore caps. All the women had on
+shawls, which they wore loose on their backs, and they held the tips
+ceremoniously under their arms. They were red, parti-colored, flaming
+shawls, and their brightness seemed to astonish the black fowls on the
+dung-heap, the ducks on the side of the pond, and the pigeons on the
+thatched roofs.
+
+The extensive farm buildings seemed to be waiting there, at the end of
+that archway of apple trees, and a sort of vapor came out of the open
+door and windows, and an almost overwhelming smell of eatables was
+exhaled from the vast building, from all its openings and from all its
+very walls. The string of guests extended through the yard; when the
+foremost of them reached the house, they broke the chain and dispersed,
+while behind they were still coming in at the open gate. The ditches
+were now lined with urchins and poor curious people, and the shots did
+not cease, but came from every side at once, and mingled a cloud of
+smoke, and that smell which has the same intoxicating effects as
+absinthe, with the atmosphere.
+
+The women were shaking their dresses outside the door, to get rid of
+the dust, were undoing their cap strings and pulling their shawls over
+their arms, and then they went into the house to lay them aside
+altogether for the time. The table was laid in the great kitchen, that
+would hold a hundred persons; they sat down to dinner at two o'clock and
+at eight o'clock they were still eating, and the men, in their shirt
+sleeves, with their waistcoats unbuttoned, and with red faces, were
+swallowing the food and drink down, as if they had been whirlpools. The
+cider sparkled merrily, clear and golden in the large glasses, by the
+side of the dark, blood-colored wine, and between every dish they made
+the hole, the Normandy hole, with a glass of brandy which inflamed the
+body, and put foolish notions into the head.
+
+From time to time, one of the guests, being as full as a barrel, would
+go out for a few moments to get a mouthful of fresh air, as they said,
+and then return with redoubled appetite. The farmers' wives, with
+scarlet faces and their stays nearly bursting, did not like to follow
+their example, until one of them, feeling more uncomfortable than the
+others, went out, when all the rest followed her example, and they came
+back quite ready for any fun, and the rough jokes began afresh.
+Broad-sides of obscenities were exchanged across the table, and all
+about the wedding-night, until the whole arsenal of peasant wit was
+exhausted. For the last hundred years, the same broad jokes had served
+for similar occasions, and although every one knew them, they still hit
+the mark, and made both rows of guests roar with laughter.
+
+At the bottom of the table four young fellows, who were neighbors, were
+preparing some practical jokes for the newly married couple, and they
+seemed to have got hold of a good one, by the way they whispered and
+laughed, and suddenly, one of them profiting by a moment of silence,
+exclaimed: "The poachers will have a good time to-night, with this
+moon!... I say, Jean, you will not be looking at the moon, will you?"
+The bridegroom turned to him quickly and replied: "Only let them come,
+that's all!" But the other young fellow began to laugh, and said: "I do
+not think you will neglect your business for them!"
+
+The whole table was convulsed with laughter, so that the glasses shook,
+but the bridegroom became furious at the thought that anybody would
+profit by his wedding to come and poach on his land, and repeated: "I
+only say: Just let them come!"
+
+Then there was a flood of talk with a double meaning which made the
+bride blush somewhat, although she was trembling with expectation, and
+when they had emptied the kegs of brandy they all went to bed; the young
+couple went into their own room, which was on the ground floor, as most
+rooms in farmhouses are. As it was very warm, they opened the window and
+closed the shutters. A small lamp in bad taste, a present from the
+bride's father, was burning on the chest of drawers, and the bed stood
+ready to receive the young people, who did not stand upon all the
+ceremony which is usual among towns-people, in their first embraces.
+
+The young woman had already taken off her wreath and her dress, and she
+was in her petticoat, unlacing her boots, while Jean was finishing his
+cigar, and looking at her out of the corners of his eyes. It was an
+ardent look, more sensual than tender, for he felt more desire than
+love for her, and suddenly with a brusque movement, like a man who is
+going to set to work, he took off his coat. She had already taken off
+her boots, and was now pulling off her stockings, and then she said to
+him: "Go and hide yourself behind the curtains while I get into bed."
+
+He seemed as if he were going to refuse, but then with a cunning look he
+went and hid himself with the exception of his head. She laughed and
+tried to cover up his eyes, and they romped in an amorous and happy
+manner, without shame or embarrassment. At last he did as she asked him,
+and in a moment she unfastened her petticoat, which slipped down her
+legs, fell at her feet and lay on the ground in a circle. She left it
+there, stooped over it, naked with the exception of her floating
+chemise, and slipped into the bed, whose springs creaked beneath her
+weight. He immediately went up to her, without his shoes and in his
+trousers, and stooping over his wife he sought her lips, which she hid
+beneath the pillow, when a shot was heard in the distance, in the
+direction of the forest of Rapees, as he thought.
+
+He raised himself anxiously and with his heart beating, and running to
+the window, he opened the shutters. The full moon flooded the yard with
+yellow light, and the reflection of the apple trees made black shadows
+at their feet, while in the distance the fields gleamed, covered with
+the ripe corn. But as he was leaning out, listening to every sound in
+the still night, two bare arms were put round his neck, and his wife
+whispered, trying to pull him back: "Do leave them alone; it has nothing
+to do with you. Come to bed."
+
+He turned round, put his arms round her, and drew her towards him,
+feeling her warm skin through the thin material, and lifting her up in
+his vigorous arms, he carried her towards their couch, but just as he
+was laying her on the bed, which yielded beneath her weight, they heard
+another report, considerably nearer this time, and Jean, giving way to
+his tumultuous rage, swore aloud: "God, G...! Do you think I shall not
+go out and see what it is, because of you?... Wait, wait a few minutes!"
+He put on his shoes again, took down his gun, which was always hanging
+within reach, against the wall, and, as his wife threw herself on her
+knees in her terror to implore him not to go, he hastily freed himself,
+ran to the window and jumped into the yard.
+
+She waited one hour, two hours, until daybreak, but her husband did not
+return. Then she lost her head, aroused the house, related how angry
+Jean was, and said that he had gone after the poachers, and immediately
+all the male farm-servants, even the boys, went in search of their
+master. They found him two leagues from the farm, tied hand and foot,
+half dead with rage, his gun broken, his trousers turned inside out, and
+with three dead hares hanging round his neck, and a placard on his
+chest, with these words: _Who goes on the chase, loses his place._
+
+And later on, when he used to tell this story of his wedding night, he
+generally added: "Ah! As far as a joke went, it was a good joke. They
+caught me in a snare, as if I had been a rabbit, the dirty brutes, and
+they shoved my head into a bag. But if I can only catch them some day,
+they had better look out for themselves!"
+
+That is how they amuse themselves in Normandy on a wedding day.
+
+
+
+
+A COCK CROWED
+
+
+Madame Berthe d'Avancelles had up till that time resisted all the
+prayers of her despairing adorer, Baron Joseph de Croissard. He had
+pursued her ardently in Paris during the winter, and now he was giving
+fetes and shooting parties in her honor at his Chateau at Carville, in
+Normandy.
+
+Monsieur d'Avancelles, her husband, saw nothing and knew nothing, as
+usual. It was said that he lived apart from his wife on account of
+physical weakness, for which Madame d'Avancelles would not pardon him.
+He was a short, stout, bald man, with short arms, legs, neck, nose and
+everything else, while Madame d'Avancelles, on the contrary, was a tall,
+dark and determined young woman, who laughed in her husband's face with
+sonorous laughter, while he called her openly _Mrs. Housewife_, who
+looked at the broad shoulders, strong build and fair moustaches of her
+titled admirer, Baron Joseph de Croissard, with a certain amount of
+tenderness.
+
+She had not, however, granted him anything as yet. The baron was ruining
+himself for her, and there was a constant round of feting, hunting
+parties and new pleasures, to which he invited the neighboring nobility.
+All day long the hounds gave tongue in the woods, as they followed the
+fox or the wild boar, and every night dazzling fireworks mingled their
+burning plumes with the boars, while the illuminated windows of the
+drawing-room cast long rays of light onto the wide lawns, where shadows
+were moving to and fro.
+
+It was autumn, the russet-colored season of the year, and the leaves
+were whirling about on the grass like flights of birds. One noticed the
+smell of damp earth in the air, of the naked earth, like one smells the
+odor of the bare skin, when a woman's dress falls off her, after a ball.
+
+One evening, in the previous spring, during an entertainment, Madame
+d'Avancelles had said to Monsieur de Croissard, who was worrying her by
+his importunities: "If I do succumb to you, my friend, it will not be
+before the fall of the leaf. I have too many things to do this summer to
+have any time for it." He had not forgotten that bold and amusing
+speech, and every day he became more pressing, every day he pushed his
+approaches nearer--to use a military phrase--and gained a step in the
+heart of the fair, audacious woman, who seemed only to be resisting for
+form's sake.
+
+It was the day before a large wild-boar hunt, and in the evening Madame
+Berthe said to the baron with a laugh: "Baron, if you kill the brute, I
+shall have something to say to you." And so, at dawn he was up and out,
+to try and discover where the solitary animal had its lair. He
+accompanied his huntsmen, settled the places for the relays, and
+organized everything personally to insure his triumph, and when the
+horns gave the signal for setting out, he appeared in a closely fitting
+coat of scarlet and gold, with his waist drawn in tight, his chest
+expanded, his eyes radiant, and as fresh and strong as if he had just
+got out of bed. They set off, and the wild boar set off through the
+underwood as soon as he was dislodged, followed by the hounds in full
+cry, while the horses set off at a gallop through the narrow sides cut
+in the forest, while the carriage which followed the chase at a
+distance, drove noiselessly along the soft roads.
+
+From mischief, Madame d'Avancelles kept the baron by her side, and
+lagging behind at a walk in an interminably long and straight drive,
+over which four rows of oaks hung, so as to form almost an arch, while
+he, trembling with love and anxiety, listened with one ear to the young
+woman's bantering chatter, while with the other he listened to the blast
+of the horns and to the cry of the hounds as they receded in the
+distance.
+
+"So you do not love me any longer?" she observed. "How can you say such
+things?" he replied. And she continued: "But you seem to be paying more
+attention to the sport than to me." He groaned, and said: "Did you not
+order me to kill the animal myself?" And she replied gravely: "Of course
+I reckon upon it. You must kill it under my eyes."
+
+Then he trembled in his saddle, spurred his horse until it reared, and,
+losing all patience, exclaimed: "But, by Jove, Madame, that is
+impossible if we remain here." Then she spoke tenderly to him, laying
+her hand on his arm, or stroking his horse's mane, as if from
+abstraction, and said with a laugh: "But you must do it ... or else ...
+so much the worse for you."
+
+Just then they turned to the right, into a narrow path which was
+overhung by trees, and suddenly, to avoid a branch which barred their
+way, she leaned towards him so closely, that he felt her hair tickling
+his neck, and he suddenly threw his arms brutally round her, and
+putting his thick moustache onto her forehead, he gave her a furious
+kiss.
+
+At first she did not move, and remained motionless under that mad
+caress; then she turned her head with a jerk, and either by accident or
+design her little lips met his, under their wealth of light hair, and a
+moment afterwards, either from confusion or remorse, she struck her
+horse with her riding-whip, and went off at full gallop, and they rode
+on like that for some time, without exchanging a look.
+
+The noise of the hunt came nearer, the thickets seemed to tremble, and
+suddenly the wild boar broke through the bushes, covered with blood, and
+trying to shake off the hounds who had fastened onto him, and the baron,
+uttering a shout of triumph, exclaimed: "Let him who loves me, follow
+me!" And he disappeared in the copse, as if the wood had swallowed him
+up.
+
+When she reached an open glade a few minutes later, he was just getting
+up, covered with mud, his coat torn, and his hands bloody, while the
+brute was lying stretched out at full length, with the baron's hunting
+knife driven into its shoulder up to the hilt.
+
+The quarry was cut at night by torchlight. It was a warm and dull
+evening, and the wan moon threw a yellow light onto the torches which
+made the night misty with their resinous smoke. The hounds devoured the
+wild boar's stinking entrails, and snarled and fought for them, while
+the prickers and the gentlemen, standing in a circle round the spoil,
+blew their horns as loud as they could. The flourish of the
+hunting-horns resounded beyond the woods on that still night and was
+repeated by the echoes of the distant valleys, awaking the timid stags,
+rousing the yelping foxes, and disturbing the little rabbits in their
+gambols at the edge of the rides.
+
+The frightened night-birds flew over the eager pack of hounds, while the
+women, who were moved by all these gentle and violent things, leaned
+rather heavily on the men's arms; and turned aside into the forest
+rides, before the hounds had finished their meal, and Madame
+d'Avancelles, feeling languid after that day of fatigue and tenderness,
+said to the baron: "Will you take a turn in the park, my friend?" And
+without replying, but trembling and nervous, he went with her, and
+immediately they kissed each other. They walked slowly under the almost
+leafless trees through which the moonbeams filtered, and their love,
+their desires, their longing for a closer embrace became so vehement,
+that they nearly yielded to it at the foot of a tree.
+
+The horns were not sounding any longer, and the tired hounds were
+sleeping in the kennels. "Let us return," the young woman said, and they
+went back.
+
+When they got to the chateau and before they went in, she said in a weak
+voice: "I am so tired that I shall go to bed, my friend." And as he
+opened his arms for a last kiss, she ran away, saying as a last good-bye:
+"No.... I am going to sleep.... Let him who loves me follow me!"
+
+An hour later, when the whole silent chateau seemed dead; the baron
+crept stealthily out of his room, and went and scratched at her door,
+and as she did not reply, he tried to open it, and found that it was not
+locked.
+
+She was in a reverie, resting her arms against the window ledge, and he
+threw himself at her knees, which he kissed madly, through the
+nightdress. She said nothing, but buried her delicate fingers
+caressingly in his hair, and suddenly, as if she had formed some great
+resolution, she whispered with her daring look: "I shall come back, wait
+for me." And stretching out her hand, she pointed with her finger to an
+indistinct white spot at the end of the room; it was her bed.
+
+Then, with trembling hands and scarcely knowing what he was doing, he
+quickly undressed, got into the cool sheets, and stretching himself out
+comfortably, he almost forgot his love in the pleasure he found, tired
+out as he was, in the contact of the linen. She did not return, however,
+no doubt finding amusement in making him languish. He closed his eyes
+with a feeling of exquisite comfort, and reflected peaceably while
+waiting for what he so ardently longed for. But by degrees his limbs
+grew languid and his thoughts became indistinct and fleeting, until his
+fatigue gained the upper hand and he fell asleep.
+
+He slept that unconquerable, heavy sleep of the worn-out hunter, and he
+slept until daylight; and then, as the window had remained half open,
+the crowing of a cock suddenly woke him, and the baron opened his eyes,
+and feeling a woman's body against his, finding himself, much to his
+surprise, in a strange bed, and remembering nothing for a moment, he
+stammered:
+
+"What? Where am I? What is the matter?"
+
+Then she, who had not been asleep at all, looking at this unkempt man,
+with red eyes and swollen lips, replied in the haughty tone of voice in
+which she occasionally spoke to her husband:
+
+"It is nothing; it is only a cock crowing. Go and sleep again, Monsieur,
+it has nothing to do with you."
+
+
+
+
+JULOT'S OPINION
+
+
+The Duchess Huguette de Lionzac was very much infatuated with herself,
+but then she had a perfect right to be, and who, in her place, would not
+have shown a spice of conceit? There was no success which she had wished
+for, that she had not attained. She had received a medal for sculpture
+at the _Salon_, and at the _Exhibition of Excessives_ she had shown a
+water-color which looked eccentric, even there.
+
+She had published a collection of poems which was crowned by the French
+Academy, and a small volume of _Rhythmic Prose_ of which the _Revue de
+lemain_ said, "That it showed the most subtle and evanescent performance
+of those fugitive pieces which was sure to descend to posterity," and
+when she acted in private theatricals, some exclaimed:
+
+"It is better than the _Comedie Francaise_," while others, who were more
+refined, went so far as to utter the supreme praise: "Better than the
+_Theatre Libre_."
+
+At one time, there had been a report, which had been propagated by the
+newspapers, that she was going to come out at the _Opera Comique_, in a
+part that had been written especially for her extraordinary voice, for
+it appeared that Massenet would not hear of anybody else for the part.
+
+She was the circus-rider, Miss Edith, who, under that assumed name gave
+that unique and never-to-be-forgotten exhibition of horsemanship, and
+you remember what cheers there were, and what quantities of flowers
+covered the arena! And you must not forget that this was before a
+_paying public_!
+
+Then, it was notorious that she had carried off the lovers of several
+celebrated courtesans, which was not one of the smallest of her
+triumphs, for she had chosen as her rivals some of those terrible and
+hitherto unconquered women, of whom it was said:
+
+"Oh! When she has got hold of a man, she does not let him go again. She
+has some secrets that attach them to her."
+
+There was, therefore, nothing surprising in the fact that the Duchess
+Huguette should have been so proud of so many victories, and in such
+various sports; but now, for the first time, a doubt had entered her
+mind. In turning over the _Notules Psychologiques_[3] of her favorite
+novel-writer, she had just read these two sentences which disturbed her:
+
+[Footnote 3: Psychological Notes.]
+
+"If anyone wishes to excel in an art, he must have gained a living by
+it."
+
+"What pleases us in a woman of the world who gives herself up to
+debauchery, is the contrast between what she is, and what she would like
+to be."
+
+And she asked herself whether she could really have lived by those arts
+in which she excelled, and whether the successes that she had obtained,
+did not chiefly depend on her charm of a woman of the world, who wished
+to be what she was not. The last _whether_, especially, made her
+anxious. For was not it precisely that special charm which had given her
+an advantage over courtesans who employed secrets?
+
+Would she have been victorious if she had been deprived of that weapon?
+How could she find out?
+
+"And yet," she said to herself, "I must know, for everything depends on
+this point. If I can win the game without playing that card, I am sure
+of all my other triumphs; my mind will be easy then, whatever it may
+cost."
+
+She consulted her old god-father, Viscount Hugues de Pierras, on the
+subject, and, after a few complimentary words, as she had begged him to
+be sincere, he said:
+
+"Good heavens! my dear child, I must confess that your psychologist is
+not altogether wrong, nor your apprehensions either. I have, before now,
+left many learned mistresses for women who were not in the least
+learned, and who pleased me all the better on that account. But that did
+not prevent the mistresses I had sacrificed from being women of
+incomprehensible talents, in spite of their defeat. But what does that
+matter? It ought to be enough for you, that you conquer, without
+troubling yourself about the means by which you obtain your victory. I
+do not suppose that you have any pretensions to being a _virtuosa_
+in ..."
+
+"In everything, yes. Excuse me, god-father, I have such pretensions. And
+what I ask of you, is the means of obtaining absolute proof that my
+pretensions are justified."
+
+"Hum! Hum!" the viscount said, in some embarrassment, "I do not know of
+any means, my dear child, unless we get together a jury...."
+
+"Please do not joke about it!" Huguette exclaimed. "I am perfectly
+serious."
+
+"I am very serious also, I assure you, I think that a jury..."
+
+"Composed of whom? Of men of the world, I suppose?"
+
+"And what does this Julot do?"
+
+"Oh! really, Duchess, you force me to speak of persons and things,
+which ..."
+
+"Yes, yes, I force you to; we understand that. But tell me! Bluntly,
+without mincing matters, if necessary. You know that I have no objection
+to that sort of thing, so go on. Do not keep me in suspense like this. I
+am burning with curiosity. What does Julot do?"
+
+"Very well, little volunteer, if you insist on knowing, I will tell you.
+Julot, generally called _Fine-Gueule_, is a trier of women."
+
+"I beg your pardon?"
+
+"I will explain it to you. There are a few of us old amateurs in Paris,
+who are too old and impatient to hunt for truffles, but who want them of
+such and such a flavor, exactly to our taste. Now, Julot knows our
+tastes, our various fancies, and he undertakes ..."
+
+"Capital! Capital!"
+
+
+
+
+MADEMOISELLE
+
+
+He had been registered under the names of Jean Marie Mathieu Valot, but
+he was never called anything but _Mademoiselle_. He was the idiot of the
+district, but not one of those wretched, ragged idiots who live on
+public charity. He lived comfortably on a small income which his mother
+had left him, and which his guardian paid him regularly, and so he was
+rather envied than pitied. And then, he was not one of those idiots with
+wild looks, and the manners of an animal, for he was by no means an
+unpleasing object, with his half-open lips and smiling eyes, and
+especially in his constant make-up in female dress. For he dressed like
+a girl, and showed by that, how little he objected to being called
+_Mademoiselle_.
+
+And why should he not like the nickname which his mother had given him
+affectionately, when he was a mere child, and so delicate and weak, with
+such a fair complexion, a poor little diminutive lad, that he was not as
+tall as many girls of the same age? It was in pure love that, in his
+earlier years, his mother whispered that tender _Mademoiselle_ to him,
+while his old grandmother used to say jokingly:
+
+"The fact is, that as for the _tip-cat_ he has got, it is really not
+worth mentioning in a Christian. No offense to God in saying so." And
+his grandfather who was equally fond of a joke, used to add: "I only
+hope he will not lose it, as he grows bigger, like tadpoles do their
+tails!"
+
+And they treated him as if he had really been a girl and coddled him,
+the more so as they were very prosperous, and did not require a man to
+keep things together.
+
+When his mother and grandparents were dead, _Mademoiselle_ was almost as
+happy with his paternal uncle, an unmarried man, who had carefully
+attended the idiot, and who had grown more and more attached to him by
+dint of looking after him; and the worthy man continued to call Jean
+Marie Mathieu Valot, _Mademoiselle_.
+
+He was called so in all the country round as well, not with the
+slightest intention of hurting his feelings, but, on the contrary,
+because all thought they would please the poor gentle creature who
+harmed nobody.
+
+The very street boys meant no harm by it, accustomed as they were to
+call the tall idiot in a frock and cap, so; but it would have struck
+them as very extraordinary, and would have led them to in rude fun, if
+they had seen him dressed like a boy.
+
+_Mademoiselle_, however, took care of that, for his dress was as dear to
+him as his nickname. He delighted in wearing it, and, in fact, cared for
+nothing else, and what gave it a particular zest was, that he knew that
+he was not a girl, and that he was living in disguise. And this was
+evident, by the exaggerated feminine bearing and walk he put on, as if
+to show that it was not natural to him. His enormous, carefully frilled
+cap was adorned with large variegated ribbons. His petticoat, with
+numerous flounces, was distended behind by many hoops. He walked with
+short steps, and with exaggerated swaying of the hips, while his folded
+arms and crossed hands were distorted into pretensions of comical
+coquetry.
+
+On such occasions, if anybody wished to make friends with him, it was
+necessary to say:
+
+"Ah! _Mademoiselle_, what a nice girl you make."
+
+That put him into a good humor, and he used to reply, much pleased:
+
+"Don't I? But people can see I only do it for a joke."
+
+But, nevertheless, when they were dancing at village festivals in the
+neighborhood, he would always be invited to dance as _Mademoiselle_, and
+would never ask any of the girls to dance with him; and one evening when
+somebody asked him the reason for this, he opened his eyes wide, laughed
+as if the man had said something very stupid, and replied:
+
+"I cannot ask the girls because I am not dressed like a lad. Just look
+at my dress, you fool!"
+
+As his interrogator was a judicious man, he said to him:
+
+"Then dress like one, _Mademoiselle_."
+
+He thought for a moment, and then said with a cunning look:
+
+"But if I dress like a lad, I shall no longer be a girl; but then, I am
+a girl;" and he shrugged his shoulders as he said it.
+
+But the remark seemed to make him think.
+
+For some time afterwards, when he met the same person, he asked him
+abruptly:
+
+"If I dress like a lad, will you still call me _Mademoiselle_?"
+
+"Of course, I shall," the other replied. "You will always be called so."
+
+The idiot appeared delighted, for there was no doubt that he thought
+more of his nickname than he did of his dress, and the next day he made
+his appearance in the village square without his petticoats and dressed
+as a man. He had taken a pair of trousers, a coat and a hat, from his
+guardian's clothes-press, and this created quite a revolution in the
+neighborhood, for the people, who had been in the habit of smiling at
+him kindly when he was dressed as a woman, looked at him in astonishment
+and almost in fear, while the indulgent could not help laughing, and
+visibly making fun of him.
+
+The involuntary hostility of some, and the too evident ridicule of
+others, the disagreeable surprise of all, were too palpable for him not
+to see it, and to be hurt by it, and it was still worse when a street
+urchin said to him in a jeering voice, as he danced round him:
+
+"Oh! oh! _Mademoiselle_, you wear trousers! Oh! oh! _Mademoiselle_!"
+
+And it grew worse and worse, when a whole band of these vagabonds were
+on his heels, hooting and yelling after him, as if he had been somebody
+in a masquerading dress, during the carnival.
+
+It was quite certain that the unfortunate creature looked much more as
+if he were in a disguise now than he had done formerly. By dint of
+living like a girl, and by even exaggerating the feminine walk and
+manners, he had totally lost all masculine looks and ways. His smooth
+face, his long flax like hair, required a cap with ribbons, and became a
+caricature under the high chimney-pot hat of the old doctor, his
+grandson.
+
+_Mademoiselle's_ shoulders, and especially her swelling stern danced
+about wildly in this old fashioned coat and wide trousers. And nothing
+was as funny as the contrast between his quiet dress and slow trotting
+pace, the winning way he combed his head, and the conceited movements
+of his hands, with which he fanned himself, like a silly girl.
+
+Soon the older lads and the girls, the old women, men of ripe age and
+even the Judicial Councilor joined the little brats, and hooted
+_Mademoiselle_, while the astonished idiot ran away, and rushed into the
+house with terror. There he took his poor head between both hands, and
+tried to comprehend the matter. Why were they angry with him? For it was
+quite evident that they were angry with him. What wrong had he done, and
+whom had he injured, by dressing as a boy? Was he not a boy, after all?
+For the first time in his life, he felt a horror for his nickname, for
+had he not been insulted through it? But immediately he was seized with
+a horrible doubt.
+
+"Suppose that, after all, I was a girl?"
+
+He would have liked to ask his guardian about it but he did not want to,
+for he somehow felt, although only obscurely, that he, worthy man, might
+not tell him the truth, out of kindness. And, besides, he preferred to
+find out for himself, without asking anyone.
+
+All his idiot's cunning, which had been lying latent up till then,
+because he never had any occasion to make use of it, now came out and
+urged him to a solitary and dark action.
+
+The next day he dressed himself as a girl again, and made his appearance
+as if he had perfectly forgotten his escapade of the day before, but the
+people, especially the street boys, had not forgotten it. They looked at
+him sideways, and, even the best of them, could not help smiling, while
+the little blackguards ran after him and said:
+
+"Oh! oh! _Mademoiselle_, you had on a pair of breeches!"
+
+But he pretended to hear, moreover, to guess to whom they were alluding.
+He seemed as happy, and glad to look about him as he usually did, with
+half open lips and smiling eyes. As usual, he wore an enormous cap with
+variegated ribbons, and large petticoats as usual, he walked with short,
+mincing steps, swaying and wriggling his hips and crupper, and he
+gesticulated like a coquette, and licked his lips, when they called him
+_Mademoiselle_, while in his head, he would have liked too have jumped
+at the throat of those who called him so.
+
+Days and months passed, and by degrees these about him forgot all about
+his strange escapade, but he had never left off thinking about it, nor
+trying to find out, for which he was ever on the alert--how he could
+find out what were his qualities as a boy, and how could he assert them
+victoriously. Really innocent, he had reached the age of twenty without
+knowing anything about it, or without ever having any natural impulse to
+discover it, but being tenacious of purpose, curious and dissembling, he
+asked no questions, but observed all that was said and done.
+
+Often at their village dances, he had heard young fellows boasting about
+girls whom they had seduced, and praising such and such a young fellow,
+and often, also, after a dance, he saw the couples go away together,
+with their arms round each other's waists. They had no suspicions of
+him, and he listened and watched, until, at last, he discovered what was
+going on.
+
+And, then, one night, when dancing was over, and the couples were going
+away with their arms round each other's waists, a terrible screaming was
+heard at the corner of the woods through which those going to the next
+village, had to pass. It was Josephine, pretty Josephine, for she was
+brave as well, and when her screams were heard, they ran to her
+assistance, and they arrived only just in time to rescue her, half
+strangled from _Mademoiselle's_ clutches.
+
+The idiot had watched her, and had thrown himself upon her in order to
+treat her as the other young fellows did the girls, but she resisted him
+so stoutly that he took her by the throat and squeezed with all his
+might until she could not breathe, and was nearly dead.
+
+In rescuing Josephine from him, they had thrown him on the ground, but
+he jumped up again immediately, foaming at the mouth and slobbering, and
+exclaimed:
+
+"I am not a girl any longer, I am a young man, I am a young man, I tell
+you."
+
+And he proudly essayed to convince them that it was so, but the evidence
+that he could adduce was very slight.
+
+
+
+
+THE MOUNTEBANKS
+
+
+Compardin, the clever manage of the _Eden Reunis Theatre_, as the
+theater critics invariably called him, was reckoning on a great success,
+and he had invested his last franc in the affair, without thinking of
+the morrow, or of the bad luck which had been pursuing him so inexorably
+for months past. For a whole week, the walls, the kiosks, shopfronts,
+and even the trees, had been placarded with flaming posters, and from
+one end of Paris to the other carriages were to be seen which were
+covered with fancy sketches of Cheret, that represented two strong,
+well-built men who looked like ancient athletes. The younger of them,
+who was standing with his arms folded, had the vacant smile of an
+itinerant mountebank on his face, and the other, who was dressed in what
+was supposed to be the costume of a Mexican trapper, held a revolver in
+his hand. There were large type advertisements in all the papers, that
+the Montefiores would appear without fail at the _Eden Reunis_, the next
+Monday.
+
+Nothing else was talked about, for the puff and humbug attracted people.
+The Montefiores, like fashionable knicknacks, succeeded that whimsical
+jade, Rose Peche, who had gone off the preceding autumn, between the
+third and fourth acts of the burlesque, _Ousca Iscar_, in order to make
+a study of love in company of a young fellow of seventeen, who had just
+entered the university. The novelty and difficulty of their performance,
+revived and agitated the curiosity of the public, for there seemed to
+be an implied threat of death, or, at any rate, of wounds and of blood
+in it, and it seemed as if they defied danger with absolute
+indifference. And that always pleased women; it holds them and masters
+them, and they grow pale with emotion and cruel enjoyment. Consequently,
+all the seats in the large theater were let almost immediately, and were
+soon taken for several days in advance. And stout Compardin losing his
+glass of absinthe over a game of dominoes, was in high spirits, and saw
+the future through rosy glasses, and exclaimed in a loud voice: "I think
+I have turned up trumps, by George!"
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The Countess Regina de Villegby was lying on the sofa in her boudoir,
+languidly fanning herself. She had only received three or four intimate
+friends that day, Saint Mars Montalvin, Tom Sheffield, and his cousin,
+Madame de Rhouel, a Creole, who laughed as incessantly as a bird sings.
+It was growing dusk, and the distant rumbling of the carriages in the
+Avenue of the Champs-Elysees sounded like some somnolent rhythm. There
+was a delicate perfume of flowers; the lamps had not been brought in
+yet, and chatting and laughing filled the room with a confused noise.
+
+"Would you pour out the tea?" the Countess said, suddenly, touching
+Saint Mars' fingers, who was beginning an amorous conversation in a low
+voice, with her fan. And while he slowly filled the little china cup, he
+continued: "Are the Montefiores as good as the lying newspapers make
+out?"
+
+Then Tom Sheffield and the others all joined in.
+
+They had never seen anything like it, they declared; it was most
+exciting, and made one shiver unpleasantly, like when the _espada_
+comes to close quarters with the infuriated brute at a bull fight.
+
+Countess Regina listened in silence, and nibbled the petals of a tea
+rose.
+
+"How I should like to see them!" giddy Madame de Rhouel exclaimed.
+
+"Unfortunately, cousin," the Countess said, in the solemn tones of a
+preacher, "a respectable woman dare not let herself be seen in improper
+places."
+
+They all agreeing with her, nevertheless, Madame de Villegby was present
+at the Montefiores' performance two days later, dressed all in black,
+and wearing a thick veil, at the back of a stage box.
+
+And that woman was as cold as a steel buckler, and had married as soon
+as she left the convent in which she had been to school, without any
+affection or even liking for her husband, whom the most skeptical
+respected as a saint, and who had a look of virgin purity on her calm
+face as she went down the steps of the Madeleine on Sundays, after high
+mass.
+
+Countess Regina stretched herself nervously, grew pale, and trembled
+like the strings of a violin, on which an artist had been playing some
+wild symphony, and inhaled the nasty smell of the sawdust, as if it had
+been the perfume of a bouquet of unknown flowers, and clenched her
+hands, and gazed eagerly at the two mountebanks, whom the public
+applauded rapturously at every feat. And contemptuously and haughtily
+she compared those two men, who were as vigorous as wild animals that
+have grown up in the open air, with the rickety limbs, which look so
+awkward in the dress of an English groom, that had tried to inflame her
+heart.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Count de Villegby had gone back to the country, to prepare for his
+election as Councilor-General, and the very evening that he started,
+Regina again took the stage box at the _Eden Reunis_. Consumed by
+sensual ardor as if by some love philter, she scribbled a few words on a
+piece of paper--the eternal formula that women write on such occasions:
+
+"A carriage will be waiting for you at the stage door after the
+performance--An unknown woman who adores you."
+
+And then she gave it to a box opener, who handed it to the Montefiore
+who was the champion pistol shot.
+
+Oh! that interminable waiting in a malodorous cab, the overwhelming
+emotion, and the nausea of disgust, the fear, the desire of waking the
+coachman who was nodding on the box, of giving him her address, and
+telling him to drive her home. But she remained with her face against
+the window, mechanically looking at the dark passage, that was
+illuminated by a gas lamp, at the "actors' entrance," through which men
+were continually hurrying, who talked in a loud voice, and chewed the
+end of a cigar which had gone out. She remained as if she were glued to
+the cushions, and tapped impatiently on the bottom of the cab with her
+heels.
+
+When the actor who thought it was a joke, made his appearance, she could
+hardly utter a word, for evil pleasure is as intoxicating as adulterated
+liquor, so face to face with this immediate surrender, and this
+unconstrained immodesty, he at first thought that he had to do with a
+street walker.
+
+Regina felt various sensations, and a morbid pleasure throughout her
+whole person. She pressed close to him, and raised her veil to show how
+young, beautiful, and desirable she was. They did not speak a word, like
+wrestlers before a combat. She was eager to be locked up with him, to
+give herself to him, and, at last, to know that moral uncleanness, of
+which, she was, of course, ignorant, as a chaste wife; and when they
+left the room in the hotel together, where they had spent hours like
+amorous deer, the man dragged himself along, and almost groped his way
+like a blind man, while Regina was smiling, though nevertheless, she
+retained her serene candor of an unsullied virgin, like she did almost
+always on Sundays, after mass.
+
+Then she took the second. He was very sentimental, and his head was full
+of romance. He thought the unknown woman, who merely used him as her
+plaything, really loved him, and he was not satisfied with furtive
+meetings. He questioned her, besought her, and the Countess made fun of
+him. Then she chose the two Mountebanks in turn. They did not know it,
+for she had forbidden them ever to talk about her to each other, under
+the penalty of never seeing her again, and one night the younger of them
+said with humble tenderness, as he knelt at her feet:
+
+"How kind you are, to love and to want me! I thought that such happiness
+only existed in novels, and that ladies of rank only made fun of poor
+strolling Mountebanks, like us!"
+
+Regina knitted her golden brows.
+
+"Do not be angry," he continued, "because I followed you and found out
+where you lived, and your real name, and that you are a countess, and
+rich, very rich."
+
+"You fool!" she exclaimed, trembling with anger. "People would make you
+believe things, as easily as they would a child!"
+
+She had had enough of him; he knew her name, and might compromise her.
+The Count might possibly come back from the country before the
+elections, and then, the Mountebank began to love her. She no longer had
+any feeling, any desire for those two lovers, whom a fillip from her
+rosy fingers could bend to her will. It was time to go on to the next
+chapter, and to seek for fresh pleasures elsewhere.
+
+"Listen to me," she said to the champion shot, the next night. "I would
+rather not hide anything from you. I like your comrade; I have given
+myself to him, and I do not want to have anything more to do with you."
+
+"My comrade!" he repeated.
+
+"Well, what then? The change amuses me!"
+
+He uttered a furious cry, and rushed at Regina with clenched fists. She
+thought he was going to kill her, and closed her eyes, but he had not
+the courage to hurt that delicate body, which he had so often covered
+with caresses, and in despair, and hanging his head, he said hoarsely:
+
+"Very well, we shall not meet again, since it is your wish."
+
+The house at the _Eden Reunis_ was as full as an over-filled basket The
+violins were playing a soft and delightful waltz of Gungl's, which the
+reports of a revolver accentuated.
+
+The Montefiores were standing opposite to one another, like in Cheret's
+picture, and about a dozen yards apart, and an electric light was thrown
+on to the youngest, who was leaning against a large white target, and
+very slowly the other traced his living outline with bullet after
+bullet. He aimed with prodigious skill, and the black dots showed on the
+cardboard, and marked the shape of his body. The applause drowned the
+orchestra, and increased continually, when suddenly a shrill cry of
+horror resounded from one end of the hall to the other. The women
+fainted, the violins stopped, and the spectators jostled each other. At
+the ninth ball, the younger brother had fallen to the ground, an inert
+mass, with a gaping wound in his forehead. His brother did not move, and
+there was a look of madness on his face, while the Countess de Villegby
+leaned on the ledge of her box, and fanned herself calmly, as implacable
+as any cruel goddess of ancient mythology.
+
+The next day, between four and five, when she was surrounded by her
+usual friends in her little, warm, Japanese drawing room, it was strange
+to hear in what a languid and indifferent voice she exclaimed:
+
+"They say that an accident happened to one of those famous clowns, the
+Monta ... the Monti ... what is his name, Tom?"
+
+"The Montefiores, Madame!"
+
+And then they began to talk about the sale at Angele Velours, who was
+going to buy the former follies, at the hotel Drouot, before marrying
+Prince Storbeck.
+
+
+
+
+THE SEQUEL TO A DIVORCE
+
+
+Certainly, although he had been engaged in the most extraordinary, most
+unlikely, most extravagant and funniest cases, and had won legal games
+without a trump in his hand, although he had worked out the obscure law
+of divorce, as if it had been a Californian gold mine Maitre[4]
+Garrulier the celebrated, the only Garrulier, could not check a movement
+of surprise, nor a disheartening shake of the head, nor a smile when the
+Countess de Baudemont explained her affairs to him for the first time.
+
+[Footnote 4: Title given to advocates in France.--TRANSLATOR.]
+
+He had just opened his correspondence, and his long hands, on which he
+bestowed the greatest attention, buried themselves in a heap of female
+letters, and one might have thought oneself in the confessional of a
+fashionable preacher, so impregnated was the atmosphere with delicate
+perfumes.
+
+Immediately, even before she had said a word, with the sharp glance of a
+practiced man of the world, that look which made beautiful Madame de
+Serpenoise say: "He strips your heart bare!" The lawyer had classed her
+in the third category. Those who suffer came into his first category,
+those who love, into the second, and those who are bored, into the
+third, and she belonged to the latter.
+
+She was a pretty windmill, whose sails turned and flew round, and
+fretted the blue sky with a delicious shiver of joy, as it were. The
+brain of a bird, in which four correct and healthy ideas could not exist
+side by side, and in which all dreams and every kind of folly are
+engulfed, like a great crevice.
+
+Incapable of hurting a fly, emotional, charitable, with a feeling of
+tenderness for the street girl who sold bunches of violets for a penny,
+for a cab horse, which a driver was ill using, for a melancholy pauper's
+funeral, when the body, without friends or relations to follow it, was
+being conveyed to the common grave, doing anything that might afford
+five minutes' amusement, not caring if she made men miserable for the
+rest of their days, and taking pleasure in kindling passions which
+consumed men's whole being, looking upon life as too short to be
+anything else than one uninterrupted round of gaiety and enjoyment, she
+thought that people might find plenty of time for being serious and
+reasonable in the evening of life, when they are at the bottom of the
+hill, and their looking glass showed them a wrinkled face, surrounded
+with white hair.
+
+A thoroughbred Parisian, whom one would follow to the end of the world
+like a poodle; a woman whom one adores with the head, the heart and the
+senses until one is nearly driven mad, as soon as one has inhaled the
+delicate perfume that emanates from her dress and hair, or touched her
+skin, and heard her laugh; a woman for whom one would fight a duel and
+risk one's life without a thought; for whom a man would remove
+mountains, and sell his soul to the devil several times over, if the
+devil were still in the habit of frequenting the places of bad repute on
+this earth.
+
+She had perhaps come to see this Garrulier, whom she had so often heard
+mentioned at five o'clock tea, near, so as to be able to describe him to
+her female friends subsequently in droll phrases, to imitate his
+gestures and the unctuous inflections of his voice, perhaps, in order to
+experience some new sensation, or, perhaps, for the sake of dressing
+like a woman who was going to try for a divorce; and, certainly, the
+whole effect was perfect. She wore a splendid cloak embroidered with
+jet, which gave an almost serious effect to her golden hair, to her
+small slightly turned up nose, with its quivering nostrils, and to her
+long eyes, full of enigmas and fun; and a dark stuff dress, which was
+fastened at the neck by a sapphire and a diamond pin.
+
+The barrister did not interrupt her, but allowed her to get excited and
+to chatter, to enumerate her causes for complaint against poor Count de
+Baudemont, who certainly had no suspicion of his wife's escapade, who
+would have been very much surprised if any one had told him of it at
+that moment, when he was taking his fencing lesson at the club.
+
+When she had quite finished, he said coolly, as if he were throwing a
+pail of water on some burning straw.
+
+"But, Madame, there is not the slightest pretext for a divorce in
+anything that you have told me, here...the judges would ask me whether I
+took the Law Courts for a theater, and intended to make fun of them."
+
+And seeing how disheartened she was, and that she looked like a child
+whose favorite toy had been broken, and, also, because she was so
+pretty, that he would have liked to kiss her hands in his devotion, and
+as she seemed to be witty, and very amusing, and as, moreover, he had no
+objection to such visits being prolonged, when papers had to be looked
+over, while sitting close together, Maitre Garrulier appeared to be
+considering, and, taking his chin in his hand, he said:
+
+"However, I will think it over...there is sure to be some dark spot that
+can be made out worse.... Write to me, and come and see me again..."
+
+In the course of her visits, that black spot had increased so much, and
+Madame de Baudemont had followed her lawyer's advice so punctually, and
+had played on the various cords so skillfully, a few months later, that
+after a lawsuit, which is still spoken of in the Courts of Justice, and
+during the course of which, the President had to take off his
+spectacles, and to use his pocket-handkerchief noisily, the divorce was
+pronounced in favor of the Countess Marie Anne Nicole Bournet de
+Baudemont, _nee_ de Tanchart de Peothus.
+
+The Count, who was nonplussed at such an adventure, which was turning
+out so seriously, first of all, flew into a terrible rage, and nearly
+rushed off to the lawyer's office, and threatened to cut off his knavish
+ears for him, but when his access of fury was over, and thinking better
+of it, he shrugged his shoulders and said:
+
+"All the better for her, if it amuses her!"
+
+Then he bought Baron Silberstein's yacht, and with some friends, got up
+a cruise, to Ceylon and India.
+
+Marie-Anne began by triumphing, and felt as happy as a schoolgirl going
+home for the holidays, who feels the bridle on her neck, committed every
+possible folly, and soon, tired, satiated, and disgusted, she began to
+yawn, cried and found out that she had sacrificed her happiness, like a
+millionaire who had gone mad, and who threw his banknotes and shares
+into the river, and that she was nothing more than a disabled waif and
+stray. Consequently, she now married again, as the solitude of her home
+made her morose from morning till night; and then, besides, a woman
+requires a mansion when she goes into society, to race meetings, or to
+the theater.
+
+And so, while she became a marchioness, and pronounced her second "Yes,"
+before a very few friends, at the office of the mayor of the English
+urban district, and malicious ones in the Faurbourg were making fun of
+the whole affair, and affirming this and that, whether rightly or
+wrongly, and compromising the present husband to the former one, even
+declaring that he had partially been the cause of the former divorce,
+Monsieur de Baudemont was wandering over the four quarters of the globe
+trying to overcome his homesickness, and to deaden his longing for love,
+which had taken possession of his heart and of his body, like a slow
+poison.
+
+He traveled through the most out of the way places, and the most lovely
+countries, and spent months and months at sea, and plunged into every
+kind of dissipation and debauchery. But neither the supple backs nor the
+luxurious gestures of the _bayaderes_, nor the large, passive eyes of
+the Creoles, nor flirtations with English _missives_ with hair the color
+of new cider, nor nights of waking dreams, when he saw new
+constellations in the sky, nor dangers during which a man thinks it is
+all over with him, and mutters a few words of prayer in spite of
+himself, when the waves are so high, and the sky so black, nothing was
+able to make him forget that little Parisian woman who smelled so
+delicious that she might have been taken for a bouquet of rare flowers;
+who was so coaxing, so curious, so funny; who never had the same
+caprice, the same smile, or the same look twice, and who, at bottom, was
+worth more than many others, than the saints and the sinless.
+
+He thought of her constantly, during long hours of sleeplessness. He
+carried her portrait about with him in the pocket of his pea-jacket; a
+charming portrait in which she was smiling, and showing her white teeth
+between her half-open lips, and while her gentle eyes, with their
+magnetic look, had a happy, frank expression, and in which, from the
+mere reflection of her hair, one could see that she was fair among the
+fair.
+
+And he used to kiss that portrait of the woman who had been his wife as
+if he wished to efface it, and would look at it for hours, and then
+throw himself down on the netting, and sob like a child as he looked at
+the infinite expanse before him, and seemed to see in their lost
+happiness the joys of their perished affections, and the divine
+remembrance of their love in the monotonous waste of green waters. And
+he tried to accuse himself for all that had occurred, and not to be
+angry with her, to think that his grievances were imaginary, and to
+adore her in spite of everything and always.
+
+And that he roamed about the world, tossed to and fro, suffering, and
+hoping, he knew not what. He ventured into the greatest dangers, and
+sought for death just as a man seeks for his mistress, and death passed
+close to him without touching him, and was perhaps amused at his grief
+and misery.
+
+For he was as wretched as a stone-breaker, as one of those poor devils
+who work and nearly break their backs over the hard flints the whole day
+long, under the scorching sun or the cold rain, and Marie-Anne herself
+was not happy, for she was pining for the past, and remembered their
+former love.
+
+At last, however, he returned to France, changed, tamed by exposure,
+sun, and rain, and transformed as if by some witch's filter.
+
+Nobody would have recognized the elegant and effeminate clubman in this
+species of corsair, with broad shoulders, a skin the color of blister,
+with very red lips, and who rolled a little in his walk; who seemed to
+be stifled in his black dress-coat, but who still retained his
+distinguished manners, the bearing of a nobleman of the last century,
+who, when he was ruined, fitted out a privateer, and fell upon the
+English wherever he met them, from St. Malo to Calcutta. And wherever he
+showed himself his friends exclaimed:
+
+"Why! Is that you? I should never have known you again!"
+
+He was very nearly starting off again immediately. He even telegraphed
+orders to Havre to get the steam-yacht ready for sea again directly,
+when he heard that Marie-Anne had married again.
+
+He saw her in the distance, at the _Theatre Francais_ one Tuesday, and
+when he noticed how pretty, how fair, how desirable she was, and looking
+so melancholy, with all the appearance of an unhappy soul that regrets
+something, his determination grew weaker, and he delayed his departure
+from week to week, and waited, without knowing why, until, at last, worn
+out with the struggle, watching her wherever she went, more in love with
+her than he had ever been before, he wrote her long, mad, ardent letters
+in which his passion overflowed like a stream of lava.
+
+He altered his handwriting, as he remembered her restless brain and her
+many whims. He sent her the flowers which he knew she liked best, and
+told her that she was his life, that he was dying of waiting for her, of
+longing for her, for her, his idol.
+
+At last, very much puzzled and surprised, guessing--who knows?--from the
+instinctive beating of her heart, and her general emotion, that it must
+be he this time, he whose soul she had tortured with such cold cruelty,
+and knowing that she could make amends for the past and bring back their
+former love, she replied to him, and granted him the meeting that he
+asked for. She fell into his arms, and they both sobbed with joy and
+ecstasy. Their kisses were those which lips only give when they have
+lost each other and found each other again at last, when they meet and
+exhaust themselves in each other's looks, thirsting for tenderness, love
+and enjoyment.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Last week Count de Baudemont carried off Marie-Anne quietly and coolly,
+just like one resumes possession of one's house on returning from a
+journey, and drives out the intruders. And when _Maitre_ Garrulier was
+told of this unheard-of scandal, he rubbed his hands--his long, delicate
+hands of a sensual prelate--and exclaimed:
+
+"That is absolutely logical, and I should like to be in their place."
+
+
+
+
+THE MAN WITH THE DOGS
+
+
+His wife, even when talking to him, always called him Monsieur Bistaud,
+but in all the country round, within a radius of ten leagues in France
+and Belgium, he was known as _cet homme aux chiens_[5]. It was not a
+very valuable reputation, however, and "That man with the dogs" became a
+sort of pariah.
+
+[Footnote 5: That man with the dogs.]
+
+In Thierache they are not very fond of the custom-house officers, for
+everybody, high or low, profits by smuggling; thanks to which many
+articles, and especially coffee, gunpowder and tobacco are to be had
+cheap. It may here be stated that on that wooded, broken country, where
+the meadows are surrounded by brushwood, and the lanes are dark and
+narrow, smuggling is chiefly carried on by means of sporting dogs, who
+are broken in to become smuggling dogs. Scarcely an evening passes
+without some of them being seen, loaded with contraband, trotting
+silently along, pushing their noses through a hole in a hedge, with
+furtive and uneasy looks, and sniffing the air to scent the custom-house
+officers and their dogs. These dogs also are specially trained, and are
+very ferocious, and easily rip up their unfortunate congeners, who
+become the game instead of hunting for it.
+
+Now, nobody was capable of imparting this unnatural education to them so
+well as "the man with his dogs," whose business consisted in breaking in
+dogs for the custom-house authorities, and everybody looked upon it as
+a dirty business, a business which could only be performed by a man
+without any proper feeling.
+
+"He is a men's robber," the women said, "to take honest dogs into nurse,
+and to make a lot of Judas's out of them."
+
+While the boys shouted insulting verses behind his back, the men and the
+women abused him, but no one ventured to do it to his face, for he was
+not very patient, and was always accompanied by one of his huge dogs,
+and that served to make him respected.
+
+Certainly, without that bodyguard, he would have had a bad time of it,
+especially at the hands of the smugglers, who had a deadly hatred for
+him. By himself, and in spite of his quarrelsome looks, he did not
+appear very formidable, for he was short and thin, his back was round,
+his legs were bandy, and his arms were as long and as thin as spiders'
+legs, and he could easily have been knocked down by a back-handed blow
+or a kick. But then, he had those confounded dogs which interfered with
+the bravest smugglers. How could they risk even a thrust when he had
+those huge brutes, with their fierce and bloodshot eyes, and their
+square heads, whose jaws were like a vise, with enormous white teeth,
+that were as sharp as daggers, and whose huge molars crunched up
+beef-bones to a pulp with them? They were wonderfully broken in, were
+always by him, obeyed him by signs, and were taught, not only to worry
+the smugglers' dogs, but also to fly at the throats of the smugglers
+themselves.
+
+The consequence was that both he and his dogs were left alone, and
+people were satisfied in calling them names and sending them all to
+Coventry. No peasant ever set foot in his cottage, although Bistaud's
+wife kept a small shop and was a handsome woman, and the only persons
+who went there were the custom-house officers. The others took their
+revenge on them all by saying that the man with the dogs sold his wife
+to the custom-house officers, like he did his dogs.
+
+"He keeps her for them, as well as his dogs," they said jeeringly. "You
+can see that he is a born cuckold with his yellow beard and eyebrows,
+which stick up like a pair of horns."
+
+His hair was certainly red, or rather yellow, his thick eyebrows were
+turned up in two points on his temples, and he used to twirl them
+mechanically as if they had been a pair of moustaches. And certainly,
+with his hair like that, and with his long beard and shaggy eyebrows,
+with his sallow face, blinking eyes, and dull looks, with his dogged
+mouth, thin lips, and his miserable, deformed body, he was not a
+pleasing object.
+
+But he assuredly was not a complaisant cuckold, and those who have said
+that of him had never seen him at home. On the contrary, he was always
+jealous, and kept as sharp a lookout on his wife as he did on his dogs,
+and if he had broken her in at all, it was to be as faithful to him as
+they were.
+
+She was a handsome, and what they call in the country, a fine body of a
+woman; tall, well-built, with a full bust and broad breech, and she
+certainly made more than one excise man squint at her, but it was no use
+for them to come and sniff round her too closely, or else there would
+have been blows. At least, that is what the custom-house officers said
+when anybody joked with them and said to them: "That does not matter, no
+doubt, you and she have hunted for your fleas together."
+
+It was no use for them to defend Madame Bistaud's fierce virtue; nobody
+believed them, and the only answer they got was: "You are hiding your
+game, and are ashamed of going to seduce a woman who belongs to such a
+wretched creature."
+
+And, certainly, nobody would have believed that such a buxom woman, who
+looked as if her crupper were as warm as her looks, and who assuredly
+must have liked to be well attended to, could be satisfied with such a
+puny husband; with such an ugly, weak, red-headed fellow, who smelled of
+his own hair and of the mustiness of the carrion which he gave to his
+hounds.
+
+But they did not know that "the man with the dogs" had some years before
+given her, once for all, a lesson in fidelity, and that for a mere
+trifle, and that for a venial sin! He had surprised her for allowing
+herself to be kissed by some gallant; that was all! He had not taken any
+notice, but when the man was gone he brought two of his hounds into the
+room, and said:
+
+"If you do not want them to tear your inside out as they would a
+rabbit's, go down on your knees so that I may thrash you!"
+
+She obeyed in terror, and "the man with the dogs" had beaten her with a
+whip until his arm dropped with fatigue. And she did not venture to
+scream, although she was bleeding under the blows of the thong, which
+tore her dress, and cut into the flesh; all she dared to do was to utter
+low, hoarse groans; for while beating her, he kept on saying:
+
+"Don't make a noise, by ----; don't make a noise, or I will let the dogs
+fly at your stern."
+
+From that time she had been faithful to Bistaud, though she had
+naturally not told anyone the reason for it, nor for her hatred either,
+not even Bistaud himself, who thought that she was subdued for all time,
+and who always found her very submissive and respectful. But for six
+years she had nourished her hatred in her heart, feeding it on silent
+hopes and promises of revenge. And it was that flame of hope and that
+longing for revenge which made her so coquettish with the custom-house
+officers, for she hoped to find a possible avenger among her inflammable
+admirers.
+
+At last she came across the right man. He was a splendid sub-officer of
+the customs, built like a Hercules, with fists like a butcher's, and who
+had long leased four of his ferocious dogs from her husband.
+
+As soon as they had grown accustomed to their new master, and especially
+after they had tasted flesh of the smugglers' dogs, they had, by
+degrees, become detached from their former master, who had reared them.
+No doubt they still recognized him a little, and would not have sprung
+at his throat as if he had been a perfect stranger, but still, they did
+not hesitate between his voice and that of their new master, and they
+obeyed the latter only.
+
+Although the woman had often noticed this, she had not hitherto been
+able to make much use of the circumstance. A custom-house officer, as a
+rule, only keeps one dog, and this fellow always had half-a-dozen, at
+least, in training, without reckoning a personal guard which he kept for
+himself and which was the fiercest of all. Consequently, any duel
+between some lover assisted by only one dog, and the dog-breaker
+defended by his pack, was impossible.
+
+But on that occasion, the chances were more equal. Just then he had only
+five dogs in the kennel, and two of them were quite young, though
+certainly old _Bourreau_[6] counted for several, but after all, they
+could risk a battle against him and the other three, with the two
+couples of the custom-house officer, and they must profit by the
+occasion.
+
+[Footnote 6: Executioner, hangman.]
+
+And one fine evening, as the brigadier of the custom-house officers was
+alone in the shop with Bistaud's wife and was squeezing her waist, she
+said to him abruptly:
+
+"Do you really want to have something to do with me, _Mossieu_[7]
+Fernand?"
+
+[Footnote 7: Vulgar for Monsieur.]
+
+He kissed her on the lips as he replied: "Do I really want to? I would
+give my stripes for it; so you see...."
+
+"Very well," she replied, "do as I tell you, and upon my word, as an
+honest woman, I will be your commodity to do what you like with."
+
+And laying a stress on that word _commodity_, which in that part of the
+country means mistress, she whispered hotly into his ear:
+
+"A commodity who knows her business, I can tell you, for my beast of a
+husband has trained me up in such a way that I am now absolutely
+disgusted with him."
+
+Fernand, who was much excited, promised her everything that she wished,
+and feverishly, malignantly, she told him how shamefully her husband had
+treated her a short time before, how her fair skin had been cut, told
+him her hatred and thirst for revenge; and the brigadier acquiesced, and
+that same evening he came to the cottage accompanied by his four hounds,
+with their spiked collars on.
+
+"What are you going to do with them?" "the man with the dogs" asked.
+
+"I have come to see whether you did not rob me when you sold them to
+me," the brigadier replied.
+
+"What do you mean by 'robbed you'?"
+
+"Well, robbed! I have been told that they could not tackle a dog like
+your _Bourreau_, and that many smugglers have dogs who are as good as he
+is."
+
+"Impossible."
+
+"Well, in case any of them should have one, I should like to see how the
+dogs that you sold me could tackle them."
+
+The woman laughed an evil laugh, and her husband grew suspicious, when
+he saw that the brigadier replied to it by a wink. But his suspicions
+came too late. The _breaker_ had no time to go to the kennel to let out
+his pack, for _Bourreau_ had been seized by the custom-house officer's
+four dogs. At the same time the woman locked the door, and already her
+husband was lying motionless on the floor, while _Bourreau_ could not go
+to his assistance, as he had enough to do to defend himself against the
+furious attack of the other dogs, who were almost tearing him to pieces,
+in spite of his strength and courage. Five minutes later two of the
+attacking hounds were totally disabled with the bowels protruding, but
+_Bourreau_ himself was dying, with his throat gaping.
+
+Then the woman and the custom-house officer kissed each other before the
+breaker whom they bound firmly, while the two dogs of the custom-house
+officer, that were still on their legs, were panting for breath, and the
+other three were wallowing in their own blood, and while the amorous
+couple were carrying on all sorts of capers, who were still further
+excited by the rage of the dog-breaker, who was forced to look at them,
+and who shouted in his despair:
+
+"You wretches! You shall pay for this!" And the woman's only reply was,
+to say: "Cuckold! Cuckold! Cuckold!"
+
+When she was tired of larking, her hatred was not yet satisfied, and she
+said to the brigadier:
+
+"Fernand, go to the kennels and shoot the five other brutes; otherwise
+he will make them kill me to-morrow. Off you go, old fellow!"
+
+The brigadier obeyed, and immediately five shots were heard in the
+darkness. It did not take long, but that short time had been enough for
+"the man with the dogs" to show what he could do. While he was tied, the
+two dogs of the custom-house officer had gradually recognized him, and
+came and fondled him, and as soon as he was alone with his wife, as she
+was insulting him, he said, in his usual voice of command to the dogs:
+
+"At her, Flanbard! At her, Garou!" And the two dogs sprang at the
+wretched woman, and one seized her by the throat, while the other caught
+her by the side.
+
+When the brigadier came back, she was dying on the ground in a pool of
+blood, and "the man with the dogs" said with a laugh: "There, you see,
+that is the way I break in my dogs!"
+
+The custom-house officer rushed out in horror, followed by his hounds
+who licked his hands as they ran, and made them quite red.
+
+The next morning "the man with the dogs" was found still bound, but
+chuckling, in his hovel that was turned into a slaughter-house.
+
+They were both arrested and tried, when "the man with the dogs" was
+acquitted, and the brigadier sentenced to a term of imprisonment. The
+matter gave much food for talk in the district, and is, indeed, still
+talked about, for "the man with the dogs" returned there, and is more
+celebrated than ever under his nickname, but his celebrity is not of a
+bad kind, for he is now just as much respected and liked as he was
+despised and hated formerly. He is still, as a matter of fact, "the man
+with the dogs," as he is rightly called, for he has not his equal as a
+dog-breaker for leagues around, but now he no longer breaks in mastiffs,
+as he has given up teaching honest dogs to "act the part of Judas," as
+he says, for those dirty custom-house officers, and now he only devotes
+himself to dogs to be used for smuggling, and he is worth listening to
+when he says:
+
+"You may depend upon it, that I know how to punish such commodities as
+she was, where they have sinned!"
+
+
+
+
+THE CLOWN
+
+
+The hawkers' cottage stood at the end of the Esplanade, on the little
+promontory where the jetty is, where all the winds, all the rain, and
+all the spray met. The hut, both walls and roof, was built of old
+planks, more or less covered with tar, whose chinks were stopped with
+oakum, and dry wreckage was heaped up against it. In the middle of the
+room an iron pot stood on two bricks, and served as a stove, when they
+had any coal, but as there was no chimney, it filled the room, which was
+ventilated only by a low door, with smoke, and there the whole crew
+lived, eighteen men and one woman. Some had undergone various terms of
+imprisonment, and nobody knew what the others were, but though they were
+all, more or less, suffering from some physical defect and were nearly
+old men, they were still all strong enough for hauling. For the "Chamber
+of Commerce" tolerated them there, and allowed them that hovel to live
+in, on condition that they should be ready to haul, by day and by night.
+
+For every vessel they hauled, each got a penny by day and two-pence by
+night, but that was not certain, on account of the competition of
+retired sailors, fishermen's wives, laborers who had nothing to do, but
+who were all stronger than those half-starved wretches in the hut.
+
+And yet they lived there, those eighteen men and one woman. Were they
+happy? Certainly not. Hopeless? Not that, either; for they occasionally
+got a little besides their scanty pay, and then they stole occasionally,
+fish, lumps of coal, things without any value to those who lost them,
+but of great value to the poor, beggarly thieves.
+
+The eighteen kept the woman, and there was no jealousy on her account.
+She had no special favorite among them.
+
+She was a fat woman of about forty, chubby faced and puffy, and of whom
+Daddy La Bretagne, who was one of the eighteen, used to say: "She does
+us honor."
+
+If she had had a favorite among them, Daddy La Bretagne would certainly
+have had the greatest right to that privilege, for although he was one
+of the most crippled among them, as he was partially paralyzed in his
+legs, he showed himself skillful and strong-armed as any of them, and in
+spite of his infirmities, he always managed to secure a good place in
+the row of haulers. None of them knew as well as he did how to inspire
+visitors with pity during the season, and to make them put their hands
+into the pockets, and he was a past master at cadging, so that among
+those empty stomachs and penniless rascals he had windfalls of victuals
+and coppers more frequently than fell to his share. But he did not make
+use of them in order to monopolize their common mistress.
+
+"I am just," he used to say. "Let each of us have his spoonful in turn,
+and no more, when we are all eating out of the same dish."
+
+With the coal he picked up, he used to make a good fire for the whole
+band under the iron pot, in which he cooked whatever he brought home
+with him, without any complaining about it, for he used to say:
+
+"It gives you a good fire in which to warm yourselves, for nothing, and
+the smell of my stew into the bargain."
+
+As for his money, he spent in drink with the trollop, and afterwards,
+what was left of it, with the other eighteen.
+
+"You see," he used to say, "I am just, and more than just. I give her up
+to you, because it is your right."
+
+The consequence was that they all liked Daddy La Bretagne, so that he
+gloried in it, and said proudly:
+
+"What a pity that we are living under the Republic! These fellows would
+think nothing of making me king."
+
+And one day, when he said this, his trollop replied: "The king is here,
+old fellow!" And at the same time she presented a new comrade to them,
+who was no less ragged or wretched looking than the eighteen, but quite
+young by the size of him. He was a tall, thin fellow of about forty, and
+without a white streak in his long hair. He was dressed only in a pair
+of trousers and a shirt, which he wore outside them, like a blouse, and
+the trollop said:
+
+"Here, Daddy La Bretagne, you have two knitted vests on, so just give
+him one."
+
+"Why should I?" the hauler asked.
+
+"Because I choose you to," the woman replied. "I have been living with
+you set of old men for a long time, so now I want to have a young one;
+there he is, so you must give him a vest, and keep him here, or I shall
+throw you up. You may take it or leave it, as you like. Do you
+understand me?"
+
+The eighteen looked at each other open-mouthed, and good Daddy La
+Bretagne scratched his head, and then said:
+
+"What she asks is quite right, and we must give way," he replied.
+
+Then they explained themselves, and came to an understanding. The poor
+devil did not come like a conqueror, for he was a wretched clown who had
+just been released from prison, where he had undergone three years' hard
+labor for an attempted outrage on a girl, but, with one exception, the
+best fellow in the world, so the people declared.
+
+"And something nice for me," the trollop added, "for I can assure you
+that I mean him to reward me for anything I may do for him."
+
+From that time the household of eighteen persons consisted of nineteen,
+and at first all went well. The clown was very humble, and tried not to
+be burdensome to them. Fed, clothed and supplied with tobacco, he tried
+not to be too exacting in the other matter, and if needful, he would
+have hauled like the others, but the woman would not allow it.
+
+"You shall not fatigue yourself, my little man," she said. "You must
+reserve yourself entirely for me."
+
+And he did as she wished.
+
+And soon, the eighteen, who had never been jealous of each other, grew
+jealous of the favored lover. Some tried to pick a quarrel with him. He
+resisted. The best fellow in the world, no doubt, but he was not going
+to be taken for a mussel shut up in its shell, for all that. Let them
+call him as lazy as a priest if they liked; he did not mind that, but
+when they put hairs into his coffee, armsful of rushes among his
+wreckage, and filth into his soup, they had better look out!
+
+"None of that, all the lot of you, or you will see what I can do," he
+used to say.
+
+They repeated the practical jokes, however, and he thrashed them. He did
+not try to find out who the culprits were, but attacked the first one he
+met, so much the worse for him. With a kick from his wooden clog (it was
+his specialty) he smashed their noses into a pulp, and having thus
+acquired the knowledge of his strength, and urged on by his trollop, he
+soon became a tyrant. The eighteen felt that they were slaves, and their
+former paradise where concord and perfect equality had reigned, became a
+hell, and that state of things could not last.
+
+"Ah!" Daddy La Bretagne growled, "if only I were twenty years younger I
+would nearly kill him! I have my Breton's hot head still, but my
+confounded legs are no good any longer."
+
+And he boldly challenged the clown to a duel, in which the latter was to
+have his legs tied, and then both of them were to sit on the ground and
+hack at each other with knives.
+
+"Such a duel would be perfectly fair!" he replied, kicking him in the
+side with one of his clogs, and the woman burst out laughing, and said:
+
+"At any rate, you cannot compete with him on equal terms as regards
+myself, so do not worry yourself about it."
+
+Daddy La Bretagne was lying in his corner and spitting blood, and none
+of the rest spoke. What could the others do, when he, the blustering of
+them all, had been served so? The jade had been right when she had
+brought in the intruder, and said:
+
+"The king is here, old fellow."
+
+Only, she ought to have remembered that, after all, she alone kept her
+subjects in check, and as Daddy La Bretagne said, by a right object.
+With her to console them, they would no doubt have borne anything, but
+she was foolish enough to cut down their food, and not to fill their
+common dish as full as it used to be. She wanted to keep everything for
+her lover, and that raised the exasperation of the eighteen to its
+height, and so one night when she and the clown were asleep, among all
+these fasting men, the eighteen threw themselves upon them. They wrapped
+the despot's arms and legs up in tarpaulin, and in the presence of the
+woman, who was firmly bound, they flogged him till he was black and
+blue.
+
+"Yes," old Bretagne said to me, himself, "yes, Monsieur, that was our
+revenge. The king was guillotined in 1793, and so we guillotined our
+king also."
+
+And he concluded with a sneer, and said: "Ah! We wished to be just, and
+as it was not his head that had made him our king, so, by Jove, we
+settled him."
+
+
+
+
+BABETTE
+
+
+I was not very fond of going to inspect that asylum for old, infirm
+men, officially, as I was obliged to go over it in company of the
+superintendent, who was talkative, and a statistician. But then, the
+grandson of the foundress accompanied us, who was evidently pleased at
+that minute inspection, and he was a charming man, and the owner of a
+large forest, where he had given me permission to shoot, and I was, of
+course, obliged to pretend to be interested in his grandmother's
+philanthropic work. So with a smile on my lips I endured the
+superintendent's interminable discourse, punctuating it here and there,
+as best I could, by a:
+
+"Ah! really! ... Very strange, indeed! ... I should never have believed
+it! ..."
+
+I was absolutely ignorant of the matter to which I replied thus, for my
+thoughts were lulled to repose by the constant humming of our loquacious
+guide. I was only vaguely conscious that no doubt the persons and things
+would have appeared worthy of attention to me if I had been there alone
+as an idler, for in that case, I should certainly have asked the
+superintendent:
+
+"Who is this Babette, whose name appears so constantly in the complaints
+of so many of the inmates?"
+
+Quite a dozen men and women had spoken to us about her, now to complain
+of her, now to praise her; and especially the women, as soon as they saw
+the superintendent, cried out:
+
+"M'sieur, Babette has again been ..."
+
+"There! that will do, that will do!" he interrupted them, his gentle
+voice suddenly becoming harsh.
+
+At other times he would amicably question some old man with a happy
+countenance, and say:
+
+"Well, my friend! I suppose you are very happy here?"
+
+Many replied with fervent expressions of gratitude, with which Babette's
+name was frequently mingled, and when he heard them speak so, the
+superintendent put on an ecstatic air; looking up to heaven with clasped
+hands, he said, slowly shaking his head: "Ah! Babette is a very precious
+woman, very precious!"
+
+Yes, it would certainly interest one to know who that creature was, but
+not under present circumstances, and so, rather than to undergo any more
+of this, I made up my mind to remain in ignorance of who Babette was,
+for I could pretty well guess what she would be like. I pictured her to
+myself as a flower that had sprung up in a corner of these dull
+courtyards, like a ray of sun shining through the sepulchral gloom of
+these dismal passages.
+
+I pictured her so clearly to myself that I did not even feel any wish to
+know her, but yet she was dear to me, because of the happy expression
+which they all put on when they spoke of her, and I was angry with the
+old women who spoke against her. One thing certainly puzzled me, and
+that was, that the superintendent was among those who went into
+ecstasies over her, and this made me strongly disinclined to question
+him about her, though I had no other reason for this feeling.
+
+But all this passed through my mind in rather a confused manner, and
+without my taking the trouble to fix or to formulate any ideas and
+sensations, for I continued to dream, rather than to think effectively,
+and it is very probable that, when my visit was over, I should not have
+remembered much about it, not even with regard to Babette, if I had not
+been suddenly awakened by the sight of her in the person, and been quite
+upset by the difference that there was between my fancy and the reality.
+
+We had just crossed a small back yard, and had gone into a very dark
+passage, when a door suddenly opened at the other end of it, and an
+unexpected apparition appeared through another door, and we could
+indistinctly see that it was the figure of a woman. At the same moment,
+the superintendent called out in a furious voice:
+
+"Babette! Babette!"
+
+He had mechanically quickened his pace, and almost ran, and we followed
+him, and he quickly opened the door through which the apparition had
+vanished, and which led on to a staircase, and he again called out, and
+a burst of stifled laughter was the only reply. I looked over the
+balusters, and saw a woman down below, who was looking at us fixedly.
+
+She was an old woman; there could be no doubt of that, from her wrinkled
+face and her few straggling gray locks which appeared under her cap. But
+one did not think of that when one saw her eyes, which were wonderfully
+youthful, for then, one saw nothing but them. They were profound eyes,
+of a deep, almost violet blue; the eyes of a child.
+
+Suddenly the superintendent called out to her: "You have been with _la
+Frieze_ again!"
+
+The old woman did not reply, but shook with laughter, as she had done
+just before, and then she ran off, giving the superintendent a look,
+which said as plainly as words could have done: "Do you think I care a
+fig for you?"
+
+Those insulting words were clearly written in her face, and at the same
+time I noticed that the old woman's eyes had utterly changed, for during
+that short moment of bravado the childish eyes had become the eyes of a
+monkey, of some ferocious, obstinate baboon.
+
+That time, in spite of any dislike to question him further, I could not
+help saying to him: "That is Babette, I suppose?"
+
+"Yes," he replied, growing rather red, as if he guessed that I
+understood the old woman's insulting looks.
+
+"Is she the woman who is so precious?" I added, with a touch of irony,
+which made him grow altogether crimson.
+
+"That is she," he said, walking on quickly, so as to escape my further
+questions.
+
+But I was egged on by curiosity, and I made a direct appeal to our
+host's complaisance. "I should like to see this _Frieze_," I said. "Who
+is _Frieze_?"
+
+He turned round and said: "Oh! nothing, nothing, he is not at all
+interesting. What is the good of seeing him? It is not worth while."
+
+And he ran downstairs, two at a time. He who was usually so delicate,
+and so very careful to explain everything, was now in a hurry to get
+finished, and our visit was cut short.
+
+The next day I had to leave that part of the country, without hearing
+anything more about Babette, but I came back about four months later,
+when the shooting season began. I had not forgotten her during that
+time, for nobody could ever forget her eyes, and so I was very glad to
+have as my traveling companion on my three hours' diligence journey from
+the station to my friend's house, a man who talked to me about her all
+the time.
+
+He was a young magistrate whom I had already met, and who had much
+interested me by his wit and his close manner of observing things, and
+by his singularly refined casuistry, and, above all, by the contrast
+between his professional severity, and his tolerant philosophy.
+
+But he never appeared so attractive to me as he did on that day, when he
+told me the history of that mysterious Babette.
+
+He had inquired into it, and had applied all his faculties as an
+examining magistrate to it, for, like me, his visit to the asylum had
+roused his curiosity. This is what he had learned and what he told me.
+
+When she was ten years old, Babette had been violated by her own father,
+and at thirteen she had been sent to the house of correction for
+vagabondage and debauchery. From the time she was twenty until she was
+forty she had been a servant in the neighborhood, frequently changing
+her situation, and being nearly everywhere her employer's mistress, and
+she had ruined several families without getting any money herself, or
+without gaining any definite position. A shopkeeper had committed
+suicide on her account, and a respectable young fellow had turned thief
+and incendiary, and had finished at the hulks.
+
+She had been married twice, and had twice been left a widow, and for ten
+years, until she was fifty, she had been the only commodity in the
+district, for pleasure, to which five villages came to amuse themselves
+on holidays.
+
+"She was very pretty, I suppose?"
+
+"No; she never was that. It seems she was short, thin, with no bust or
+hips, at her best, I am told, and nobody can remember that she was
+pretty, even when she was young."
+
+"Then how can you explain ...?"
+
+"How?" the magistrate exclaimed. "Well! what about the eyes? You could
+not have looked at them?"
+
+"Yes, yes, you are right," I replied. "Those eyes explain many things,
+certainly. They are the eyes of an innocent child."
+
+"Ah!" he exclaimed again, enthusiastically, "Cleopatra, Diana of
+Poiters, Ninon de L'Enclos, all the queens of love who were adored when
+they were growing old, must have had eyes like hers. A woman who has
+such eyes can never grow old. But if Babette lives to be a hundred, she
+will always be loved as she has been, and as she is."
+
+"As she is! Bah! By whom, pray?"
+
+"By all the old men in the asylum, by all those who have preserved a
+fiber that can be touched, a corner of their heart that can be inflamed,
+or the least spark of desire left."
+
+"Do you think so?"
+
+"I am sure of it. And the superintendent loves her more than any of them
+do."
+
+"Impossible!"
+
+"I would stake my head on it."
+
+"Well, after all, it is possible, and even probable; it is even certain.
+I now remember ..."
+
+And again I saw the insulting, ferocious, familiar look which she had
+given the superintendent.
+
+"And who is _la Frieze_?" I asked the magistrate "I suppose you know
+that also?"
+
+"He is a retired butcher, who had both his legs frozen in the war of
+1870, and whom she is very fond of. No doubt he is a cripple, with two
+wooden legs, but still a vigorous man enough, in spite of his
+fifty-three years. The loins of a Hercules and the face of a satyr. The
+superintendent is quite jealous of him!"
+
+I thought the matter over again, and it seemed very probable to me.
+"Does she love _la Frieze_?"
+
+"Yes; he is the chosen lover."
+
+When we arrived at the host's house a short time afterwards, we were
+surprised to find everybody in a terrible state of excitement. A crime
+had been committed in the asylum; the gendarmes were there and our host
+was with them, so we instantly joined them. _La Frieze_ had murdered the
+superintendent, and they gave us the details, which were horrible. The
+former butcher had hidden behind a door, and catching hold of the other,
+had rolled onto the ground with him and bitten him in the throat,
+tearing out his carotid, from which the blood spurted into the
+murderer's face.
+
+I saw him, _la Frieze_. His fat face, which had been badly washed, was
+still blood-stained; he had a low forehead, square jaws, pointed ears,
+sticking out from his head, and flat nostrils, like the muzzle of some
+wild animal; but above all, I saw Babette.
+
+She was smiling, and at that moment, her eyes had not their monkey-like
+and ferocious expression, but they were pleading and tender, with all of
+their sweetest childlike candor.
+
+"You know," my host said to me in a low voice, "that the poor woman has
+fallen into senile imbecility, and that is the cause of her looks, which
+are so strange, considering the terrible sight she has seen.
+
+"Do you think so?" the magistrate said. "You must remember that she is
+not yet sixty, and I do not think that it is a case of senile
+imbecility, but that she is quite conscious of the crime that has been
+committed."
+
+"Then why should she smile?"
+
+"Because she is pleased at what she has done."
+
+"Oh! no; you are really too subtle!"
+
+The magistrate suddenly turned to Babette, and, looking at her steadily,
+he said:
+
+"I suppose you know what has happened, and why this crime was
+committed?"
+
+She left off smiling, and her pretty, childlike eyes became her
+abominable monkey's eyes again, and then the answer was, suddenly to
+pull up her petticoats and to show us the lower part of her person. Yes,
+the magistrate had been quite right. That old woman had been a
+Cleopatra, a Diana, a Ninon de L'Enclos, and the rest of her body had
+remained like a child's, even more than her eyes. We were thunderstruck
+at the sight.
+
+"Pigs! Pigs!" _la Frieze_ shouted to us. "You also wanted to have
+something to do with her!"
+
+And I saw that actually the magistrate's face was pale and contracted,
+and that his hands and lips trembled like those of a man caught in the
+act of doing wrong.
+
+
+
+
+SYMPATHY
+
+
+He was going up the _Rue des Martyrs_ in a melancholy frame of mind, and
+in a melancholy frame of mind she also was going up the _Rue des
+Martyrs_. He was already old, nearly sixty, with a bald head under his
+seedy, tall hat, a gray beard, half buried in a high shirt collar, with
+dull eyes, an unpleasant mouth and yellow teeth.
+
+She was past forty, with thin hair over her pads, and with a false
+plait; her linen was doubtful in color, and she had evidently bought her
+unfashionable dress at a _reach-me-down shop_. He was thin, while she
+was chubby. He had been handsome, proud, ardent, full of
+self-confidence, certain of his future, and seeming to hold in his hands
+all the trumps with which to win the game on the green table of Parisian
+life, while she had been pretty, sought after, fast, and in a fair way
+to have horses and carriages, and to win the first prize on the turf of
+gallantry, among the favorites of fortune.
+
+At times, in his dark moments, he remembered the time when he had come
+to Paris from the country, with a volume of poetry and plays in his
+portmanteau, feeling a supreme contempt for all the writers who were
+then in vogue, and sure of supplanting them. She often, when she awoke
+in the morning to another day's unhappiness, remembered that happy time
+when she had been launched onto the world, when she already saw that she
+was more sought after than Marie G. or Sophie N. or any other woman of
+that class, who had been her companions in vice, and whose lovers she
+had stolen from them.
+
+He had had a splendid start. Not, indeed, as a poet and dramatist, as he
+had hoped at first, but thanks to a series of scandalous stories which
+had made a sensation on the boulevards, so that after an action for
+damages and several duels, he had become _our witty and brilliant
+colleague who, etc., etc._
+
+She had had her moments of extraordinary good luck, though she certainly
+did not eclipse Marie P. or Camille L., whom men compared to Zenobia or
+Ninon de l'Enclos, but still enough to cause her to be talked about in
+the newspapers, and to cause a resolution at certain _tables-d'hotes_ at
+Montmarte. But one fine day, the newspaper in which _our brilliant and
+witty colleague who_ ... used to write, became defunct, having been
+killed by a much more cynical rival, thanks to the much more venomous
+pen of a much more brilliant and witty colleague who .... Then, the
+insults of the latter having become pure and simple mud-pelting, his
+style soon became worn out, to the disgust of the public, and the
+celebrated _Mr. What's his name_ had great difficulty in getting onto
+some obscure paper, where he was transformed into the obscure
+penny-a-liner _Machin_.
+
+Now, one evening the quasi-rival of Marie X. and Camille L. had fallen
+ill, and consequently into pecuniary difficulties, and the prostitute
+_No-matter-who_ was now on the lookout for a dinner, and would have been
+only too happy to get it at some _table-d'hote_ at Montmarte. Machin had
+had a return of ambition with regard to his poetry and his dramas, but
+then, his verses of former days had lost their freshness, and his
+youthful dramas appeared to him to be childish. He would have to write
+others, and, by Jove! he felt himself capably of doing it, for he had
+plenty of ideas and plans in his head, and he could easily demolish many
+successful writers if he chose to try! But then, the difficulty was, how
+to set about it, and to find the necessary leisure and time for thought.
+He had his daily bread to gain, and something besides: his coffee, his
+game of cards and other little requirements; and the incessant writing
+article upon article barely sufficed for that, and so days and years
+went by, and Machin was Machin still.
+
+She also longed for former years, and surely it could not be so very
+hard to find a lover to start her on her career once more, for many of
+her female friends, who were not nearly so nice as she was, had
+unearthed one, so why should not she be equally fortunate? But there,
+her youth had gone and she had lost all her chances; other women had
+their fancy men, and she had to take them on, every day at reduced
+prices, so that she was reduced from taking up with any man she met, and
+so day after day and months and years passed, and the prostitute
+_No-matter-who_ had remained the prostitute _No-matter-who_.
+
+Often, in a fit of despondency, he used to say to himself, thinking of
+some one who had succeeded in life: "But, after all, I am cleverer than
+that fellow." And she always said to herself, when she got up to her
+miserable, daily round, when she thought of such and such a woman, who
+was now settled in life: "In what respect is that woman better than I
+am?"
+
+And Machin, who was nearly sixty, and whose head was bald under his
+shabby tall hat, and whose gray beard was half-buried in a high shirt
+collar, who had dull eyes, an unpleasant mouth and yellow teeth, was
+mad with his fellow men, while the prostitute _No-matter-who_, with
+thin hair over her pads, and with a false plait, with her linen of a
+doubtful color, and with her unfashionable dress, which she had
+evidently bought at a _reach-me-down_ shop, was enraged with society.
+
+Ah! Those miserable, dark hours, and the wretched awakenings! And that
+evening he was more than usually wretched, as he had just lost all his
+pay for the next month, that miserable screw which he earned so hardly
+by almost editing the newspaper, for three hundred francs a month, in a
+brothel.
+
+And that evening she was in a state of semi-stupidity, as she had had
+too many glasses of beer which a charitable female friend had given her,
+and was almost afraid to go back to her room, as her landlord had told
+her in the morning that unless she paid the fortnight's back rent that
+she owed at the rate of a franc a day, he would turn her out of doors
+and keep her things.
+
+And this was the reason why they were both going up the _Rue des
+Martyrs_ in a melancholy frame of mind. There was scarcely a soul in the
+muddy streets; it was getting dark, and beginning to rain, and the
+drains smelled horribly.
+
+He passed her, and in a mechanical voice she said: "Will you not come
+home with me, you handsome dark man?" "I have no money," he replied. But
+she ran after him, and catching hold of his arm, she said: "Only a
+franc; that is having it for nothing." And he turned round, looked at
+her, and seeing that she must have been pretty, and that she was still
+stout (and he was fond of fat women), he said: "Where do you live? Near
+here?" "In the _Rue Lepic_." "Why! So do I." "Then that is all right, eh?
+Come along, old fellow."
+
+He felt in his pockets and pulled out all the money he found there,
+which amounted to thirteen sous, and said: "That is all I have, upon my
+honor!" "All right," she said; "come along."
+
+And they continued their melancholy walk along the _Rue des Martyrs_,
+side by side now, but without speaking, and without guessing that their
+two existences harmonized and corresponded with each other, and that by
+huddling up together, they would be merely accomplishing the acme of
+their twin destinies.
+
+
+
+
+THE DEBT
+
+
+"Pst! Pst! Come with me, you handsome, dark fellow. I am very nice, as
+you will see. Do come up. At any rate you will be able to warm yourself,
+for I have a capital fire at home."
+
+But nothing enticed the foot-passengers, neither being called a
+handsome, dark fellow, which she applied quite impartially to old or fat
+men also, nor the promise of pleasure which was emphasized by a
+caressing ogle and smile, nor even the promise of a good fire, which was
+so attractive in the bitter December wind. And tall Fanny continued her
+useless walk, and the night advanced and foot-passengers grew scarcer.
+In another hour the streets would be absolutely deserted, and unless she
+could manage to pick up some belated drunken man, she would be obliged
+to return home alone.
+
+And yet, tall Fanny was a beautiful woman! With her head like a
+_Bacchante_, and her body like a goddess, in all the full splendor of
+her twenty-three years, she deserved something better than this
+miserable pavement, where she could not even pick up the five francs
+which she wanted for the requirements of the next day. But there! In
+this infernal Paris, in this swarming crowd of competitors who all
+jostled each other, courtesans, like artists, did not attain to eminence
+until their later years. In that they resembled precious stones, as the
+most valuable of them are those that have been set the oftenest.
+
+And that was why tall Fanny, who was later to become one of the richest
+and most brilliant stars of Parisian gallantry, was walking about the
+streets on this bitter December night, without a half-penny in her
+pocket, in spite of her head like a Bacchante, and her body like a
+goddess, and in all the full splendor of her twenty-three years.
+
+However, it was too late now to hope to meet anybody; there was not a
+single foot passenger about; the street was decidedly empty, dull and
+lifeless. Nothing was to be heard, except the whistling of sudden gusts
+of wind, and nothing was to be seen, except the flickering gas lights,
+which looked like dying butterflies. Well! The only thing was to return
+home alone.
+
+But suddenly, tall Fanny saw a human form standing on the pavement at
+the next crossing, and whoever it was, seemed to be hesitating and
+uncertain which way to go. The figure, which was very small and slight,
+was wrapped in a long cloak, which reached almost to the ground.
+
+"Perhaps he is a hunchback," the girl said to herself. "They like tall
+women!" And she walked quickly towards him, from habit, already saying:
+"_Pst! Pst!_ Come home with me, you handsome, dark fellow!" What luck!
+The man did not go away, but came towards Fanny, although somewhat
+timidly, while she went to meet him, repeating her wheedling words, so
+as to reassure him. She went all the quicker, as she saw that he was
+staggering with the zig-zag walk of a drunken man, and she thought to
+herself: "When once they sit down, there is no possibility of getting
+these beggars up again, and they want to go to sleep just where they
+are. I only hope I shall get to him before he tumbles down."
+
+Luckily she reached him, just in time to catch him in her arms, but as
+soon as she had done so, she almost let him fall, in her astonishment.
+It was neither a drunken man nor a hunchback, but a child of twelve or
+thirteen in an overcoat, who was crying, and who said in a weak voice:
+"I beg your pardon, madame, I beg your pardon. If you only knew how
+hungry and cold I am! I beg your pardon! Oh! I am so cold."
+
+"Poor child!" she said, putting her arms around him and kissing him.
+And she carried him off, with a full, but happy heart, and while he
+continued to sob, she said to him mechanically: "Don't be frightened, my
+little man. You will see how nice I can be! And then, you can warm
+yourself; I have a capital fire." But the fire was out; the room,
+however, was warm, and the child said, as soon as they got in: "Oh! How
+comfortable it is here! It is a great deal better than in the streets, I
+can tell you! And I have been living in the streets for six days." He
+began to cry again, and added: "I beg your pardon, madame. I have eaten
+nothing for two days."
+
+Tall Fanny opened her cupboard, which had glass doors. The middle shelf
+held all her linen, and on the upper one there was a box of Albert
+biscuits, a drop of brandy at the bottom of a bottle, and a few small
+lumps of sugar in a cup. With that, and some water out of the bottle,
+she concocted a sort of broth, which he swallowed ravenously, and when
+he had done, he wished to tell his story, which he did, yawning all the
+time.
+
+His grandfather, (the only one of his relations whom he had ever known,)
+who had been painter and decorator at Soisson, had died about a month
+before; but before his death he had said to him: "When I am gone,
+little man, you will find a letter to my brother, who is in business in
+Paris, among my papers. You must take it to him, and he will be certain
+to take care of you. However, in any case you must go to Paris, for you
+have an aptitude for painting, and only there can you hope to become an
+artist."
+
+When the old man was dead (he died in the hospital), the child started,
+dressed in an old coat of his grandfather's and with thirty francs,
+which was all that the old man had left behind him in his pocket. But
+when he got to Paris, there was nobody of the name at the address
+mentioned on the letter. The dead man's brother had left there six
+months before, and nobody knew where he had gone to, and so the child
+was alone, and for a few days he managed to exist on what he had over,
+after paying for his journey. After he had spent his last franc, he had
+wandered about the streets, as he had no money with which to pay for a
+bed, buying his bread by the half-penny-worth, until for the last
+forty-eight hours, he had been without anything, absolutely without
+anything.
+
+He told her all this while he was half asleep, amidst sobs and yawns, so
+that the girl did not venture to ask him any more questions, in spite of
+her curiosity, but, on the contrary, cut him short, and undressed him
+while she listened, and only interrupted him to kiss him, and to say to
+him: "There, there, my poor child! You shall tell me the rest to-morrow.
+You cannot go on now, so go to bed and have a good sleep." And as soon
+as he had finished, she put him to bed, where he immediately fell into a
+profound sleep. Then she undressed herself quickly, got into bed by his
+side, so she might keep him warm, and went to sleep, crying to herself,
+without exactly knowing why.
+
+The next day they breakfasted and dined together at a common eating
+house, on money that she had borrowed, and when it was dark, she said to
+the child: "Wait for me here; I will come for you at closing time." She
+came back sooner, however about ten o'clock. She had twelve francs,
+which she gave him, telling him that she had _earned them_, and she
+continued, with a laugh: "I feel that I shall make some more. I am in
+luck this evening, and you have brought it me. Do not be impatient, but
+have some milk-posset while you are waiting for me."
+
+She kissed him before she went, and the kind girl felt real maternal
+happiness as she went out. An hour later, however, she was _run in_ by
+the police for having been found in a prohibited place, and off she
+went, game for _St. Lazare_[8].
+
+[Footnote 8: Prison in Paris.]
+
+And the child, who was turned out by the proprietor at closing time, and
+then driven from the furnished lodgings the next morning, where they
+told him that _Tall Fanny was in quod_, began his wretched vagabond life
+in the streets again, with only the twelve francs to depend on.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Fifteen years afterwards the newspapers announced one morning that the
+famous Fanny Clairet, the celebrated _horizontal_, whose caprices had
+caused a revolution in high life, that queen of frail beauties for whom
+three men had committed suicide, and so many others had ruined
+themselves, that incomparable living statue, who had attracted all Paris
+to the theater where she impersonated Venus in her transparent skin
+tights, made of woven air and knitted nothing had been shut up in a
+lunatic asylum. She had been seized suddenly; it was an attack of general
+paralysis, and as her debts were enormous, when her estate had been
+liquidated, she would have to end her days at _La Salpetriere_.
+
+"No, certainly not!" Francois Guerland, the painter, said to himself,
+when he read the notice of it in the papers. "No, the great Fanny shall
+certainly not end like that." For it was certainly she; there could be
+no doubt about it. For a long time after she had shown him that act of
+charity, which he could never forget, the child had tried to see his
+benefactress again. But Paris is a very mysterious place, and he himself
+had had many adventures before he grew up to be a man, and, eventually,
+almost somebody! But he only found her in the distance; he had
+recognized her at the theater, on the stage, or as she was getting into
+her carriage, which was fit for a princess. And how could he approach
+her then? Could he remind her of the time when her price was five
+francs? No, assuredly not; and so he had followed her, thanked her, and
+blessed her, from a distance.
+
+But now the time had come for him to pay his debt, and he paid it.
+Although tolerably well known as a painter with a future in store for
+him, he was not rich. But what did that matter? He mortgaged that future
+which people prophesied for him, and gave himself over, bound hand and
+foot, to a picture dealer. Then he had the poor woman taken to an
+excellent asylum, where she could have not only every care, but every
+necessary comfort and even luxury. Alas! however, general paralysis
+never forgives. Sometimes it releases its prey, like the cruel cat
+releases the mouse, for a brief moment, only to lay hold of it again
+later, more fiercely than ever. Fanny had that period of abatement in
+her symptoms, and one morning the physician was able to say to the young
+man: "You are anxious to remove her? Very well! But you will soon have
+to bring her back, for the cure is only apparent, and her present state
+will only endure for a month, at most, and then, only if the patient is
+kept free from every excitement and excess!"
+
+"And without that precaution?" Guerland asked him. "Then," the doctor
+replied; "the final crisis will be all the nearer; that is all. But
+whether it would be nearer or more remote, it will not be the less
+fatal." "You are sure of that?" "Absolutely sure."
+
+Francois Guerland took tall Fanny out of the asylum, installed her in
+splendid apartments, and went to live with her there. She had grown old,
+bloated, with white hair, and sometimes wandered in her mind, and she
+did not recognize in him the poor little lad on whom she had taken pity
+in the days gone by, nor did he remind her of the circumstance. He
+allowed her to believe that she was adored by a rich young man, who was
+passionately devoted to her. He was young, ardent, and caressing. Never
+had a mistress such a lover, and for three weeks, before she relapsed
+into the horrors of madness, which were happily soon terminated by her
+death, she intoxicated herself with the ecstasy of his kisses, and thus
+bade farewell to conscient life in an apotheosis of love.
+
+The other day, at dessert, after an artists' dinner, they were speaking
+of Francois Guerland, whose last picture at the _Salon_ had been so
+deservedly praised. "Ah! yes," one of them said, with a contemptuous
+voice and look. "That handsome fellow Guerland!" And another,
+accentuating the insinuation, added boldly: "Yes, that is exactly it!
+That handsome, too handsome fellow Guerland, the man who allows himself
+to be kept by women."
+
+
+
+
+AN ARTIST
+
+
+"Bah! Monsieur," the old mountebank said to me; "it is a matter of
+exercise and habit, that is all! Of course, one requires to be a little
+gifted that way, and not to be butter-fingered, but what is chiefly
+necessary is patience and daily practice for long, long years."
+
+His modesty surprised me all the more, because of all those performers
+who are generally infatuated with their own skill, he was the most
+wonderfully clever one that I had ever met. Certainly, I had frequently
+seen him, and everybody had seen him in some circus or other, or even in
+traveling shows, performing the trick that consists of putting a man or
+a woman with extended arms against a wooden target, and in throwing
+knives between their fingers and round their head, from a distance.
+There is nothing very extraordinary in it, after all, when one knows
+_the tricks of the trade_, and that the knives are not the least sharp,
+and stick into the wood at some distance from the flesh. It is the
+rapidity of the throws, the glitter of the blades, the curve which the
+handles make towards their living aim, which give an air of danger to an
+exhibition that has become common-place, and only requires very middling
+skill.
+
+But here there was no trick and no deception, and no dust thrown into
+the eyes. It was done in good earnest and in all sincerity. The knives
+were as sharp as razors, and the old mountebank planted them close to
+the flesh, exactly in the angle between the fingers, and surrounded the
+head with a perfect halo of knives, and the neck with a collar, from
+which nobody could have extricated himself without cutting his carotid
+artery, while to increase the difficulty, the old fellow went through
+the performance without seeing, his whole face being covered with a
+close mask of thick oil-cloth.
+
+Naturally, like other great artists, he was not understood by the crowd,
+who confounded him with vulgar tricksters, and his mask only appeared to
+them a trick the more, and a very common trick into the bargain. "He
+must think us very stupid," they said. "How could he possibly aim
+without having his eyes open?" And they thought there must be
+imperceptible holes in the oil-cloth, a sort of lattice work concealed
+in the material. It was useless for him to allow the public to examine
+the mask for themselves before the exhibition began. It was all very
+well that they could not discover any trick, but they were only all the
+more convinced that they were being tricked. Did not the people know
+that they ought to be tricked?
+
+I had recognized a great artist in the old mountebank, and I was quite
+sure that he was altogether incapable of any trickery, and I told him
+so, while expressing my admiration to him; and he had been touched, both
+by my admiration, and above all by the justice I had done him. Thus we
+became good friends, and he explained to me, very modestly, the real
+trick which the crowd cannot understand, the eternal trick compromised
+in these simple words: "To be gifted by nature, and to practice every
+day for long, long years."
+
+He had been especially struck by the certainty which expressed, that any
+trickery must become impossible to him. "Yes," he said to me; "quite
+impossible! Impossible to a degree which you cannot imagine. If I were
+to tell you! But where would be the use?"
+
+His face clouded over, and his eyes filled with tears, but I did not
+venture to force myself into his confidence. My looks, however, were no
+doubt not so discreet as my silence, and begged him to speak, and so he
+responded to their mute appeal. "After all," he said: "why should I not
+tell you about it? You will understand me." And he added, with a look of
+sudden ferocity: "She understood it at any rate!" "Who?" I asked. "My
+unfaithful wife," he replied. "Ah! Monsieur, what an abominable creature
+she was, if you only knew! Yes, she understood it too well, too well,
+and that is why I hate her so; even more on that account, than for
+having deceived me. For that is a natural fault, is it not, and may be
+pardoned? But the other thing was a crime, a horrible crime."
+
+The woman who stood against the wooden target every night with her arms
+stretched out and her fingers extended, and whom the old mountebank
+fitted with gloves and with a halo formed of his knives which were as
+sharp as razors, and which he planted close to her, was his wife. She
+might have been a woman of forty, and must have been fairly pretty, but
+with perverse prettiness, an impudent mouth, a mouth that was at the
+same time sensual and bad, with the lower lip too thick for the thin,
+dry upper lip.
+
+I had several times noticed that every time he planted a knife in the
+board, she uttered a laugh, so low as scarcely to be heard, but which
+was very significant when one heard it, for it was a hard and very
+mocking laugh, but I had always attributed that sort of reply to an
+artifice which the occasion required. It was intended, I thought, to
+accentuate the danger she incurred and the contempt that she felt for
+it, thanks to the sureness of the thrower's hands, and so I was very
+surprised when the mountebank said to me:
+
+"Have you observed her laugh, I say? Her evil laugh which makes fun of
+me, and her cowardly laugh, which defies me? Yes, cowardly, because she
+knows nothing can happen to her, nothing, in spite of all she deserves,
+in spite of all that I ought to do to her, in spite of all that I want
+to do to her." "What do you want to do?" "Confound it! Cannot you guess?
+I want ... to kill her," "To kill her, because she has ..." "Because she
+has deceived me? No, no, not that, I tell you again. I have forgiven her
+for that, a long time ago, and I am too much accustomed to it! But the
+worst of it is, that the first time I forgave her, when I told her that
+all the same, I might some day have my revenge by cutting her throat, if
+I chose, without seeming to do it on purpose, as if it were an accident,
+mere awkwardness." "Oh! So you said that to her?" "Of course I did, and
+I meant it. I thought I might be able to do it, for you see I had the
+perfect right to do so. It was so simple, so easy, so tempting! Just
+think! A mistake of less than half an inch, and her skin would be cut at
+the neck where the jugular vein is, and the jugular would be severed. My
+knives cut very well! And when once the jugular is cut ... good-by. The
+blood would spurt out, and one, two, three red jets, and all would be
+over; she would be dead, and I should have had my revenge!"
+
+"That is true, certainly, horribly true!" "And without any risk to me,
+eh? An accident, that is all; bad luck, one of those mistakes which
+happen every day in our business. What could they accuse me of? Whoever
+would think of accusing me, even? Homicide through imprudence, that
+would be all! They would even pity me, rather than accuse me. 'My wife!
+My poor wife!' I should say, sobbing. 'My wife, who is so necessary to
+me, who is half the bread-winner, who takes part in my performance!' You
+must acknowledge that I should be pitied!"
+
+"Certainly; there is not the least doubt about that." "And you must
+allow that such a revenge would be a very nice revenge, the best
+possible revenge, which I could have with assured impunity?" "Evidently
+that is so." "Very well! But when I told her so, just as I have told
+you, and better still; threatening her, as I was mad with rage, and
+ready to do the deed that I had dreamt of, on the spot; what do you
+think she said?" "That you were a good fellow, and would certainly not
+have the atrocious courage to ..."
+
+"Tut! tut! tut! I am not such a good fellow as you think. I am not
+frightened of blood, and that I have proved already, though it would be
+useless to tell you how and where. But I had no necessity to prove it to
+her, for she knows that I am capable of a good many things; even of
+crime; especially of a crime." "And she was not frightened?" "No. She
+merely replied that I could not do what I said; you understand." "That I
+could not do it!" "Why not?" "Ah! Monsieur, so you do not understand? Why
+do you not? Have I not explained to you by what constant, long, daily
+practice I have learnt to plant my knives without seeing what I am
+doing?" "Yes, well, what then?" "Well! Cannot you understand what she
+has understood with such terrible results, that now my hand would no
+longer obey me, if I wished to make a mistake as I threw?" "Is it
+possible?" "Nothing is truer, I am sorry to say. For I really have
+wished to have my revenge, which I have dreamt of, and which I thought
+so easy. Exasperated by that bad woman's insolence and confidence in her
+own safety, I have several times made up my mind to kill her, and have
+exerted all my energy and all my skill, to make my knives fly aside when
+I threw them to make a border round her neck. I tried with all my might
+to make them deviate half an inch, just enough to cut her throat. I
+wanted to, and I have never succeeded, never. And always the horrible
+laugh makes fun of me, always, always."
+
+And with a deluge of tears, with something like a roar of unsatiated and
+muzzled rage, he ground his teeth as he wound up: "She knows me, the
+jade; she is in the secret of my work, of my patience, of my trick,
+routine, whatever you may call it! She lives in my innermost being, and
+sees into it more closely than you do, or than I do myself. She knows
+what a faultless machine I have become, the machine of which she makes
+fun, the machine which is too well wound up, the machine which cannot
+get out of order, and she knows that I _cannot_ make a mistake."
+
+
+
+
+MADEMOISELLE FIFI
+
+
+The Major, Graf von Farlsberg, the Prussian commandant, was reading his
+newspaper, lying back in a great armchair, with his booted feet on the
+beautiful marble fire-place, where his spurs had made two holes, which
+grew deeper every day, during the three months that he had been in the
+chateau of Urville.
+
+A cup of coffee was smoking on a small, inlaid table, which was stained
+with liquors, burnt by cigars, notched by the pen-knife of the
+victorious officer, who occasionally would stop while sharpening a
+pencil, to jot down figures, or to make a drawing on it, just as it took
+his fancy.
+
+When he had read his letters and the German newspapers, which his
+baggage-master had brought him, he got up, and after throwing three or
+four enormous pieces of green wood on to the fire, for those gentlemen
+were gradually cutting down the park in order to keep themselves warm,
+he went to the window. The rain was descending in torrents, a regular
+Normandy rain, which looked as if it were being poured out by some
+furious hand, a slanting rain, which was as thick as a curtain, and
+which formed a kind of wall with oblique stripes, and which deluged
+everything, a regular rain, such as one frequently experiences in the
+neighborhood of Rouen, which is the watering-pot of France.
+
+For a long time the officer looked at the sodden turf, and at the
+swollen Andelle beyond it, which was overflowing its banks; and he was
+drumming a waltz from the Rhine on the window-panes, with his fingers,
+when a noise made him turn round; it was his second in command, Captain
+Baron von Kelweinstein.
+
+The major was a giant, with broad shoulders, and a long, fair-like
+beard, which hung like a cloth on his chest. His whole, solemn person
+suggested the idea of a military peacock, a peacock who was carrying his
+tail spread out on to his breast. He had cold, gentle, blue eyes, and
+the scar from a sword-cut, which he had received in the war with
+Austria; he was said to be an honorable man, as well as a brave officer.
+
+The captain, a short, red-faced man, who was tightly girthed in at the
+waist, had his red hair cropped quite close to his head, and in certain
+lights he almost looked as if he had been rubbed over with phosphorus.
+He had lost two front teeth one night, though he could not quite
+remember how, and this made him speak so that he could not always be
+understood, and he had a bald patch on the top of his head, which made
+him look rather like a monk, with a fringe of curly, bright, golden hair
+round the circle of bare skin.
+
+The commandant shook hands with him, and drank his cup of coffee (the
+sixth that morning), at a draught, while he listened to his
+subordinate's report of what had occurred; and then they both went to
+the window, and declared that it was a very unpleasant outlook. The
+major, who was a quiet man, with a wife at home, could accommodate
+himself to everything; but the captain, who was rather fast, who was in
+the habit of frequenting low resorts, and who was much given to women,
+was mad at having been shut up for three months in the compulsory
+chastity of that wretched hole.
+
+There was a knock at the door, and when the commandant said: "_Come
+in_," one of their automatic soldiers appeared, and by his mere presence
+announced that breakfast was ready. In the dining-room, they met three
+other officers of lower rank: a lieutenant, Otto von Grossling, and two
+sub-lieutenants, Fritz Scheunebarg, and Baron von Eyrick, a very short,
+fair-haired man, who was proud and brutal towards men, harsh towards
+prisoners, and as violent as a rifle.
+
+Since he had been in France, his comrades had called him nothing but
+Mademoiselle Fifi. They had given him that nickname on account of his
+dandified style and small waist, which looked as if he wore stays, of
+his pale face, on which his budding moustache scarcely showed, and on
+account of the habit he had acquired of employing the French expression,
+_fi, fi donc_, which he pronounced with a slight whistle, when he wished
+to express his sovereign contempt for persons or things.
+
+The dining-room of the chateau was a magnificent long room, whose fine
+old mirrors, that were cracked by pistol bullets, and whose Flemish
+tapestry, which was cut to ribbons, and hanging in rags in places, from
+sword-cuts, told too well what Mademoiselle Fifi's occupation was during
+his spare time.
+
+There were three family portraits on the walls: a steel-clad knight, a
+cardinal, and a judge, who were all smoking long porcelain pipes, which
+had been inserted into holes in the canvas, while a lady in a long,
+pointed waist proudly exhibited an enormous moustache, drawn with a
+piece of charcoal. The officers ate their breakfast almost in silence in
+that mutilated room, which looked dull in the rain, and melancholy under
+its vanquished appearance, although its old, oak floor had become as
+solid as the stone floor of a public house.
+
+When they had finished eating, and were smoking and drinking they began,
+as usual, to talk about the dull life they were leading. The bottles of
+brandy and of liquors passed from hand to hand, and all sat back in
+their chairs and took repeated sips from their glasses, scarcely
+removing the long, bent stems, which terminated in china bowls, that
+were painted in a manner to delight a Hottentot, from their mouths.
+
+As soon as their glasses were empty, they filled them again, with a
+gesture of resigned weariness, but Mademoiselle Fifi emptied his every
+minute, and a soldier immediately gave him another. They were enveloped
+in a thick cloud of strong tobacco smoke, and they seemed to be sunk in
+a state of drowsy, stupid intoxication, in that dull state of
+drunkenness of men who have nothing to do, when suddenly, the baron sat
+up, and said: "By heavens! This cannot go on; we must think of something
+to do." And on hearing this, lieutenant Otto and sub-lieutenant Fritz,
+who pre-eminently possessed the grave, heavy German countenance, said:
+"What, captain?"
+
+He thought for a few moments, and then replied: "What? Well, we must get
+up some entertainment, if the commandant will allow us." "What sort of
+an entertainment, captain?" the major asked, taking his pipe out of his
+mouth. "I will arrange all that, commandant," the Baron said. "I will
+send _Le Devoir_ to Rouen, who will bring us some ladies. I know where
+they can be found. We will have supper here, as all the materials are at
+hand, and, at least, we shall have a jolly evening."
+
+Graf von Farlsberg shrugged his shoulders with a smile: "You must
+surely be mad, my friend."
+
+But all the other officers got up, ran round their chief, and said: "Let
+the captain have his own way, commandant; it is terribly dull here." And
+the major ended by yielding. "Very well," he replied, and the baron
+immediately sent for _Le Devoir_. He was an old non-commissioned
+officer, who had never been seen to smile, but who carried out all the
+orders of his superiors to the letter, no matter what they might be. He
+stood there, with an impassive face, while he received the baron's
+instructions, and then went out, and five minutes later a large wagon
+belonging to the military train, covered with a miller's till, galloped
+off as fast as four horses could take it, under the pouring rain, and
+the officers all seemed to awaken from their lethargy, their looks
+brightened, and they began to talk.
+
+Although it was raining as hard as ever, the major declared that it was
+not so dull, and Lieutenant von Grossling said with conviction, that the
+sky was clearing up, while Mademoiselle Fifi did not seem to be able to
+keep in his place. He got up, and sat down again, and his bright eyes
+seemed to be looking for something to destroy. Suddenly, looking at the
+lady with the moustache, the young fellow pulled out his revolver, and
+said: "You shall not see it." And without leaving his seat he aimed, and
+with two successive bullets cut out both the eyes of the portrait.
+
+"Let us make a mine!" he then exclaimed, and the conversation was
+suddenly interrupted, as if they had found some fresh and powerful
+subject of interest. The mine was his invention, his method of
+destruction, and his favorite amusement.
+
+When he left the chateau, the lawful owner, Count Fernand d'Amoys
+d'Uville, had not had time to carry away or to hide anything, except the
+plate, which had been stowed away in a hole made in one of the walls, so
+that, as he was very rich and had good taste, the large drawing-room,
+which opened into the dining-room, had looked like the gallery in a
+museum, before his precipitate flight.
+
+Expensive oil-paintings, water colors, and drawings hung against the
+walls, while on the tables, on the hanging shelves, and in elegant glass
+cupboards, there were a thousand knick-knacks; small vases, statuettes,
+groups in Dresden china, and grotesque Chinese figures, old ivory, and
+Venetian glass, which filled the large room with their precious and
+fantastical array.
+
+Scarcely anything was left now; not that the things had been stolen, for
+the major would not have allowed that, but Mademoiselle Fifi _would have
+a mine_, and on that occasion all the officers thoroughly enjoyed
+themselves for five minutes. The little marquis went into the
+drawing-room to get what he wanted, and he brought back a small,
+delicate china teapot, which he filled with gunpowder, and carefully
+introduced a piece of German tinder into it, through the spout. Then he
+lighted it, and took this infernal machine into the next room; but he
+came back immediately, and shut the door. The Germans all stood
+expectantly, their faces full of childish, smiling curiosity, and as
+soon as the explosion had shaken the chateau, they all rushed in at
+once.
+
+Mademoiselle Fifi, who got in first, clapped his hands in delight at the
+sight of a terra-cotta Venus, whose head had been blown off, and each
+picked up pieces of porcelain, and wondered at the strange shape of the
+fragments, while the major was looking with a paternal eye at the large
+drawing-room, which had been wrecked in such a Neronic fashion, and
+which was strewn with the fragments of works of art. He went out first,
+and said, with a smile: "He managed that very well!"
+
+But there was such a cloud of smoke in the dining-room, mingled with the
+tobacco smoke, that they could not breathe, so the commandant opened the
+window, and all the officers, who had gone into the room for a glass of
+cognac, went up to it.
+
+The moist air blew into the room, and brought a sort of moist dust with
+it, which powdered their beards. They looked at the tall trees, which
+were dripping with the rain, at the broad valley, which was covered with
+mist, and at the church spire in the distance, which rose up like a gray
+point in the beating rain.
+
+The bells had not rung since their arrival. That was the only resistance
+which the invaders had met with in the neighborhood. The parish priest
+had not refused to take in and to feed the Prussian soldiers; he had
+several times even drunk a bottle of beer or claret with the hostile
+commandant, who often employed him as a benevolent intermediary; but it
+was no use to ask him for a single stroke of the bells; he would sooner
+have allowed himself to be shot. That was his way of protesting against
+the invasion, a peaceful and silent protest, the only one, he said,
+which was suitable to a priest, who was a man of mildness and not of
+blood; and everyone, for twenty-five miles around, praised Abbe
+Chantavoine's firmness and heroism, in venturing to proclaim the public
+morning by the obstinate silence of his church bells.
+
+The whole village grew enthusiastic over his resistance, and was ready
+to back up their pastor and to risk anything, as they looked upon that
+silent protest as the safeguard of the national honor. It seemed to the
+peasants that thus they had deserved better of their country than
+Belfort and Strassburg, that they had set an equally valuable example,
+and that the name of their little village would become immortalized by
+that; but with that exception, they refused their Prussian conquerors
+nothing.
+
+The commandant and his officers laughed among themselves at that
+inoffensive courage, and as the people in the whole country round showed
+themselves obliging and compliant towards them, they willingly tolerated
+their silent patriotism. Only little Baron Wilhelm would have liked to
+have forced them to ring the bells. He was very angry at his superior's
+politic compliance with the priest's scruples, and every day he begged
+the commandant to allow him to sound "ding-dong, ding-dong," just once,
+only just once, just by way of a joke. And he asked it like a wheedling
+woman, in the tender voice of some mistress who wishes to obtain
+something, but the commandant would not yield, and to console _herself_,
+Mademoiselle Fifi made _a mine_ in the chateau.
+
+The five men stood there together for some minutes, drawing in the moist
+air, and at last, Lieutenant Fritz said, with a laugh: "The ladies will
+certainly not have fine weather for their drive." Then they separated,
+each to his own duties, while the captain had plenty to do in seeing
+about the dinner.
+
+When they met again, as it was growing dark, they began to laugh at
+seeing each other as dandified and smart as on the day of a grand
+review. The commandant's hair did not look so gray as it was in the
+morning, and the captain had shaved, and had only kept his moustache
+on, which made him look as if he had a streak of fire under his nose.
+
+In spite of the rain, they left the window open, and one of them went to
+listen from time to time, and at a quarter past six the baron said he
+heard a rumbling in the distance. They all rushed down, and soon the
+wagon drove up at a gallop with its four horses, which were splashed up
+to their backs, steaming and panting, and five women got out at the
+bottom of the steps, five handsome girls whom a comrade of the captain,
+to whom _Le Devoir_ had taken his card, had selected with care.
+
+They had not required much pressing, as they were sure of being well
+paid, for they had got to know the Prussians in the three months during
+which they had had to do with them, and so they resigned themselves to
+the men as they did the state of affairs. "It is a part of our business,
+so it must be done," they said as they drove along; no doubt to allay
+some slight, secret scruples of conscience.
+
+They went into the dining-room immediately, which looked still more
+dismal in its dilapidated state, when it was lighted up; while the
+table, covered with choice dishes, the beautiful china and glass, and
+the plate, which had been found in the hole in the wall where its owner
+had hidden it, gave the look of a bandit's inn, where they were supping
+after committing a robbery, to the place. The captain was radiant, and
+took hold of the women as if he were familiar with them; appraising
+them, kissing them, sniffing them, valuing them for what they were worth
+as _ladies of pleasure_; and when the three young men wanted to
+appropriate one each, he opposed them authoritatively, reserving to
+himself the right to apportion them justly, according to their several
+ranks, so as not to wound the hierarchy. Therefore, so as to avoid all
+discussion, jarring, and suspicion of partiality, he placed them all in
+a line according to height, and addressing the tallest, he said in a
+voice of command:
+
+"What is your name?" "Pamela," she replied, raising her voice. And then
+he said: "Number one, called Pamela, is adjudged to the commandant."
+Then, having kissed Blondina, the second, as a sign of proprietorship,
+he proffered stout Amanda to Lieutenant Otto, Eva, _the Tomato_, to
+Sub-Lieutenant Fritz, and Rachel, the shortest of them all, a very
+young, dark girl, with eyes as black as ink, a Jewess, whose snub nose
+confirmed the rule which allots hooked noses to all her race, to the
+youngest officer, frail Count Wilhelm d'Eyrick.
+
+They were all pretty and plump, without any distinctive features, and
+all were very much alike in look and person, from their daily practice
+of love, and their life in common in houses of public accommodation.
+
+The three younger men wished to carry off their women immediately, under
+the pretext of finding them brushes and soap; but the captain wisely
+opposed this, for he said they were quite fit to sit down to dinner, and
+that those who went up would wish for a change when they came down, and
+so would disturb the other couples, and his experience in such matters
+carried the day. There were only many kisses; expectant kisses.
+
+Suddenly Rachel choked, and began to cough until the tears came into her
+eyes, while smoke came through her nostrils. Under pretense of kissing
+her, the count had blown a whiff of tobacco into her mouth. She did not
+fly into a rage, and did not say a word, but she looked at her possessor
+with latent hatred in her dark eyes.
+
+They sat down to dinner. The commandant seemed delighted; he made Pamela
+sit on his right, and Blondina on his left, and said, as he unfolded his
+table napkin: "That was a delightful idea of yours, Captain."
+
+Lieutenants Otto and Fritz, who were as polite as if they had been with
+fashionable ladies, rather intimidated their neighbors, but Baron von
+Kelweinstein gave the reins to all his vicious propensities, beamed,
+made obscene remarks, and seemed on fire with his crown of red hair. He
+paid them compliments in French from the other side of the Rhine, and
+sputtered out gallant remarks, only fit for a low pot-house, from
+between his two broken teeth.
+
+They did not understand him, however, and their intelligence did not
+seem to be awakened until he uttered nasty words and broad expressions,
+which were mangled by his accent. Then all began to laugh at once, like
+mad women, and fell against each other, repeating the words, which the
+baron then began to say all wrong, in order that he might have the
+pleasure of hearing them say dirty things. They gave him as much of that
+stuff as he wanted, for they were drunk after the first bottle of wine,
+and, becoming themselves once more, and opening the door to their usual
+habits, they kissed the moustaches on the right and left of them,
+pinched their arms, uttered furious cries, drank out of every glass, and
+sang French couplets, and bits of German songs, which they had picked up
+in their daily intercourse with the enemy.
+
+Soon the men themselves, intoxicated by that female flesh which was
+displayed to their sight and touch, grew very amorous, shouted and
+broke the plates and dishes, while the soldiers behind them waited on
+them stolidly. The commandant was the only one who put any restraint
+upon himself.
+
+Mademoiselle Fifi had taken Rachel onto his knees, and, getting excited,
+at one moment kissed the little black curls on her neck, inhaling the
+pleasant warmth of her body, and all the savor of her person, through
+the slight space there was between her dress and her skin, and at
+another he pinched her furiously through the material, and made her
+scream, for he was seized by a species of ferocity, and tormented by his
+desire, to hurt her. He often held her close to him, as if to make her
+part of himself, and put his lips in a long kiss on the Jewess's rosy
+mouth, until she lost her breath; and at last he bit her until a stream
+of blood ran down her chin and onto her bodice.
+
+For the second time, she looked him full in the face, and as she bathed
+the wound, she said: "You will have to pay for that!" But he merely
+laughed a hard laugh, and said: "I will pay."
+
+At dessert, champagne was served, and the commandant rose, and in the
+same voice in which he would have drunk to the health of the Empress
+Augusta, he drank: "To our ladies!" And a series of toasts began, toasts
+worthy of the lowest soldiers and of drunkards, mingled with obscene
+jokes, which were made still more brutal by their ignorance of the
+language. They got up, one after another, trying to say something witty,
+forcing themselves to be funny, and the women, who were so drunk that
+they almost fell off their chairs, with vacant looks and clammy tongues,
+applauded madly each time.
+
+The captain, who no doubt wished to impart an appearance of gallantry to
+the orgy, raised his glass again, and said: "To our victories over
+hearts!" And thereupon Lieutenant Otto, who was a species of bear from
+the Black Forest, jumped up, inflamed and saturated with drink, and
+suddenly seized by an excess of alcoholic patriotism, he cried: "To our
+victories over France!"
+
+Drunk as they were, the women were silent, and Rachel turned round with
+a shudder, and said: "Look here, I know some Frenchmen, in whose
+presence you would not dare to say that." But the little count, still
+holding her on his knee, began to laugh, for the wine had made him very
+merry, and said: "Ha! ha! ha! I have never met any of them, myself. As
+soon as we show ourselves, they run away!" The girl, who was in a
+terrible rage, shouted into his face: "You are lying, you dirty
+scoundrel!"
+
+For a moment, he looked at her steadily with his bright eyes upon her,
+like he had looked at the portrait before he destroyed it with revolver
+bullets, and then he began to laugh: "Ah! yes, talk about them, my dear!
+Should we be here now, if they were brave?" And getting excited, he
+exclaimed: "We are the masters! France belongs to us!" She jumped off
+his knees with a bound, and threw herself into her chair, while he rose,
+held out his glass over the table, and repeated: "France and the French,
+the woods, the fields, and the houses of France belong to us!"
+
+The others, who were quite drunk, and who were suddenly seized by
+military enthusiasm, the enthusiasm of brutes, seized their glasses, and
+shouting: "Long live Prussia!" they emptied them at a draught.
+
+The girls did not protest, for they were reduced to silence, and were
+afraid. Even Rachel did not say a word, as she had no reply to make, and
+then, the little marquis put his champagne glass, which had just been
+refilled, onto the head of the Jewess, and exclaimed: "All the women in
+France belong to us, also!"
+
+At that, she got up so quickly that the glass upset and poured
+the amber-colored wine onto her black hair as if to baptize her,
+and broke into a hundred fragments, as it fell onto the floor. With
+trembling lips, she defied the looks of the officer who was still
+laughing, and she stammered out, in a voice choked with rage:
+"That ... that ... that ... is not true for you shall certainly not
+have any French women."
+
+He sat down again, so as to laugh at his ease, and trying ineffectually
+to speak in the Parisian accent, he said: "That is good, very good!
+Then, what did you come here for, my dear?" She was thunderstruck, and
+made no reply for a moment, for in her agitation she did not understand
+him at first; but as soon as she grasped his meaning, she said to him
+indignantly and vehemently: "I! I! I am not a woman; I am only a
+strumpet, and that is all that Prussians want."
+
+Almost before she had finished, he slapped her full in the face; but as
+he was raising his hand again, as if he would strike her, she, almost
+mad with passion, took up a small dessert knife with a silver blade from
+the table, and stabbed him in the neck, just above the breast bone.
+Something that he was going to say was cut short in his throat, and he
+sat there, with his mouth half open, and a terrible look in his eyes.
+
+All the officers shouted in horror, and leaped up tumultuously; but
+throwing her chair between Lieutenant Otto's legs, who fell down at
+full length, she ran to the window, opened it before they could seize
+her, and jumped out into the night and pouring rain.
+
+In two minutes, Mademoiselle Fifi was dead, and Fritz and Otto drew
+their swords and wanted to kill the women, who threw themselves at their
+feet and clung to their knees. With some difficulty the major stopped
+the slaughter, and had the four terrified girls locked up in a room
+under the care of two soldiers, and then he organized the pursuit of the
+fugitive, as carefully as if they were about to engage in a skirmish,
+feeling quite sure that she would be caught.
+
+The table, which had been cleared immediately, now served as a bed on
+which to lay him out, and the four officers stood at the windows, rigid
+and sobered, with the stern faces of soldiers on duty, and tried to
+pierce through the darkness of the night, amid the steady torrent of
+rain. Suddenly, a shot was heard, and then another, a long way off; and
+for four hours they heard from time to time near or distant reports and
+rallying cries, strange words uttered as a call, in guttural voices.
+
+In the morning they all returned. Two soldiers had been killed, and
+three others wounded by their comrades in the ardor of that chase, and
+in the confusion of such a nocturnal pursuit, but they had not caught
+Rachel.
+
+Then the inhabitants of the district were terrorized, the houses were
+turned topsy-turvy, the country was scoured and beaten up, over and over
+again, but the Jewess did not seem to have left a single trace of her
+passage behind her.
+
+When the general was told of it, he gave orders to hush up the affair,
+so as not to set a bad example to the army, but he severely censured
+the commandant, who in turned punished his inferiors. The general had
+said: "One does not go to war in order to amuse oneself, and to caress
+prostitutes." And Graf von Farlsberg, in his exasperation, made up his
+mind to have his revenge on the district, but as he required a pretext
+for showing severity, he sent for the priest, and ordered him to have
+the bell tolled at the funeral of Baron von Eyrick.
+
+Contrary to all expectation, the priest showed himself humble and most
+respectful, and when Mademoiselle Fifi's body left the Chateau d'Ville
+on its way to the cemetery, carried by soldiers, preceded, surrounded,
+and followed by soldiers, who marched with loaded rifles, for the first
+time, the bell sounded its funereal knell in a lively manner, as if a
+friendly hand were caressing it. At night it sounded again, and the next
+day, and every day; it rang as much as any one could desire. Sometimes
+even, it would start at night, and sound gently through the darkness,
+seized by strange joy, awakened, one could not tell why. All the
+peasants in the neighborhood declared that it was bewitched, and nobody,
+except the priest and the sacristan would now go near the church tower,
+and they went because a poor girl was living there in grief and
+solitude, and secretly nourished by those two men.
+
+She remained there until the German troops departed, and then one
+evening the priest borrowed the baker's cart, and himself drove his
+prisoner to Rouen. When they got there, he embraced her, and she quickly
+went back on foot to the establishment from which she had come, where
+the proprietress, who thought that she was dead, was very glad to see
+her.
+
+A short time afterwards, a patriot who had no prejudices, and who liked
+her because of her bold deed, and who afterwards loved her for herself,
+married her, and made a lady of her, who was quite as good as many
+others.
+
+
+
+
+THE STORY OF A FARM-GIRL
+
+
+PART I
+
+As the weather was very fine, the people on the farm had dined more
+speedily than usual, and had returned to the fields.
+
+The female servant, Rose, remained alone in the large kitchen, where the
+fire on the hearth was dying out, under the large boiler of hot water.
+From time to time she took some water out of it, and slowly washed her
+plates and dishes, stopping occasionally to look at the two streaks of
+light which the sun threw onto the long table through the window, and
+which showed the defects in the glass.
+
+Three venturesome hens were picking up the crumbs under the chairs,
+while the smell of the poultry yard, and the warmth from the cow-stall
+came in through the half-open door, and a cock was heard crowing in the
+distance.
+
+When she had finished her work, wiped down the table, dusted the
+mantel-piece, and put the plates onto the high dresser, close to the
+wooden clock, with its enormous _tic-tac_, she drew a long breath, as
+she felt rather oppressed, without exactly knowing why. She looked at
+the black clay walls, the rafters that were blackened with smoke, from
+which spiders' webs were hanging, amid pickled herrings and strings of
+onions, and then she sat down, rather overcome by the stale emanations
+which the floor, onto which so many things had been continually spilt,
+gave out. With this, there was mingled the pungent smell of the pans of
+milk, which were set out to raise the cream in the adjoining dairy.
+
+She wanted to sew, as usual, but she did not feel strong enough for it,
+and so she went to get a mouthful of fresh air at the door, which seemed
+to do her good.
+
+The fowls were lying on the smoking dung-hill; some of them were
+scratching with one claw in search of worms, while the cock stood up
+proudly among them. Every moment he selected one of them, and walked
+round her with a slight cluck of amorous invitation. The hen got up in a
+careless way as she received his attentions, and only supported herself
+on her legs and spread out her wings; then she shook her feathers to
+shake out the dust, and stretched herself out on the dung-hill again,
+while he crowed, in sign of triumph, and the cocks in all the
+neighboring farmyards replied to him, as if they were uttering amorous
+challenges from farm to farm.
+
+The girl looked at them without thinking, and then she raised her eyes
+and was almost dazzled at the sight of the apple-trees in blossom, which
+looked almost like powdered heads. But just then, a colt, full of life
+and friskiness, galloped past her. Twice he jumped over the ditches, and
+then stopped suddenly, as if surprised at being alone.
+
+She also felt inclined to run; she felt inclined to move and to stretch
+her limbs, and to repose in the warm, breathless air. She took a few
+undecided steps, and closed her eyes, for she was seized with a feeling
+of animal comfort; and then she went to look for the eggs in the hen
+loft. There were thirteen of them, which she took in and put into the
+store-room; but the smell from the kitchen incommoded her again, and
+she went out to sit on the grass for a time.
+
+The farmyard, which was surrounded by trees, seemed to be asleep. The
+tall grass, among which the tall yellow dandelions rose up like streaks
+of yellow light, was of a vivid green, fresh spring green. The
+apple-trees threw their shade all round them, and the thatched houses,
+on which the blue and yellow iris flowers with their swordlike leaves
+grew, smoked as if the moisture of the stables and barns were coming
+through the straw.
+
+The girl went to the shed where the carts and traps were kept. Close to
+it, in a ditch, there was a large patch of violets, whose scent was
+perceptible all round, while beyond it, the open country could be seen
+where the corn was growing, with clumps of trees in the distance, and
+groups of laborers here and there, who looked as small as dolls, and
+white horses like toys, who were pulling a child's cart, driven by a man
+as tall as one's finger.
+
+She took up a bundle of straw, and threw it into the ditch and sat down
+upon it; then, not feeling comfortable, she undid it, spread it out and
+lay down upon it at full length, on her back, with both arms under her
+head, and her legs stretched out.
+
+Gradually her eyes closed, and she was falling into a state of
+delightful languor. She was, in fact, almost asleep, when she felt two
+hands on her bosom, and then she sprang up at a bound. It was Jacques,
+one of the farm laborers, a tall fellow from Picardy, who had been
+making love to her for a long time. He had been looking after the sheep,
+and seeing her lying down in the shade, he had come stealthily, and
+holding his breath, with glistening eyes, and bits of straw in his hair.
+
+He tried to kiss her, but she gave him a smack in the face, for she was
+as strong as he, and he was shrewd enough to beg her pardon; so they sat
+down side by side and talked amicably. They spoke about the favorable
+weather, of their master, who was a good fellow, then of their
+neighbors, of all the people in the country round, of themselves, of
+their village, of their youthful days, of their recollections, of their
+relations, who had left them for a long time, and it might be for ever.
+She grew sad as she thought of it, while he, with one fixed idea in his
+head, rubbed against her with a kind of a shiver, overcome by desire.
+
+"I have not seen my mother for a long time," she said. "It is very hard
+to be separated like that." And she directed her looks into the
+distance, towards the village in the North, which she had left.
+
+Suddenly, however, he seized her by the neck and kissed her again; but
+she struck him so violently in the face with her clenched fist, that his
+nose began to bleed, and he got up and laid his head against the stem of
+a tree. When she saw that, she was sorry, and going up to him, she said:
+"Have I hurt you?" He, however, only laughed. "No, it was a mere
+nothing;" only, she had hit him right on the middle of the nose. "What a
+devil!" he said, and he looked at her with admiration, for she had
+inspired him with a feeling of respect and of a very different kind of
+admiration, which was the beginning of real love for that tall, strong
+wench.
+
+When the bleeding had stopped, he proposed a walk, as he was afraid of
+his neighbor's heavy hand, if they remained side by side like that much
+longer; but she took his arm of her own accord, in the avenue, as if
+they had been out for an evening walk, and said: "It is not nice of you
+to despise me like that, Jacques." He protested, however. No, he did not
+despise her. He was in love with her, that was all. "So you really want
+to marry me?" she asked.
+
+He hesitated, and then looked at her aside, while she looked straight
+ahead of her. She had fat, red cheeks, a full, protuberant bust under
+her muslin dress, thick, red lips, and her neck, which was almost bare,
+was covered with small beads of perspiration. He felt a fresh access of
+desire, and putting his lips to her ear, he murmured: "Yes, of course I
+do."
+
+Then she threw her arms round his neck, and kissed for such a long time
+that they both of them lost their breath. From that moment the eternal
+story of love began between them. They plagued one another in corners;
+they met in the moonlight under a haystack, and gave each other bruises
+on the legs with their heavy nailed boots. By degrees, however, Jacques
+seemed to grow tired of her; he avoided her; scarcely spoke to her, and
+did not try any longer to meet her alone, which made her sad and
+anxious; and soon she found that she was pregnant.
+
+At first, she was in a state of consternation, but then she got angry,
+and her rage increased every day, because she could not meet him, as he
+avoided her most carefully. At last, one night when everyone in the
+farmhouse was asleep, she went out noiselessly in her petticoat, with
+bare feet, crossed the yard and opened the door of the stable, where
+Jacques was lying in a large box of straw, over his horses. He pretended
+to snore when he heard her coming, but she knelt down by his side and
+shook him until he sat up.
+
+"What do you want?" he then asked her. And she, with clenched teeth, and
+trembling with anger, replied: "I want ... I want you to marry me, as
+you promised." But he only laughed, and replied: "Oh! If a man were to
+marry all the girls with whom he has made a slip, he would have more
+than enough to do."
+
+Then she seized him by the throat, threw him onto his back, so that he
+could not disengage himself from her, and half strangling him, she
+shouted into his face: "I am in the family way! Do you hear? I am in the
+family way?"
+
+He gasped for breath, as he was nearly choked, and so they remained,
+both of them, motionless and without speaking, in the dark silence,
+which was only broken by the noise that a horse made as he pulled the
+hay out of the manger, and then slowly chewed it.
+
+When Jacques found that she was the stronger, he stammered out: "Very
+well, I will marry you, as that is the case." But she did not believe
+his promises. "It must be at once," she said. "You must have the banns
+put up." "At once," he replied. "Swear solemnly that you will." He
+hesitated for a few moments, and then said: "I swear it, by heaven."
+
+Then she released her grasp, and went away, without another word.
+
+She had no chance of speaking to him for several days, and as the stable
+was now always locked at night, she was afraid to make any noise, for
+fear of creating a scandal. One morning, however, she saw another man
+come in at dinner-time, and so she said: "Has Jacques left?" "Yes," the
+man replied; "I have got his place."
+
+This made her tremble so violently that she could not take the saucepan
+off the fire; and later when they were all at work, she went up into her
+room and cried, burying her head in her bolster, so that she might not
+be heard. During the day, however, she tried to obtain some information
+without exciting any suspicions, but she was so overwhelmed by the
+thoughts of her misfortune, that she fancied that all the people whom
+she asked, laughed maliciously. All she learned, however, was, that he
+had left the neighborhood altogether.
+
+
+PART II
+
+Then a cloud of constant misery began for her. She worked mechanically,
+without thinking of what she was doing, with one fixed idea in her head:
+"Suppose people were to know."
+
+This continual feeling made her so incapable of reasoning, that she did
+not even try to think of any means of avoiding the disgrace that she
+knew must ensue, which was irreparable, and drawing nearer every day,
+and which was as sure as death itself. She got up every morning long
+before the others, and persistently tried to look at her figure in a
+piece of broken looking-glass at which she did her hair, as she was very
+anxious to know whether anybody would notice a change in her, and during
+the day she stopped working every few minutes to look at herself from
+top to toe, to see whether the size of her stomach did not make her
+apron look too short.
+
+The months went on, and she scarcely spoke now, and when she was asked
+a question, she did not appear to understand, but she had a frightened
+look, with haggard eyes and trembling hands, which made her master say
+to her occasionally: "My poor girl, how stupid you have grown lately."
+
+In church, she hid behind a pillar, and no longer ventured to go to
+confession, as she feared to face the priest, to whom she attributed
+superhuman powers, which enabled him to read people's consciences; and
+at meal times, the looks of her fellow servants almost made her faint
+with mental agony, and she was always fancying that she had been found
+out by the cowherd, a precocious and cunning little lad, whose bright
+eyes seemed always to be watching her.
+
+One morning the postman brought her a letter, and as she had never
+received one in her life before, she was so upset by it that she was
+obliged to sit down. Perhaps it was from him? But as she could not read,
+she sat anxious and trembling, with that piece of paper covered with ink
+in her hand; after a time, however, she put it into her pocket, as she
+did not venture to confide her secret to anyone. She often stopped in
+her work to look at those lines written at regular intervals, and which
+terminated in a signature, imagining vaguely that she would suddenly
+discover their meaning, until at last, as she felt half mad with
+impatience and anxiety, she went to the schoolmaster, who told her to
+sit down, and read to her, as follows:
+
+    MY DEAR DAUGHTER: I write to tell you that I am very ill. Our
+    neighbor, Monsieur Dentu, begs you to come, if you can. For your
+    affectionate mother,
+
+    CESAIRE DENTU,
+    DEPUTY MAYOR.
+
+She did not say a word, and went away, but as soon as she was alone,
+her legs gave way, and she fell down by the roadside, and remained there
+till night.
+
+When she got back, she told the farmer her trouble, who allowed her to
+go home for as long as she wanted, and promised to have her work done by
+a char-woman, and to take her back when she returned.
+
+Her mother died soon after she got there, and the next day Rose gave
+birth to a seven months' child, a miserable little skeleton, thin enough
+to make anybody shudder, and which seemed to be suffering continually,
+to judge from the painful manner in which it moved its poor little hands
+about, which were as thin as a crab's legs, but it lived, for all that.
+She said that she was married, but that she could not saddle herself
+with the child, so she left it with some neighbors, who promised to take
+great care of it, and she went back to the farm.
+
+But then, in her heart, which had been wounded so long, there arose
+something like brightness, an unknown love for that frail little
+creature which she had left behind her, but there was fresh suffering in
+that very love, suffering which she felt every hour and every minute,
+because she was parted from her child. What pained her most, however,
+was a mad longing to kiss it, to press it in her arms, to feel the
+warmth of its little body against her skin. She could not sleep at
+night; she thought of it the whole day long, and in the evening, when
+her work was done, she used to sit in front of the fire and look at it
+intently, like people do whose thoughts are far away.
+
+They began to talk about her, and to tease her about her lover. They
+asked her whether he was tall, handsome and rich. When was the wedding
+to be, and the christening? And often she ran away, to cry by herself,
+for these questions seemed to hurt her, like the prick of a pin, and in
+order to forget their jokes, she began to work still more energetically,
+and still thinking of her child, she sought for the means of saving up
+money for it, and determined to work so that her master would be obliged
+to raise her wages.
+
+Then, by degrees, she almost monopolized the work, and persuaded him to
+get rid of one servant girl, who had become useless since she had taken
+to working like two; she economized in the bread, oil and candles, in
+the corn, which they gave to the fowls too extravagantly, and in the
+fodder for the horses and cattle, which was rather wasted. She was as
+miserly about her master's money, as if it had been her own, and by dint
+of making good bargains, of getting high prices for all their produce,
+and by baffling the peasants' tricks when they offered anything for
+sale, he at last entrusted her with buying and selling everything, with
+the direction of all the laborers, and with the quantity of provisions
+necessary for the household, so that in a short time she became
+indispensable to him. She kept such a strict eye on everything about
+her, that under her direction the farm prospered wonderfully, and for
+five miles round people talked of "Master Vallin's servant," and the
+farmer himself said everywhere: "That girl is worth more than her weight
+in gold."
+
+But time passed by, and her wages remained the same. Her hard work was
+accepted as something that was due from every good servant, and as a
+mere token of her good-will; and she began to think rather bitterly,
+that if the farmer could put fifty or a hundred crowns extra into the
+bank every month, thanks to her, she was still only earning her two
+hundred francs a year, neither more nor less, and so she made up her
+mind to ask for an increase of wages. She went to see the schoolmaster
+three times about it, but when she got there, she spoke about something
+else. She felt a kind of modesty in asking for money, as if it was
+something disgraceful; but at last, one day, when the farmer was having
+breakfast by himself in the kitchen, she said to him, with some
+embarrassment, that she wished to speak to him particularly. He raised
+his head in surprise, with both his hands on the table, holding his
+knife, with its point in the air, in one, and a piece of bread in the
+other, and he looked fixedly at the girl, who felt uncomfortable under
+his gaze, but asked for a week's holiday, so that she might get away, as
+she was not very well. He acceded to her request immediately, and then
+added, in some embarrassment, himself:
+
+"When you come back, I shall have something to say to you, myself."
+
+
+PART III
+
+The child was nearly eight months old, and she did not know it again. It
+had grown rosy and chubby all over like a little bundle of living fat.
+She threw herself onto it as if it had been some prey, and kissed it so
+violently that it began to scream with terror, and then she began to cry
+herself, because it did not know her, and stretched out its arms to its
+nurse, as soon as it saw her. But the next day, it began to get used to
+her, and laughed when it saw her, and she took it into the fields and
+ran about excitedly with it, and sat down under the shade of the trees,
+and then, for the first time in her life, she opened her heart to
+somebody, and told him her troubles, how hard her work was, her
+anxieties and her hopes, and she quite tired the child with the violence
+of her caresses.
+
+She took the greatest pleasure in handling it, in washing and dressing
+it, for it seemed to her that all this was the confirmation of her
+maternity, and she would look at it, almost feeling surprised that it
+was hers, and she used to say to herself in a low voice, as she danced
+it in her arms: "It is my baby, it is my baby."
+
+She cried all the way home as she returned to the farm, and had scarcely
+got in, before her master called her into his room, and she went,
+feeling astonished and nervous, without knowing why.
+
+"Sit down there," he said. She sat down, and for some moments they
+remained side by side, in some embarrassment, with their arms hanging at
+their sides, as if they did not know what to do with them, and looking
+each other in the face, after the manner of peasants.
+
+The farmer, a stout, jovial, obstinate man of forty-five, who had lost
+two wives, evidently felt embarrassed, which was very unusual with him,
+but at last he made up his mind, and began to speak vaguely, hesitating
+a little, and looking out of the window as he talked. "How is it, Rose,"
+he said, "that you have never thought of settling in life?" She grew as
+pale as death, and seeing that she gave him no answer, he went on: "You
+are a good, steady, active and economical girl, and a wife like you
+would make a man's fortune."
+
+She did not move, but looked frightened; she did not even try to
+comprehend his meaning, for her thoughts were in a whirl, as if at the
+approach of some great danger; so after waiting for a few seconds, he
+went on: "You see, a farm without a mistress can never succeed, even
+with a servant like you are." Then he stopped, for he did not know what
+else to say, and Rose looked at him with the air of a person who thinks
+that he is face to face with a murderer, and ready to flee at the
+slightest movement he may make; but after waiting for about five
+minutes, he asked her: "Well, will it suit you?" "Will what suit me,
+master?" And he said, quickly: "Why, to marry me, by Jove!"
+
+She jumped up, but fell back onto her chair as if she had been struck,
+and there she remained motionless, like a person who is overwhelmed by
+some great misfortune, but at last the farmer grew impatient, and said:
+"Come, what more do you want?" She looked at him almost in terror; then
+suddenly the tears came into her eyes, and she said twice, in a choking
+voice: "I cannot, I cannot!" "Why not?" he asked. "Come, don't be silly;
+I will give you until to-morrow to think it over."
+
+And he hurried out of the room, very glad to have got the matter, which
+had troubled him a good deal, over; for he had no doubt that she would
+the next morning accept a proposal which she could never have expected,
+and which would be a capital bargain for him, as he thus bound a woman
+to himself who would certainly bring him more than if she had the best
+dowry in the district.
+
+Neither could there be any scruples about an unequal match between them,
+for in the country everyone is very nearly equal; the farmer works just
+like his laborers do, who frequently become masters in their turn, and
+the female servants constantly become the mistresses of the
+establishments, without its making any change in their lives or habits.
+
+Rose did not go to bed that night. She threw herself, dressed as she
+was, onto her bed, and she had not even the strength to cry left in her,
+she was so thoroughly dumbfounded. She remained quite inert, scarcely
+knowing that she had a body, and without being at all able to collect
+her thoughts, though at moments she remembered some of what had
+happened, and then she was frightened at the idea of what might happen.
+Her terror increased, and every time the great kitchen clock struck the
+hour she broke into a perspiration from grief. She lost her head, and
+had the nightmare; her candle went out, and then she began to imagine
+that someone had thrown a spell over her, like country people so often
+fancy, and she felt a mad inclination to run away, to escape and to flee
+before her misfortune, like a ship scuds before the wind.
+
+An owl hooted, and she shivered, sat up, put her hands to her face, into
+her hair, and all over her body, and then she went downstairs, as if she
+were walking in her sleep. When she got into the yard, she stooped down,
+so as not to be seen by any prowling scamp, for the moon, which was
+setting, shed a bright light over the fields. Instead of opening the
+gate, she scrambled over the fence, and as soon as she was outside, she
+started off. She went on straight before her, with a quick, elastic
+trot, and from time to time, she unconsciously uttered a piercing cry.
+Her long shadow accompanied her, and now and then some night bird flew
+over her head, while the dogs in the farmyards barked, as they heard her
+pass; one even jumped over the ditch and followed her and tried to bite
+her, but she turned round at it, and gave such a terrible yell, that the
+frightened animal ran back and cowered in silence in its kennel.
+
+The stars grew dim, and the birds began to twitter; day was breaking.
+The girl was worn out and panting, and when the sun rose in the purple
+sky, she stopped, for her swollen feet refused to go any further; but
+she saw a pond in the distance, a large pond whose stagnant water looked
+like blood under the reflection of this new day, and she limped on with
+short steps and with her hand on her heart, in order to dip both her
+legs in it. She sat down on a tuft of grass, took off her heavy shoes,
+which were full of dust, pulled off her stockings and plunged her legs
+into the still water, from which bubbles were rising here and there.
+
+A feeling of delicious coolness pervaded her from head to foot, and
+suddenly, while she was looking fixedly at the deep pool, she was seized
+with giddiness, and with a mad longing to throw herself into it. All her
+sufferings would be over in there; over for ever. She no longer thought
+of her child; she only wanted peace, complete rest, and to sleep for
+ever, and she got up with raised arms and took two steps forward. She
+was in the water up to her thighs, and she was just about to throw
+herself in, when sharp, pricking pains in her ankles made her jump back,
+and she uttered a cry of despair, for, from her knees to the tips of her
+feet, long, black leeches were sucking in her life blood, and were
+swelling, as they adhered to her flesh. She did not dare to touch them,
+and screamed with horror, so that her cries of despair attracted a
+peasant, who was driving along at some distance, to the spot. He pulled
+off the leeches one by one, applied herbs to the wounds, and drove the
+girl to her master's farm, in his gig.
+
+She was in bed for a fortnight, and as she was sitting outside the door
+on the first morning that she got up, the farmer suddenly came and
+planted himself before her. "Well," he said, "I suppose the affair is
+settled, isn't it?" She did not reply at first, and then, as he remained
+standing and looking at her intently with his piercing eyes, she said
+with difficulty: "No, master, I cannot." But he immediately flew into a
+rage.
+
+"You cannot, girl; you cannot? I should just like to know the reason
+why?" She began to cry, and repeated: "I cannot." He looked at her and
+then exclaimed, angrily: "Then, I suppose you have a lover?" "Perhaps
+that is it," she replied, trembling with shame.
+
+The man got as red as a poppy, and stammered out in a rage: "Ah! So you
+confess it, you slut! And pray, who is the fellow? Some penniless,
+half-starved rag-a-muffin, without a roof to his head, I suppose? Who is
+it, I say?" And as she gave him no answer, he continued: "Ah! So you
+will not tell me. Then I will tell you; it is Jean Bauda?" "No, not he,"
+she exclaimed. "Then it is Pierre Martin?" "Oh, no, master."
+
+And he angrily mentioned all the young fellows in the neighborhood,
+while she denied that he had hit upon the right one, and every moment
+wiped her eyes with the corner of her big blue apron. But he still tried
+to find it out, with his brutish obstinacy, and, as it were, scratched
+her heart to discover her secret, just like a terrier scratches at a
+hole, to try and get at the animal which he scents in it. Suddenly,
+however, the man shouted: "By George! It is Jacques, the man who was
+here last year. They used to say that you were always talking together,
+and that you thought about getting married."
+
+Rose was choking, and she grew scarlet, while her tears suddenly
+stopped, and dried up on her cheeks, like drops of water on hot iron,
+and she exclaimed: "No, it is not he, it is not he!" "Is that really a
+fact?" the cunning peasant, who partly guessed the truth, asked; and she
+replied, hastily: "I will swear it; I will swear it to you...." She
+tried to think of something by which to swear, as she did not venture to
+invoke sacred things, but he interrupted her: "At any rate, he used to
+follow you into every corner, and devoured you with his eyes at meal
+times. Did you ever give him your promise, eh?"
+
+This time she looked her master straight in the face. "No, never, never;
+I will solemnly swear to you, that if he were to come to-day and ask me
+to marry him, I would have nothing to do with him." She spoke with such
+an air of sincerity that the farmer hesitated, and then he continued, as
+if speaking to himself: "What, then? You have not had _a misfortune_, as
+they call it, or it would have been known, and as it has no
+consequences, no girl would refuse her master on that account. There
+must be something at the bottom of it, however."
+
+She could say nothing; she had not the strength to speak, and he asked
+her again: "You will not?" "I cannot, master," she said, with a sigh,
+and he turned on his heel.
+
+She thought she had got rid of him altogether, and spent the rest of
+the day almost tranquilly, but as worn out as if she had been turning
+the threshing machine all day, instead of the old white horse, and she
+went to bed as soon as she could, and fell asleep immediately. In the
+middle of the night, however, two hands touching the bed, woke her. She
+trembled with fear, but she immediately recognized the farmer's voice,
+when he said to her: "Don't be frightened, Rose; I have come to speak to
+you." She was surprised at first, but when he tried to take liberties
+with her, she understood what he wanted, and began to tremble violently,
+as she felt quite alone in the darkness, still heavy from sleep, and
+quite unprotected, by the side of that man, who stood near her. She
+certainly did not consent, but she resisted carelessly, herself
+struggling against that instinct which is always strong in simple
+natures, and very imperfectly protected, by the undecided will of inert
+and feeble natures. She turned her head now to the wall, and now towards
+the room, in order to avoid the attentions which the farmer tried to
+press on her, and her body writhed a little under the coverlet, as she
+was weakened by the fatigue of the struggle, while he became brutal,
+intoxicated by desire.
+
+They lived together as man and wife, and one morning he said to her: "I
+have put up our banns, and we will get married next month."
+
+She did not reply, for what could she say? She did not resist, for what
+could she do?
+
+
+PART IV
+
+She married him. She felt as if she were in a pit with inaccessible
+edges, from which she could never get out, and all kinds of misfortunes
+remained hanging over her head, like huge rocks, which would fall on the
+first occasion. Her husband gave her the impression of a man whom she
+had stolen, and who would find it out some day or other. And then she
+thought of her child, who was the cause of her misfortunes, but who was
+also the cause of all her happiness on earth, and whom she went to see
+twice a year, though she came back more unhappy each time. But she
+gradually grew accustomed to her life, her fears were allayed, her heart
+was at rest, and she lived with an easier mind, though still with some
+vague fear floating in her mind, and so years went on, and the child was
+six. She was almost happy now, when suddenly the farmer's temper grew
+very bad.
+
+For two or three years he seemed to have been nursing some secret
+anxiety, to be trouble by some care, some mental disturbance, which was
+gradually increasing. He remained at table a long time after dinner,
+with his head in his hands, sad and devoured by sorrow. He always spoke
+hastily, sometimes even brutally, and it even seemed as if he bore a
+grudge against his wife, for at times he answered her roughly, almost
+angrily.
+
+One day, when a neighbor's boy came for some eggs, and she spoke very
+crossly to him, as she was very busy, her husband suddenly came in, and
+said to her in his unpleasant voice: "If that were your own child you
+would not treat him so." She was hurt, and did not reply, and then she
+went back into the house, with all her grief awakened afresh, and at
+dinner, the farmer neither spoke to her, nor looked at her, and he
+seemed to hate her, to despise her, to know something about the affair
+at last. In consequence, she lost her head, and did not venture to
+remain alone with him after the meal was over, but she left the room
+and hastened to the church.
+
+It was getting dusk; the narrow nave was in total darkness, but she
+heard footsteps in the choir, for the sacristan was preparing the
+tabernacle lamp for the night. That spot of trembling light, which was
+lost in the darkness of the arches, looked to Rose like her last hope,
+and with her eyes fixed on it, she fell on her knees. The chain rattled
+as the little lamp swung up into the air, and almost immediately the
+small bell rang out the _Angelus_ through the increasing mist. She went
+up to him, as he was going out.
+
+"Is Monsieur le Cure at home?" she asked. "Of course he is; this is his
+dinner-time." She trembled as she rang the bell of the parsonage. The
+priest was just sitting down to dinner, and he made her sit down also.
+"Yes, yes, I know all about it; your husband has mentioned the matter to
+me that brings you here." The poor woman nearly fainted, and the priest
+continued: "What do you want, my child?" And he hastily swallowed
+several spoonfuls of soup, some of which dropped onto his greasy
+cassock. But Rose did not venture to say anything more, and she got up
+to go, but the priest said: "Courage...."
+
+And she went out, and returned to the farm, without knowing what she was
+doing. The farmer was waiting for her, as the laborers had gone away
+during her absence, and she fell heavily at his feet, and shedding a
+flood of tears, she said to him: "What have you got against me?"
+
+He began to shout and to swear: "What have I got against you? That I
+have no children by ----! When a man takes a wife, he does not want to be
+left alone with her until the end of his days. That is what I have
+against you. When a cow has no calves, she is not worth anything, and
+when a woman has no children, she is also not worth anything."
+
+She began to cry, and said: "It is not my fault! It is not my fault!" He
+grew rather more gentle when he heard that, and added: "I do not say
+that it is, but it is very annoying, all the same."
+
+
+PART V
+
+From that day forward, she had only one thought; to have a child,
+another child; she confided her wish to everybody, and in consequence of
+this, a neighbor told her of an infallible method. This was, to make her
+husband a glass of water with a pinch of ashes in it, every evening. The
+farmer consented to try it, but without success; so they said to each
+other: "Perhaps there are some secret ways?" And they tried to find out.
+They were told of a shepherd who lived ten leagues off, and so Vallin
+one day drove off to consult him. The shepherd gave him a loaf on which
+he had made some marks; it was kneaded up with herbs, and both of them
+were to eat a piece of it before and after their mutual caresses: but
+they ate the whole loaf without obtaining any results from it.
+
+Next, a schoolmaster unveiled mysteries, and processes of love which
+were unknown in the country, but, infallible, so he declared; but none
+of them had the desired effect. Then the priest advised them to make a
+pilgrimage to the shrine at Fecamp. Rose went with the crowd and
+prostrated herself in the abbey, and mingling her prayers with the
+coarse wishes of the peasants around her, she prayed that she might be
+fruitful a second time; but it was in vain, and then she thought that
+she was being punished for her first fault, and she was seized by
+terrible grief. She was wasting away with sorrow; her husband was also
+aging prematurely, and was wearing himself out in useless hopes.
+
+Then war broke out between them; he called her names and beat her. They
+quarreled all day long, and when they were in bed together at night he
+flung insults and obscenities at her, panting with rage, until one
+night, not being able to think of any means of making her suffer more,
+he ordered her to get up and go and stand out of doors in the rain,
+until daylight. As she did not obey him, he seized her by the neck, and
+began to strike her in the face with his fists, but she said nothing,
+and did not move. In his exasperation he knelt on her stomach, and with
+clenched teeth, and mad with rage, he began to beat her. Then in her
+despair she rebelled, and flinging him against the wall with a furious
+gesture, she sat up, and in an altered voice, she hissed: "I have had a
+child, I have had one! I had it by Jacques; you know Jacques well. He
+promised to marry me, but he left this neighborhood without keeping his
+word."
+
+The man was thunderstruck, and could hardly speak, but at last he
+stammered out: "What are you saying? What are you saying?" Then she
+began to sob, and amidst her tears she said: "That was the reason why I
+did not want to marry you. I could never tell you, for you would have
+left me without any bread for my child. You have never had any children,
+so you cannot understand, you cannot understand!"
+
+He said again, mechanically, with increasing surprise: "You have a
+child? You have a child?" "You had me by force, as I suppose you know?
+I did not want to marry you," she said, still sobbing.
+
+Then he got up, lit the candle, and began to walk up and down, with his
+arms behind him. She was cowering on the bed and crying, and suddenly he
+stopped in front of her, and said: "Then it is my fault that you have no
+children?" She gave him no answer, and he began to walk up and down
+again, and then, stopping again, he continued: "How old is your child?"
+"Just six," she whispered. "Why did you not tell me about it?" he asked.
+"How could I?" she replied, with a sigh.
+
+He remained standing, motionless. "Come, get up," he said. She got up,
+with some difficulty, and then, when she was standing on the floor, he
+suddenly began to laugh, with his hearty laugh of his good days, and
+seeing how surprised she was, he added: "Very well, we will go and fetch
+the child, as you and I can have none together."
+
+She was so scared that, if she had the strength, she would assuredly
+have run away, but the farmer rubbed his hands and said: "I wanted to
+adopt one, and now we have found one. I asked the Cure about an orphan,
+some time ago."
+
+Then, still laughing, he kissed his weeping and agitated wife on both
+cheeks, and shouted out, as if she could not hear him: "Come along,
+mother, we will go and see whether there is any soup left; I should not
+mind a plateful."
+
+She put on her petticoat, and they went down stairs; and while she was
+kneeling in front of the fire-place, and lighting the fire under the
+saucepan, he continued to walk up and down the kitchen in long strides,
+and said:
+
+"Well, I am really glad at this: I am not saying it for form's sake, but
+I am glad, I am really very glad."
+
+
+
+
+MAMMA STIRLING
+
+
+Tall, slim, looking almost naked under her transparent dress of gauze,
+which fell in straight folds as far as the gold bracelets on her slender
+wrists, with languor in her rich voice, and something undulating and
+feline in the rhythmical swing of her wrist and hips. Tatia Caroly was
+singing one of those sweet Creole songs which call up some far distant
+fairy-like country, and unknown caresses, for which the lips remain
+always thirsting.
+
+Footit, the clown, was leaning against the piano with a blackened face,
+and with his mouth that looked like a red gash from a saber cut, and his
+wide open eyes, he expressed feelings of the most extravagant emotion,
+while some niggers squatted on the ground, and accompanied the orchestra
+by strumming on some yellow, empty gourds.
+
+But what made the woman and the children in the pantomime of the "New
+Circus" laugh most, was the incessant quarrel between an enormous Danish
+hound and a poor old supernumerary, who was blackened like a negro
+minstrel, and dressed like a Mulatto woman. The dog was always annoying
+him, followed him, snapped at his legs, and at his old wig, with his
+sharp teeth, and tore his coat and his silk pocket-handkerchief,
+whenever he could get hold of it, to pieces. And the man used positively
+to allow himself to be molested and bitten, played his part with dull
+resignation, with mechanical unconsciousness of a man who has come down
+in the world, and who gains his livelihood as best he can, and who has
+already endured worse things than that.
+
+And when half turning round to the two club men, with whom she had just
+been dining at the _Cafe Anglais_, as she used her large fan of black
+feathers, in a pretty, supple pose, with the light falling on to the
+nape of her fair neck, Noele de Frejus exclaimed: "Wherever did they
+unearth that horrible, grotesque figure?"
+
+Lord Shelley, who was a pillar of the circuses, and who knew the
+performances, the length of time the acrobats had been performing, and
+the private history of all of them, whether clowns or circus riders,
+replied: "Do not you recognize him, my dear?" "That lump of soot?... Are
+you having a joke with me?"
+
+"He certainly has very much changed, poor fellow, and not to his
+advantage...Nevertheless James Stirling was a model of manly beauty and
+elegance, and he led such an extravagant life that all sorts of stories
+were rife about him, and many people declared that he was some
+high-class adventurer...At any rate he thought no more of danger than he
+did of smoking a good cigar.
+
+"Do you not remember him at the Hippodrome, when he stood on the bare
+back of a horse, and drove five other tandem fashion at full gallop and
+without making a mistake, but checking them, or urging them on with his
+thin, muscular hands, just as he pleased. And he seemed to be riveted on
+to the horse, and kept on it, as if he had been held on by invisible
+hands."
+
+"Yes, I remember him...James Stirling," she said. "The circus rider,
+James Stirling, on whose account that tall girl Caro, who was also a
+circus rider, gave that old stager Blanche Taupin a cut right and left
+across the face with her riding-whip, because she had tried to get him
+from her...But what can have happened to him, to have brought him down
+to such a position?"
+
+Horrible, hairy monkeys, grimacing under their red and blue masks, had
+invaded the arena, and with their hair hanging down on to their bare
+shoulders, looking very funny with their long tails, their gray skin
+tights and their velvet breeches, these female dancers twisted, jumped,
+hopped and drew their lascivious and voluptuous circle more closely
+round _Chocolat_, who shook the red skirts of his coat, rolled his eyes,
+and showed his large, white teeth in a foolish smile, as if he were the
+prey of irresistible desire, and yet terribly afraid of what might
+happen, and Lord Shelley taking some grapes out of a basket that Noele
+de Frejus offered him, said: "It is not a very cheerful story, but then
+true stories rarely are. At the time when he was still unknown, and when
+he used to have to tighten his belt more frequently than he got enough
+to eat and drink, James Stirling followed the destinies of a circus
+which traveled with its vans from fair to fair and from place to place,
+and fell in love with a gipsy columbine, who also formed part of this
+wandering, half starved company.
+
+"She was not twenty, and astonished the others by her rash boldness, her
+absolute contempt for danger and obstacles, and her strange and adroit
+strength. She charmed them also by a magic philter which came from her
+hair, which was darker that a starless night, from her large, black,
+coaxing, velvety eyes, that were concealed by the fringe of such long
+lashes that they curled upwards, from her scented skin, that was as
+soft as rice paper, and every touch of which was a suggestive and
+tempting caress, from her firm, full, smiling, childlike mouth, which
+uttered nothing but laughter, jokes, and love songs, and gave promise of
+kisses.
+
+"She rode bare-backed horses, without bit or bridle, stretched herself
+out on their backs, as if on a bed, and mingled her disheveled hair with
+their manes, swaying her supple body to their most impetuous movements,
+and at other times standing almost on their shoulders or on the crupper,
+while she juggled with looking-glasses, brass balls, knives that flashed
+as they twirled rapidly round in the smoky light of the paraffin lamps
+that were fastened to the tent poles.
+
+"Her name was _Sacha_, that pretty Slavonic name which has such a sweet
+and strange sound, and she gave herself to him entirely, because he was
+handsome, strong, and spoke to women very gently, like one talks to
+quite little children, who are so easily frightened, and made to cry,
+and it was on her account that in a quarrel in Holland he knocked down
+an Italian wild beast tamer, by a blow between the two eyes.
+
+"They adored each other so, that they never thought of their poverty,
+but redoubled their caresses when they had nothing to eat, not even an
+unripe apple stolen from an orchard, nor a lump of bread which they had
+begged on the road, of some charitable soul. And they embraced each
+other more ardently still, when they were obliged to stop for the night
+in the open country, and shivered in the old, badly-closed vans, and had
+to be very sparing with the wood, and could not illuminate the snow with
+those large bivouac fires, whose smoke rises in such fantastic, spiral
+curls, and whose flames look like a spot of blood, at a distance, seen
+through the mist.
+
+"It was one of those Bohemian quasi-matrimonial arrangements, which are
+often more enduring than ours, and in which a man and a woman do not
+part for a mere caprice, a dream, or a piece of folly.
+
+"But by-and-bye she was no longer good for anything, and had to give up
+appearing on the program, for she was in the family way. James Stirling
+worked for both, and thought that he should die of grief when she was
+brought to bed, and after three days of intense suffering, died with her
+hand in his.
+
+"And now, all alone, crushed by grief, so ill that at times he thought
+his heart had stopped, the circus rider lived for the child which the
+dead woman had left him as a legacy. He bought a goat, so that it might
+have pure milk, and brought it up with such infinite, deep, womanly
+tenderness, that the child called him 'Mamma,' and in the circus they
+nick-named him: _Mamma Stirling_.
+
+"The boy was like his mother, and one might have said that he had
+brought James luck, for he had made his mark, was receiving a good
+income, and appeared in every performance. Well-made and agile, and
+profiting by the lessons which he received at the circus, little
+Stirling was soon fit to appear on the posters, and the night when he
+made his first appearance at Franconi's, old Tom Pears, the clown, who
+understood such matters better than most, exclaimed: 'My boy, you will
+make your way, if you don't break your neck first!' 'I will take care of
+that, Monsieur Pears,' the lad replied, with a careless shrug of the
+shoulder.
+
+"He was extremely daring, and when he threw himself from one trapeze to
+the other, in a bold flight through the air, one might almost have
+fancied in the silvery electric light, that he was some fabulous bird
+with folded wings, and he executed all his feats with unequalled,
+natural grace, without seeming to make an effort, but he unbraced his
+limbs of steel, and condensed all his strength in one supreme, mad leap.
+His chest, under its pearl-gray tights, hardly rose, and there was not a
+drop of perspiration on his forehead, among the light curls which framed
+it, like a golden halo.
+
+"He had an almost disdainful manner of smiling at the public, as if he
+had been working like an artist, who loves his profession, and who is
+amused at danger, rather than like an acrobat who is paid to amuse
+people after dinner; and during his most difficult feats he often
+uttered a shrill cry, like that of some wild beast which defies the
+sportsman, as it falls on its prey. But that sportsman is always on the
+alert, and he is the _Invisible_, which closes the brightest eyes, and
+the most youthful lips for ever.
+
+"And in spite of oneself, one was excited by it, and could have wished,
+from a superstitious instinct, that he would not continually have that
+defiant cry, which seemed to give him pleasure, on his lips. James
+Stirling watched over him like the mother of an actress does, who knows
+that she is in some corner, and fears dangerous connections, in which
+the strongest are entangled and ruined, and they lived together in a
+boarding-house near the _Arc de Triumph_.
+
+"It was a very simple apartment, with immense posters of every color and
+in every language pinned to the wall, on which the name of Stirling
+appeared in large, striking letters; photographs with inscriptions, and
+tinsel wreaths, though there were two of real laurel, that were covered
+with dust, and were gradually falling to pieces.
+
+"One night, the young fellow for the first time did not come home, and
+only returned in time for rehearsal, tired, with blue rims under his
+eyes, his lips cracked with feverish heat, and with pale cheeks, but
+with such a look of happiness, and such a peculiar light in his eyes,
+that _Mamma Stirling_ felt as if he had been stabbed, and had not the
+strength to find fault with him; and emboldened, radiant, longing to
+give vent to the mad joy which filled his whole being, to express his
+sensations, and recount his happiness, like a lad talking to his elder
+brother, he told James Stirling his love intrigue from beginning to end,
+and how much in love he was with the light-haired girl who had clasped
+him in her arms, and initiated him into the pleasures of the flesh.
+
+"It had been coming for some time, he said. She went to every
+performance, and always occupied the same box. She used to send him
+letters by the boxopener, letters which smelt like bunches of violets,
+and always smiled at him when he came into the ring to bow to the
+public, amidst the applause and recalls, and it was that smile, those
+red, half-open lips, which seemed to promise so many caresses and
+delicious words, that had attracted him like some strange, fragrant
+fruit. Sometimes she came with gentlemen in evening dress, and with
+gardenias in their button-holes, who seemed to bore her terribly, if not
+to disgust her. And he was happy, although he had never yet spoken to
+her, that she had not that smile for them which she had for him, and
+that she appeared dull and sad, like somebody who is homesick, or who
+has got a great longing for something.
+
+"On other evenings, she used to be quite alone, with black pearls in the
+lobes of her small ears, that were like pink shells, and got up and left
+her box as soon as he had finished his performance on the trapeze ...
+while the evening before she carried him off almost forcibly in her
+carriage, without even giving him time to get rid of his tights, and the
+india-rubber armlets that he wore on his wrists. Oh! that return to the
+cold, in the semi-obscurity, through which the trembling light of the
+street lamps shone, that warm, exciting clasp of her arms round him,
+which imprisoned him, and by degrees drew him close to that warm body,
+whose slightest throb and shiver he felt, as if she had been clothed in
+impalpable gauze, and whose odor mounted to his head like fumes of
+whisky, an odor in which there was something of everything, of the
+animal, of the woman, of spices, of flowers, and something that he did
+not yet know.
+
+"And they were despotic, imperious, divine kisses, when she put her lips
+to his and kept them there, as if to make him dream of an eternity of
+bliss, sucking in his breath, hurting his lips, intoxicating,
+overwhelming him with delight, exhausting him, while she held his head
+in both her hands, as if in a vice. And the carriage rolled on at a
+quick trot, through the silence of the snow, and they did not even hear
+the noise of the wheels, which buried themselves in that white carpet,
+as if it had been cotton-wool. Suddenly, however, tired and exhausted
+she leant against him with closed eyes and moist lips, and then they
+talked at random, like people who are not quite themselves, and who have
+uncorked too many bottles of champagne on a benefit night.
+
+"She questioned him, and laughed at his theatrical slang, wrapped her
+otter-skin rug round his legs, and murmured: 'Come close to me, darling;
+at any rate, you are not cold, I hope?' When they reached her pretty
+little house, with old tapestry and delicate colored plush hangings,
+they found supper waiting for them, and she amused herself by attending
+to him herself, with the manners of a saucy waitress... And then there
+were kisses, constant, insatiable, maddening kisses, and the lad
+exclaimed, with glistening eyes, at the thoughts of future meetings: 'If
+you only knew how pretty she is! And then, it is nicer than anything
+else in the world to obey her, to do whatever she wants, and to allow
+oneself to be loved as she wishes!'
+
+"_Mamma Stirling_ was very uneasy, but resigned himself to the
+inevitable, and seeing how infatuated the boy was, he took care not to
+be too sharp with him, or to keep too tight a hand upon the reins. The
+woman who had debauched the lad was a fast woman, and nothing else, and
+after all, the old stager preferred that to one of those excitable women
+who are as dangerous for a man as the plague, whereas a girl of that
+sort can be taken and left again, and one does not risk one's heart at
+the same time as one does one's skin, for a man knows what they are
+worth. He was mistaken, however. Nelly d'Argine, she is married to a
+Yankee, now, and has gone to New York with him, was one of those vicious
+women whom a man can only wish his worst enemy to have, and she had
+merely taken a fancy to the young fellow because she was bored to
+death, and because her senses were roused like the embers which break
+out again, when a fire is nearly out.
+
+"Unfortunately, he had taken the matter seriously, and was very jealous,
+and as suspicious as a deer, and had never imagined that this love
+affair could come to an end, and proud, with his hot gipsy blood, he
+wished to be the only lover, the only master who paid, and who could not
+be shown the door, like a troublesome and importunate parasite.
+
+"Stirling had saved some money, by dint of a hard struggle, and had
+invested it in the Funds against a rainy day, when he should be too old
+to work, and to gain a livelihood, and when he saw how madly in love his
+son was, and how obstinate in his lamentable folly, he gave him all his
+savings and deprived himself of his stout and gin, so that the boy might
+have money to give to his mistress, and might continue to be happy, and
+not have any cares, and so between them, they kept Nelly.
+
+"Stirling's debts accumulated, and he mortgaged his salary for years in
+advance to the usurers who haunt circuses as if they were gambling
+hells, who are on the watch for passions, poverty and disappointments,
+who keep plenty of ready stamped bill paper in their pockets, as well as
+money, which they haggle over, coin by coin. But in spite of all this,
+the lad sang, made a show, and amused himself, and used to say to him,
+as he kissed him on both cheeks: 'How kind you are, in spite of
+everything!'
+
+"In a month's time, as he was becoming too exacting, he followed her,
+questioned her and worried her with perpetual scenes, Nelly found that
+she had had enough of her gymnast; he was a toy which she had done with
+and worn out, and which was now only in her way, and only worth throwing
+into the gutter. She was satiated with him, and became once more the
+tranquil woman whom nothing can move, and who baits her ground quite
+calmly, in order to find a husband and to make a fresh start. And so she
+turned the young fellow out of doors, as if he had been some beggar
+soliciting alms. He did not complain, however, and did not say anything
+to _Mamma Stirling_, but worked as he had done in the past, and mastered
+himself with superhuman energy, so as to hide the grief that was gnawing
+at his heart and killing him, and the disenchantment with everything
+that was making him sick of life.
+
+"Some time afterwards, when there was to be a special display for the
+officers, seeing Nelly d'Argine there in a box surrounded by her usual
+admirers, appearing indifferent to everything that was going on, and not
+even apparently noticing that he was performing, and was being heartily
+applauded, he threw his trapeze forward as far as he could, at the end
+of his performance, and exerting all his strength, and certain that he
+should fall beyond the protecting net, he flung himself furiously into
+space.
+
+"A cry of horror resounded from one end of the house to the other, when
+he was picked up disfigured, and with nearly every bone in his body
+broken. The unfortunate young fellow was no longer breathing, his chest
+was crushed in, and blood-stained froth was issuing from his lips, and
+Nelly d'Argine made haste to leave the house with her friends, saying in
+a very vexed voice:
+
+"'It is very disgusting to come in the hopes of being amused, and to
+witness an accident!'
+
+"And _Mamma Stirling_, who was ruined and in utter despair, and who
+cared for nothing more in this world, after that took to drinking, used
+to get constantly drunk, and rolled from public-house to public-house,
+and bar to bar, and as the worst glass of vitrol still cost a penny, he
+became reduced to undertaking the part which you have seen, to dabble in
+the water, to blacken himself, and to allow himself to be bitten.
+
+"Ah! What a wretched thing life is for those who are kind, and who have
+too much heart!"
+
+
+
+
+LILIE LALA
+
+
+"When I saw her for the first time," Louis d'Arandel said, with the look
+of a man who was dreaming and trying to recollect something, "I thought
+of some slow and yet passionate music that I once heard, though I do not
+remember who was the composer, where there was a fair-haired woman,
+whose hair was so silky, so golden, and so vibrating, that her lover had
+it cut off after her death, and had the strings of the magic bow of a
+violin made out of it, which afterwards emitted such superhuman
+complaints and love melodies that they made its hearers love until
+death.
+
+"In her eyes there lay the mystery of deep waters, and one was lost in
+them, drowned in them like in fathomless depths, and at the corners of
+her mouth there lurked that despotic and merciless smile of those women
+who do not fear that they may be conquered, who rule over men like cruel
+queens, whose hearts remain as virgin as those of the strictest
+Carmelite nuns, amidst a flood of lewdness.
+
+"I have seen her angelic head, the bands of her hair, that looked like
+plates of gold, her tall, graceful figure, her white, slender, childish
+hands, in stained glass windows in churches. She suggested pictures of
+the Annunciation, where the Archangel Gabriel descends with ultra-marine
+colored wings, and Mary is sitting at her spinning-wheel and spinning,
+while uttering pious prayers, and looks like the tall sister of the
+white lilies that are growing beside her and the roses.
+
+"When she went through the acacia alley, she appeared on some First
+Night in the stage box at one of the theaters, nearly always alone, and
+apparently feeling life a great burden, and angry because she could not
+change the eternal, dull round of human enjoyment, nobody would have
+believed that she went in for a fast life, and that in the annals of
+gallantry she was catalogued under the strange name of _Lilie Lala_, and
+that no man could rub against her without being irretrievably caught,
+and spending his last half-penny on her.
+
+"But with all that, Lilie had the voice of a schoolgirl, of some little
+innocent creature who still uses a skipping-rope and wears short
+dresses, and had that clear, innocent laugh which reminds people of
+wedding bells. Sometimes, for fun, I would kneel down before her, like
+before the statue of a saint, and clasping my hands as if in prayer, I
+used to say: '_Sancta Lilie, ora pro nobis!_'
+
+"One evening, at Biarritz, when the sky had the dull glare of intense
+heat and the sea was of a sinister, inky black, and was swelling and
+rolling enormous phosphorescent waves onto the beach at _Port-Vieux_,
+Lilie, who was listless and strange, and was making holes in the sand
+with the heels of her boots, suddenly exclaimed in one of those longings
+for confidence which women sometimes feel, and for which they are sorry
+as soon as their story is done:
+
+"'Ah! My dear fellow, I do not deserve to be canonized, and my life is
+rather a subject for a drama than a chapter from the Gospels or the
+Golden Legend. As long as I can remember anything, I can remember
+seeing myself wrapped in lace, being carried by a woman, and
+continually being made a fuss with, like children are who have been
+waited for for a long time, and who are spoiled more than others.
+
+"'Those kisses were so nice, that I still seem to feel their sweetness,
+and I preserve the remembrance of them in a little place in my heart,
+like one preserves some lucky talisman in a reliquary. I still seem to
+remember an indistinct landscape lost in the mist, outlines of trees
+which frightened me as they creaked and groaned in the wind, and ponds
+on which swans were sailing. And when I look in the glass for a long
+time, merely for the sake of seeing myself, it seems to me as if I
+recognized the woman who formerly used to kiss me most frequently, and
+speak to me in a more loving voice than anyone else did. But what
+happened afterwards?
+
+"'Was I carried off, or sold to some strolling circus owner by a
+dishonest servant? I do not know; I have never been able to find out;
+but I remember that my whole childhood was spent in a circus which
+traveled from fair to fair, and from place to place, with files of vans,
+processions of animals, and noisy music.
+
+"'I was as tiny as an insect, and they taught me difficult tricks, to
+dance on the tight-rope and to perform on the slack-rope.... I was
+beaten as if I had been a bit of plaster, and I more frequently had a
+piece of dry bread to gnaw, than a slice of meat. But I remember that
+one day I slipped under one of the vans, and stole a basin of soup as my
+share, which one of the clowns was carefully making for his three
+learned dogs.
+
+"'I had neither friends nor relations; I was employed on the dirtiest
+jobs, like the lowest stable-help, and I was tattooed with bruises and
+scars. Of the whole company, however, the one who beat me the most, who
+was the least sparing of his thumps, and who continually made me suffer,
+as if it gave him pleasure, was the manager and proprietor, a kind of
+old, vicious brute, whom everybody feared like the plague, a miser who
+was continually complaining of the receipts, who hid away the crown
+pieces in his mattress, invested his money in the funds, and cut down
+the salary of everybody, as far as he could.
+
+"'His name was Rapha Ginestous. Any other child, but myself, would have
+succumbed to such constant martyrdom, but I grew up, and the more I
+grew, the prettier and more desirable I became, so that when I was
+fifteen, men were already beginning to write love letters to me, and to
+throw bouquets to me in the arena. I felt also that all the men in the
+company were watching me, and were coveting me as their prey; that their
+lustful looks rested on my pink tights, and followed the graceful
+outlines of my body when I was posing on the rope that stretched from
+one end of the circus to the other, or jumped through the paper hoops at
+full gallop.
+
+"'They were no longer the same, and spoke to me in a totally different
+tone of voice.... They tried to come into my dressing-room when I was
+changing my dress, and Rapha Ginestous seemed to have lost his head, and
+his heart throbbed audibly when he came near me. Yes, he had the
+audacity to propose bargains to me which covered my cheeks and forehead
+with blushes, and which filled me with disgust, and as I felt a fierce
+hatred for him, and detested him with all my soul and all my strength,
+as I wished to make him suffer the tortures which he had inflicted upon
+me, a hundred fold, I used him as the target at which I was constantly
+aiming.
+
+"'Instinctively, I employed every cunning perfidy, every artful
+coquetry, every lie, every artifice which upsets the strongest and most
+skeptical, and places them at our mercy, like submissive animals. He
+loved me, he really loved me, that lascivious goat, who had never seen
+anything in a woman except a soft palliasse, and an instrument of
+convenience and of forgetfulness. He loved me like old men do love, with
+frenzy, with degrading transports, and with the prostration of his will
+and of his strength.... I held him like in a leash, and did whatever I
+liked with him.
+
+"'I was much more manageress than he was manager, and the poor wretch
+wasted away in vain hopes and in useless transports; he had not even
+touched the tips of my fingers, and was reduced to bestowing his
+caresses on my columbine shoes, my tights, and my wigs. And I care not
+_that_ for it, you understand! Not the slightest familiarity, and he
+began to grow thin over it, fell ill, and almost became idiotic. And
+while he implored me, and promised to marry me, with his eyes full of
+tears, I shouted with laughter; I reminded him of how he had beaten,
+abused, and humiliated me, and had often made me wish for death. And as
+soon as he left me, he emptied bottles of gin and whisky, and got so
+abominably drunk that he rolled under the table, in order to drown his
+sorrow and forget his desire.
+
+"'He covered me with jewels, and tried everything he could to tempt me
+to become his wife, and in spite of my inexperience in life, he
+consulted me with regard to everything he undertook, and one evening,
+after I had stroked his face with my hand, I persuaded him without any
+difficulty, to make his will, by which he left me all his savings, and
+the circus and everything belonging to it.
+
+"'It was in the middle of winter, near Moscow; it snowed continually,
+and one almost burned oneself at the stoves in trying to keep warm.
+Rapha Ginestous had had supper brought into the largest van, which was
+his, after the performance, and for hours we ate and drank. I was very
+nice towards him, and filled his glass every moment; I even sat on his
+knee and kissed him. And all his love, and the fumes of the alcohol of
+the wine mounted to his head, and gradually made him so helplessly
+intoxicated, that he fell from his chair inert, and as if he had been
+struck by lightning, without opening his eyes or saying a word.
+
+"'The rest of the troupe were asleep, and the lights were out in all the
+little windows, and not a sound was to be heard, while the snow
+continued to fall in large flakes. So having put out the petroleum lamp,
+I opened the door, and taking the drunkard by the feet, as if he had
+been a bale of goods, I threw him out into that white shroud.
+
+"'The next morning the stiff and convulsed body of Rapha Ginestous was
+picked up, and as everybody knew his inveterate drinking habits, no one
+thought of instituting an inquiry, or of accusing me of a crime, and
+thus I was avenged, and had a yearly income of nearly fifteen thousand
+francs. What, after all, is the good of being honest, and of pardoning
+our enemies, as the Gospel bids us?'
+
+"And now," Louis d'Arandal said in conclusion, "suppose we go and have a
+cocktail or two at the Casino, for I do not think that I have ever
+talked so much in my life before."
+
+
+
+
+MADAME TELLIER'S ESTABLISHMENT
+
+
+PART I
+
+They used to go there every evening at about eleven o'clock, just like
+they went to the _cafe_. Six or eight of them used to meet there; they
+were always the same set, not fast men, but respectable tradesmen, and
+young men, in government or some other employ, and they used to drink
+their Chartreuse, and tease the girls, or else they would talk seriously
+with _Madame_, whom everybody respected, and then they used to go home
+at twelve o'clock. The younger men would sometimes stay the night.
+
+It was a small, comfortable house, at the corner of a street behind
+Saint Etienne's church, and from the windows one could see the docks,
+full of ships which were being unloaded, and the old, gray chapel,
+dedicated to the Virgin, on the hill.
+
+_Madame_, who came of a respectable family of peasant proprietors in the
+department of the Eure, had taken up that profession, just as she would
+have become a milliner or dressmaker. The prejudice against
+prostitution, which is so violent and deeply rooted in large towns, does
+not exist in the country places in Normandy. The peasant says:
+
+"It is a paying business," and he sends his daughter to keep a harem of
+fast girls, just as he would send her to keep a girls' school.
+
+She had inherited the house from an old uncle, to whom it had belonged.
+_Monsieur_ and _Madame_, who had formerly been inn-keepers near Yvetot,
+had immediately sold their house, as they thought that the business at
+Fecamp was more profitable, and they arrived one fine morning to assume
+the direction of the enterprise, which was declining on account of the
+absence of the proprietors, who were good people enough in their way,
+and who soon made themselves liked by their staff and their neighbors.
+
+_Monsieur_ died of apoplexy two years later, for as his new profession
+kept him in idleness and without any exercise, he had grown excessively
+stout, and his health had suffered. Since she had been a widow, all the
+frequenters of the establishment had wanted her; but people said that
+personally she was quite virtuous, and even the girls in the house could
+not discover anything against her. She was tall, stout and affable, and
+her complexion, which had become pale in the dimness of her house, the
+shutters of which were scarcely ever opened, shone as if it had been
+varnished. She had a fringe of curly, false hair, which gave her a
+juvenile look, that contrasted strongly with the ripeness of her figure.
+She was always smiling and cheerful, and was fond of a joke, but there
+was a shade of reserve about her, which her new occupation had not quite
+made her lose. Coarse words always shocked her, and when any young
+fellow who had been badly brought up, called her establishment by its
+right name, she was angry and disgusted.
+
+In a word, she had a refined mind, and although she treated her women as
+friends, yet she very frequently used to say that "she and they were not
+made of the same stuff."
+
+Sometimes during the week, she would hire a carriage and take some of
+her girls into the country, where they used to enjoy themselves on the
+grass by the side of the little river. They were like a lot of girls let
+out from a school, and used to run races, and play childish games. They
+had a cold dinner on the grass, and drank cider, and went home at night
+with a delicious feeling of fatigue, and in the carriage they kissed
+_Madame_ as their kind mother, who was full of goodness and
+complaisance.
+
+The house had two entrances. At the corner there was a sort of low
+_cafe_, which sailors and the lower orders frequented at night, and she
+had two girls whose special duty it was to attend to that part of the
+business. With the assistance of the waiter, whose name was Frederic,
+and who was a short, light-haired, beardless fellow, as strong as a
+horse, they set the half bottles of wine and the jugs of beer on the
+shaky marble tables, and then, sitting astride on the customer's knees,
+they urged them to drink.
+
+The three other girls (there were only five of them), formed a kind of
+aristocracy, and were reserved for the company on the first floor,
+unless they were wanted downstairs, and there was nobody on the first
+floor. The saloon of Jupiter, where the tradesmen used to meet, was
+papered in blue, and embellished with a large drawing representing Leda
+stretched out under the swan. That room was reached by a winding
+staircase, which ended at a narrow door opening onto the street, and
+above it, all night long a little lamp burned, behind wire bars, such as
+one still sees in some towns, at the foot of some shrine of a saint.
+
+The house, which was old and damp, rather smelled of mildew. At times
+there was an odor of Eau de Cologne in the passages, or a half open door
+downstairs admitted the noise of the common men sitting and drinking
+downstairs, to the first floor, much to the disgust of the gentlemen who
+were there. _Madame_, who was familiar with those of her customers with
+whom she was on friendly terms, did not leave the saloon, and took much
+interest in what was going on in the town, and they regularly told her
+all the news. Her serious conversation was a change from the ceaseless
+chatter of the three women; it was a rest from the obscene jokes of
+those stout individuals who every evening indulged in the common-place
+debauchery of drinking a glass of liquor in company with prostitutes.
+
+The names of the girls on the first floor were Fernande, Raphaele, and
+Rosa, the _Jade_. As the staff was limited, _Madame_ had endeavored that
+each member of it should be a pattern, an epitome of the feminine type,
+so that every customer might find as nearly as possible, the realization
+of his ideal. Fernande represented the handsome blonde; she was very
+tall, rather fat, and lazy; a country girl, who could not get rid of her
+freckles, and whose short, light, almost colorless, tow-like hair, which
+was like combed-out flax, barely covered her head.
+
+Raphaele, who came from Marseilles, played the indispensable part of the
+handsome Jewess, and was thin, with high cheek bones, which were covered
+with rouge, and her black hair, which was always covered with pomatum,
+curled onto her forehead. Her eyes would have been handsome, if the
+right one had not had a speck in it. Her Roman nose came down over a
+square jaw, where two false upper teeth contrasted strangely with the
+bad color of the rest.
+
+Rosa, _the Jade_, was a little roll of fat, nearly all stomach, with
+very short legs, and from morning till night she sang songs, which were
+alternately indecent or sentimental, in a harsh voice, told silly,
+interminable tales, and only stopped talking in order to eat, and left
+off eating in order to talk; she was never still, and was active as a
+squirrel, in spite of her fat, and of her short legs; and her laugh,
+which was a torrent of shrill cries, resounded here and there,
+ceaselessly, in a bedroom, in the loft, in the _cafe_, everywhere, and
+about nothing.
+
+The two women on the ground floor, Louise, who was nick-named _la
+Cocotte_, and Flora, whom they called _Balanciore_, because she limped a
+little, the former always dressed as Liberty, with a tri-colored sash,
+and the other as a Spanish woman, with a string of copper coins which
+jingled at every step she took, in her carrotty hair, looked like cooks
+dressed up for the carnival. They were like all other women of the lower
+orders, neither uglier nor better looking than they usually are.
+
+They looked just like servants at an inn, and they were generally called
+the two pumps.
+
+A jealous peace, which was, however, very rarely disturbed, reigned
+among these five women, thanks to _Madame's_ conciliatory wisdom, and to
+her constant good humor, and the establishment, which was the only one
+of the kind in the little town, was very much frequented. _Madame_ had
+succeeded in giving it such a respectable appearance, she was so amiable
+and obliging to everybody, her good heart was so well-known, that she
+was treated with a certain amount of consideration. The regular
+customers spent money on her, and were delighted when she was especially
+friendly towards them, and when they met during the day, they would say:
+"Until this evening, you know where," just like men say: "At the
+_cafe_, after dinner." In a word, Madame Tellier's house was somewhere
+to go to, and they very rarely missed their daily meetings there.
+
+One evening, towards the end of May, the first arrival, Monsieur Poulin,
+who was a timber merchant, and had been mayor, found the door shut. The
+little lantern behind the grating was not alight; there was not a sound
+in the house; everything seemed dead. He knocked, gently at first, but
+then more loudly, but nobody answered the door. Then he went slowly up
+the street, and when he got to the market place, he met Monsieur Duvert,
+the gun maker, who was going to the same place, so they went back
+together, but did not meet with any better success. But suddenly they
+heard a loud noise close to them, and on going round the house, they saw
+a number of English and French sailors, who were hammering at the closed
+shutters of the _cafe_ with their fists.
+
+The two tradesmen immediately made their escape, for fear of being
+compromised, but a low _pst_ stopped them; it was Monsieur Tournevau,
+the fish curer, who had recognized them, and was trying to attract their
+attention. They told him what had happened, and he was all the more
+vexed at it, as he, a married man, and father of a family, only went
+there on Saturdays, _securitatis causa_, as he said, alluding to a
+measure of sanitary policy, which his friend Doctor Borde had advised
+him to observe. That was his regular evening, and now he should be
+deprived of it for the whole week.
+
+The three men went as far as the quay together, and on the way they met
+young Monsieur Philippe, the banker's son, who frequented the place
+regularly, and Monsieur Pinipesse, the collector, and they all returned
+to the _Rue aux Juifs_ together, to make a last attempt. But the
+exasperated sailors were besieging the house, throwing stones at the
+shutters, and shouting, and the five first floor customers went away as
+quickly as possible, and walked aimlessly about the streets.
+
+Presently they met Monsieur Dupuis, the insurance agent, and then
+Monsieur Vasse, the Judge of the Tribunal of Commerce, and they took a
+long walk, going to the pier first of all, where they sat down in a row
+on the granite parapet, and watched the rising tide, and when the
+promenaders had sat there for some time, Monsieur Tournevau said:
+
+"This is not very amusing!"
+
+"Decidedly not," Monsieur Pinipesse replied, and they started off to
+walk again.
+
+After going through the street on the top of the hill, they returned
+over the wooden bridge which crosses the Retenue, passed close to the
+railway, and came out again onto the market place, when suddenly a
+quarrel arose between Monsieur Pinipesse, the collector, and Monsieur
+Tournevau, about an edible fungus which one of them declared he had
+found in the neighborhood.
+
+As they were out of temper already from annoyance, they would very
+probably have come to blows, if the others had not interfered. Monsieur
+Pinipesse went off furious, and soon another altercation arose between
+the ex-major, Monsieur Poulin, and Monsieur Dupuis, the insurance agent,
+on the subject of the tax collector's salary, and the profits which he
+might make. Insulting remarks were freely passing between them, when a
+torrent of formidable cries were heard, and the body of sailors, who
+were tired of waiting so long outside a closed house, came into the
+square. They were walking arm-in-arm, two and two, and formed a long
+procession, and were shouting furiously. The landsmen went and hid
+themselves under a gateway, and the yelling crew disappeared in the
+direction of the abbey. For a long time they still heard the noise,
+which diminished like a storm in the distance, and then silence was
+restored, and Monsieur Poulin and Monsieur Dupuis, who were enraged with
+each other, went in different directions, without wishing each other
+good-bye.
+
+The other four set off again, and instinctively went in the direction of
+Madame Tellier's establishment, which was still closed, silent,
+impenetrable. A quiet, but obstinate, drunken man was knocking at the
+door of the cafe, and then stopped and called Frederic, the waiter, in a
+low voice, but finding that he got no answer, he sat down on the
+doorstep, and waited the course of events.
+
+The others were just going to retire, when the noisy band of sailors
+reappeared at the end of the street. The French sailors were shouting
+the _Marseillaise_, and the Englishmen, _Rule Britannia_. There was a
+general lurching against the wall, and then the drunken brutes went on
+their way towards the quay, where a fight broke out between the two
+nations, in the course of which an Englishman had his arm broken, and a
+Frenchman his nose split.
+
+The drunken man, who had stopped outside the door, was crying by that
+time, like drunken men and children cry, when they are vexed, and the
+others went away. By degrees, calm was restored in the noisy town; here
+and there, at moments, the distant sound of voices could be heard, and
+then died away in the distance.
+
+One man, only, was still wandering about, Monsieur Tournevau, the fish
+curer, who was vexed at having to wait until the next Saturday, and he
+hoped for something to turn up, he did not know what; but he was
+exasperated at the police for thus allowing an establishment of such
+public utility, which they had under their control, to be thus closed.
+
+He went back to it, and examined the walls, and trying to find out the
+reason, and on the shutter he saw a notice stuck up, so he struck a wax
+vesta, and read the following in a large, uneven hand; "Closed on
+account of the Confirmation."
+
+Then he went away, as he saw it was useless to remain, and left the
+drunken man lying on the pavement fast asleep, outside that inhospitable
+door.
+
+The next day, all the regular customers, one after the other, found some
+reason for going through the street with a bundle of papers under their
+arm, to keep them in countenance, and with a furtive glance they all
+read that mysterious notice:
+
+_Closed on account of the Confirmation._
+
+
+PART II
+
+Madame had a brother, who was a carpenter in their native place,
+Virville, in the department of Eure. When _Madame_ had still kept the
+inn at Yvetot, she had stood god-mother to that brother's daughter, who
+had received the name of Constance, Constance Rivet; she herself being a
+Rivet on her father's side. The carpenter, who knew that his sister was
+in a good position, did not lose sight of her, although they did not
+meet often, for they were both kept at home by their occupations, and
+lived a long way from each other. But as the girl was twelve years old,
+and going to be confirmed, he seized that opportunity for writing to
+his sister, and asking her to come and be present at the ceremony. Their
+old parents were dead, and as she could not well refuse, she accepted
+the invitation. Her brother, whose name was Joseph, hoped that by dint
+of showing his sister attentions, she might be induced to make her will
+in the girl's favor, as she had no children of her own.
+
+His sister's occupation did not trouble his scruples in the least, and,
+besides, nobody knew anything about it at Virville. When they spoke of
+her, they only said: "Madame Tellier is living at Fecamp," which might
+mean that she was living on her own private income. It was quite twenty
+leagues from Fecamp to Virville, and for a peasant, twenty leagues on
+land are more than is crossing the ocean to an educated person. The
+people at Virville had never been further than Rouen, and nothing
+attracted the people from Fecamp to a village of five hundred houses, in
+the middle of a plain, and situated in another department, and, at any
+rate, nothing was known about her business.
+
+But the Confirmation was coming on, and _Madame_ was in great
+embarrassment. She had no under mistress, and did not at all care to
+leave her house, even for a day, for all the rivalries between the girls
+upstairs and those downstairs, would infallibly break out; no doubt
+Frederic would get drunk, and when he was in that state he would knock
+anybody down for a mere word. At last, however, she made up her mind to
+take them all with her, with the exception of the man, to whom she gave
+a holiday, until the next day but one.
+
+When she asked her brother, he made no objection, but undertook to put
+them all up for a night, and so on Saturday morning, the eight o'clock
+express carried off _Madame_ and her companions in a second-class
+carriage. As far as Beuzeille, they were alone, and chattered like
+magpies, but at that station a couple got in. The man, an old peasant,
+dressed in a blue blouse with a folding collar, wide sleeves, tight at
+the wrist, and ornamented with white embroidery, wore an old high hat
+with long nap, held an enormous green umbrella in one hand, and a large
+basket in the other, from which the heads of three frightened ducks
+protruded. The woman, who sat stiffly in her rustic finery, had a face
+like a fowl, and with a nose that was as pointed as a bill. She sat down
+opposite her husband and did not stir, as she was startled at finding
+herself in such smart company.
+
+There was certainly an array of striking colors in the carriage.
+_Madame_ was dressed in blue silk from head to foot, and had on over her
+dress a dazzling red shawl of imitation French cashmere. Fernande was
+panting in a Scottish plaid dress, whose bodice, which her companions
+had laced as tight as they could, had forced up her falling bosom into a
+double dome, that was continually heaving up and down, and which seemed
+liquid beneath the material. Raphaele, with a bonnet covered with
+feathers, so that it looked like a nest full of birds, had on a lilac
+dress with gold spots on it, and there was something Oriental about it
+that suited her Jewish face. Rosa, _the Jade_, had on a pink petticoat
+with large flounces, and looked like a very fat child, an obese dwarf;
+while the two pumps looked as if they had cut their dresses out of old,
+flowered curtains, dating from the Restoration.
+
+As soon as they were no longer alone in the compartment, the ladies put
+on staid looks, and began to talk of subjects which might give the
+others a high opinion of them. But at Bolbec a gentleman with light
+whiskers, with a gold chain, and wearing two or three rings, got in, and
+put several parcels wrapped in oil cloth into the net over his head. He
+looked inclined for a joke, and a good-natured fellow.
+
+"Are you ladies changing your quarters?" he said, and that question
+embarrassed them all considerably. _Madame_, however, quickly recovered
+her composure, and said sharply, to avenge the honor of her corps:
+
+"I think you might try and be polite!"
+
+He excused himself, and said: "I beg your pardon, I ought to have said
+your nunnery."
+
+As _Madame_ could not think of a retort, or perhaps as she thought
+herself justified sufficiently, she gave him a dignified bow, and
+pinched in her lips.
+
+Then the gentleman, who was sitting between Rose _the Jade_ and the old
+peasant, began to wink knowingly at the ducks, whose heads were sticking
+out of the basket, and when he felt that he had fixed the attention of
+his public, he began to tickle them under their bills, and spoke funnily
+to them, to make the company smile.
+
+"We have left our little pond, quack! quack! to make the acquaintance of
+the little spit, qu-ack! qu-ack!"
+
+The unfortunate creatures turned their necks away, to avoid his
+caresses, and made desperate efforts to get out of their wicker prison,
+and then, suddenly, all at once, uttered the most lamentable quacks of
+distress. The women exploded with laughter. They leaned forward and
+pushed each other, so as to see better; they were very much interested
+in the ducks, and the gentleman redoubled his airs, his wits, and his
+teasing.
+
+Rosa joined in, and leaning over her neighbor's legs, she kissed the
+three animals on the head, and immediately all the girls wanted to kiss
+them in turn, and the gentleman took them onto his knees, made them jump
+up and down and pinched them. The two peasants, who were even in greater
+consternation than their poultry, rolled their eyes as if they were
+possessed, without venturing to move, and their old wrinkled faces had
+not a smile nor a movement.
+
+Then the gentleman, who was a commercial traveler, offered the ladies
+braces by way of a joke, and taking up one of his packages, he opened
+it. It was a trick, for the parcel contained garters. There were blue
+silk, pink silk, red silk, violet silk, mauve silk garters, and the
+buckles were made of two gilt metal Cupids, embracing each other. The
+girls uttered exclamations of delight and looked at them with that
+gravity which is natural to a woman when she is hankering after a
+bargain. They consulted one another by their looks or in a whisper, and
+replied in the same manner, and _Madame_ was longingly handling a pair
+of orange garters that were broader and more imposing looking than the
+rest; really fit for the mistress of such an establishment.
+
+The gentleman waited, for he was nourishing an idea.
+
+"Come, my kittens," he said, "you must try them on."
+
+There was a torrent of exclamations, and they squeezed their petticoats
+between their legs, as if they thought he was going to ravish them, but
+he quietly waited his time, and said: "Well, if you will not, I shall
+pack them up again."
+
+And he added cunningly: "I offer any pair they like, to those who will
+try them on."
+
+But they would not, and sat up very straight, and looked dignified.
+
+But the two pumps looked so distressed that he renewed the offer to
+them, and Flora especially visibly hesitated, and he possessed her:
+"Come, my dear, a little courage! Just look at that lilac pair; it will
+suit your dress admirably ..."
+
+That decided her, and pulling up her dress she showed a thick leg fit
+for a milk-maid, in a badly-fitting, coarse stocking. The commercial
+traveler stooped down and fastened the garter below the knee first of
+all and then above it; and he tickled the girl gently, which made her
+scream and jump. When he had done, he gave her the lilac pair, and
+asked: "Who next?"
+
+"I! I!" they all shouted at once, and he began on Rosa _the Jade_, who
+uncovered a shapeless, round thing without any ankle, a regular "sausage
+of a leg," as Raphaele used to say.
+
+The commercial traveler complimented Fernande, and grew quite
+enthusiastic over her powerful columns.
+
+The thin tibias of the handsome Jewess met less success, and Louise
+Cocote, by way of a joke, put her petticoats over his head, so that
+_Madame_ was obliged to interfere to check such unseemly behavior.
+
+Lastly, _Madame_ herself put out her leg, a handsome, muscular, Norman
+leg, and in his surprise and pleasure, the commercial traveler gallantly
+took off his hat to salute that master calf, like a true French
+cavalier.
+
+The two peasants, who were speechless from surprise, looked aside, out
+of the corners of their eyes, and they looked so exactly like fowls that
+the man with the light whiskers, when he sat up, said _co--co--ri--co_,
+under their very noses, and that gave rise to another storm of
+amusement.
+
+The old people got out at Motteville, with their basket, their ducks,
+and their umbrella, and they heard the woman say to her husband, as they
+went away:
+
+"They are bad women, who are off to that cursed place Paris."
+
+The funny commercial traveler himself got out at Rouen, after behaving
+so coarsely, that _Madame_ was obliged sharply to put him into his
+right place, and she added, as a moral: "This will teach us not to talk
+to the first comer."
+
+At Oissel they changed trains, and at a little station further on,
+Monsieur Joseph Rivet was waiting for them with a large cart and a
+number of chairs in it, which was drawn by a white horse.
+
+The carpenter politely kissed all the ladies, and then helped them into
+his conveyance.
+
+Three of them sat on three chairs at the back, Raphaele, _Madame_ and
+her brother on the three chairs in front, and Rosa, who had no seat,
+settled herself as comfortably as she could on tall Fernande's knees,
+and then they set off.
+
+But the horse's jerky trot shook the cart so terribly that the chairs
+began to dance, and threw the travelers into the air, to the right and
+to the left, as if they had been dancing puppets, which made them make
+horrible grimaces and screams, which, however, were cut short by another
+jolt of the cart.
+
+They clung onto the sides of the vehicle, their bonnets fell onto their
+backs, their noses on their shoulders, and the white horse went on
+stretching out his head, and holding out his tail quite straight, a
+little, hairless rat's tail, with which he whisked his buttocks from
+time to time.
+
+Joseph Rivet, with one leg on the shafts and the other bent under him,
+held out the reins with his elbows very high, and he kept uttering a
+kind of chuckling sound, which made the horse prick up its ears and go
+faster.
+
+The green country extended on either side of the road, and here and
+there the colza in flower presented a waving expanse of yellow, from
+which there arose a strong, wholesome, sweet and penetrating smell,
+which the wind carried to some distance.
+
+The cornflowers showed their little blue heads among the rye, and the
+women wanted to pick them, but Monsieur Rivet refused to stop.
+
+Then sometimes a whole field appeared to be covered with blood, so
+thickly were the poppies growing, and the cart, which looked as if it
+were filled with flowers of more brilliant hue, drove on through the
+fields colored with wild flowers, and disappeared behind the trees of a
+farm, only to reappear and to go on again through the yellow or green
+standing crops, which were studded with red or blue.
+
+One o'clock struck as they drove up to the carpenter's door. They were
+tired out, and pale with hunger, as they had eaten nothing since they
+left home, and Madame Rivet ran out, and made them alight, one after
+another, and kissed them as soon as they were on the ground, and she
+seemed as if she would never tire of kissing her sister-in-law, whom she
+apparently wanted to monopolize. They had lunch in the workshop, which
+had been cleared out for the next day's dinner.
+
+A capital omelette, followed by boiled chitterlings, and washed down by
+good, sharp cider, made them all feel comfortable.
+
+Rivet had taken a glass so that he might hob-nob with them, and his wife
+cooked, waited on them, brought in the dishes, took them out, and asked
+all of them in a whisper whether they had everything they wanted. A
+number of boards standing against the walls, and heaps of shavings that
+had been swept into the corners, gave out a smell of planed wood, or
+carpentering, that resinous odor which penetrates the lungs.
+
+They wanted to see the little girl, but she had gone to church, and
+would not be back until evening, so they all went out for a stroll in
+the country.
+
+It was a small village, through which the high road passed. Ten or a
+dozen houses on either side of the single street, were inhabited by the
+butcher, the grocer, the carpenter, the inn-keeper, the shoemaker and
+the baker.
+
+The church was at the end of the street, and was surrounded by a small
+churchyard, and four enormous lime-trees, which stood just outside the
+porch, shaded it completely. It was built of flint, in no particular
+style, and had a slated steeple. When you got past it, you were in the
+open country again, which was broken here and there by clumps of trees
+which hid the homestead.
+
+Rivet had given his arm to his sister, out of politeness, although he
+was in his working clothes, and was walking with her majestically. His
+wife, who was overwhelmed by Raphaele's gold-striped dress, was walking
+between her and Fernande, and round-about Rosa was trotting behind with
+Louise Cocote and Flora, the see-saw, who was limping along, quite
+tired out.
+
+The inhabitants came to their doors, the children left off playing, and
+a window curtain would be raised, so as to show a muslin cap, while an
+old woman with a crutch, and who was almost blind, crossed herself as if
+it were a religious procession, and they all looked for a long time
+after those handsome ladies from the town, who had come so far to be
+present at the confirmation of Joseph Rivet's little girl, and the
+carpenter rose very much in the public estimation.
+
+As they passed the church, they heard some children singing; little
+shrill voices were singing a hymn, but _Madame_ would not let them go
+in, for fear of disturbing the little cherubs.
+
+After a walk, during which Joseph Rivet enumerated the principal landed
+proprietors, spoke about the yield of the land, and productiveness of
+the cows and sheep, he took his herd of women home and installed them in
+his house, and as it was very small, they had put them into the rooms,
+two and two.
+
+Just for once, Rivet would sleep in the workshop on the shavings; his
+wife was going to share her bed with her sister-in-law, and Fernande and
+Raphaele were to sleep together in the next room. Louise and Flora were
+put into the kitchen, where they had a mattress on the floor, and Rosa
+had a little dark cupboard at the top of the stairs to herself, close to
+the loft, where the candidate for confirmation was to sleep.
+
+When the girl came in, she was overwhelmed with kisses; all the women
+wished to caress her, with that need of tender expansion, that habit of
+professional wheedling, which had made them kiss the ducks in the
+railway carriage.
+
+They all of them took her onto their laps, stroked her soft, light
+hair, and pressed her in their arms with vehement and spontaneous
+outbursts of affection, and the child, who was very good and religious,
+bore it all patiently.
+
+As the day had been a fatiguing one for every body, they all went to bed
+soon after dinner. The whole village was wrapped in that perfect
+stillness of the country, which is almost like a religious silence, and
+the girls, who were accustomed to the noisy evenings of their
+establishment, felt rather impressed by the perfect repose of the
+sleeping village, and they shivered, not with cold, but with those
+little shivers of solitude which come over uneasy and troubled hearts.
+
+As soon as they were in bed, two and two together, they clasped each
+other in their arms, as if to protect themselves against this feeling of
+the calm and profound slumber of the earth. But Rosa _the Jade_, who
+was alone in her little dark cupboard, felt a vague and painful emotion
+come over her.
+
+She was tossing about in bed, unable to get to sleep, when she heard the
+faint sobs of a crying child close to her head through the partition.
+She was frightened, and called out, and was answered by a weak voice,
+broken by sobs. It was the little girl, who was always used to sleeping
+in her mother's room, and who was frightened in her small attic.
+
+Rosa was delighted, got up softly so as not to awaken anyone, and went
+and fetched the child. She took her into her warm bed, kissed her and
+pressed her to her bosom, cossetted her, lavished exaggerated
+manifestations of tenderness on her, and at last grew calmer herself and
+went to sleep. And till morning, the candidate for confirmation slept
+with her head on the prostitute's naked bosom.
+
+At five o'clock, the little church bell ringing the _Angelus_, woke the
+women up, who usually slept the whole morning long.
+
+The peasants were up already, and the women went busily from house to
+house, carefully bringing short, starched, muslin dresses in
+band--boxes, or very long wax tapers, with a bow of silk fringed with
+gold in the middle, and with dents in the wax for the fingers.
+
+The sun was already high in the blue sky, which still had a rosy tint
+towards the horizon, like a faint trace of dawn, remaining. Families of
+fowls were walking about outside houses, and here and there a black
+cock, with a glistening breast, raised his head, which was crowned by
+his red comb, flapped his wings, and uttered his shrill crow, which the
+other cocks repeated.
+
+Vehicles of all sorts came from neighboring parishes, and discharged
+tall, Norman women, in dark dresses, with neck--handkerchiefs crossed
+over the bosom, which were fastened with silver brooches, a hundred
+years old.
+
+The men had put on their blouses over their new frock--coats, or over
+their old dress--coats of green cloth, the two tails of which hung down
+below their blouses. When the horses were in the stable, there was a
+double line of rustic conveyances along the road; carts, cabriolets,
+tilburies, char--a--bancs, traps of every shape and age, resting on
+their shafts, or else with them in the air.
+
+The carpenter's house was as busy as a beehive. The ladies, in
+dressing--jackets and petticoats, with their hanging down, thin, short
+hair, which looked as if it were faded and worn by use, were busy
+dressing the child, who was standing motionless on a table, while
+Madame Tellier was directing the movements of her battalion. They washed
+her, did her hair, dressed her, and with the help of a number of pins,
+they arranged the folds of her dress, and took in the waist, which was
+too large.
+
+Then, when she was ready, she was told to sit down and not to move, and
+the women hurried off to get ready themselves.
+
+The church bell began to ring again, and its tinkle was lost in the air,
+like a feeble voice which is soon drowned in space. The candidates came
+out of the houses, and went towards the parochial building which
+contained the two--school and the mansion house--and which stood quite
+at one end of the village, while the church was situated at the other.
+
+The parents, in their very best clothes, followed their children, with
+awkward looks, and those clumsy movements of the body, which is always
+bent at work.
+
+The little girls disappeared in a cloud of muslin, which looked like
+whipped cream, while the lads, who looked like embryo waiters in a
+_cafe_, and whose heads shone with pomatum, walked with their legs
+apart, so as not to get any dust or dirt onto their black trousers.
+
+It was something for the family to be proud of, when a large number of
+relations, who had come from a distance, surrounded the child, and,
+consequently, the carpenter's triumph was complete.
+
+Madame Tellier's regiment, with its mistress at its head, followed
+Constance; her father gave his arm to his sister, her mother walked by
+the side of Raphaele, Fernande, with Rosa and the two pumps together,
+and thus they walked majestically through the village, like a general's
+staff in full uniform, while the effect on the village was startling.
+
+At the school, the girls arranged themselves under the Sister of Mercy,
+and the boys under the schoolmaster, and they started off, singing a
+hymn as they went. The boys led the way, in two files, between the two
+rows of vehicles, from which the horses had been taken out, and the
+girls followed in the same order; and as all the people in the village
+had given the town ladies the precedence out of politeness, they came
+immediately behind the girls, and lengthened the double line of the
+procession still more, three on the right and three on the left, while
+their dresses were as striking as a bouquet in fireworks.
+
+When they went into the church, the congregation grew quite excited.
+They pressed against each other, they turned round, they jostled one
+another in order to see, and some of the devout ones spoke almost aloud,
+as they were so astonished at the sight of those ladies whose dresses
+were more trimmed than the priest's chasuble.
+
+The Mayor offered them his pew, the first one on the right, close to the
+choir, and Madame Tellier sat there with her sister-in-law, Fernande and
+Raphaele, Rosa _the Jade_, and the two pumps occupied the second seat,
+in company with the carpenter.
+
+The choir was full of kneeling children, the girls on one side, and the
+boys on the other, and the long wax tapers which they held looked like
+lances, pointing in all directions, and three men were standing in front
+of the lectern, singing as loud as they could.
+
+They prolonged the syllables of the sonorous Latin indefinitely,
+holding onto _Amens_ with interminable _a--a's_, while the serpent of
+the organ kept up its monotorious, long drawn out notes, which that
+longthroated, copper instrument uttered.
+
+A child's shrill voice took up the reply, and from time to time a priest
+sitting in a stall and wearing a biretta, got up, muttered something,
+and sat down again, while the three singers continued, with their eyes
+fixed on the big book of plain song lying open before them on the
+outstretched wings of an eagle, mounted on a pivot.
+
+Then silence ensued, and so the service went on, and towards the end of
+it, Rosa, with her head in both her hands, suddenly thought of her
+mother and her village church on a similar occasion. She almost fancied
+that that day had returned, when she was so small, and almost hidden in
+her white dress, and she began to cry.
+
+First of all, she wept silently, and the tears dropped slowly from her
+eyes, but her emotion increased with her recollections, and she began to
+sob. She took out her pocket-handkerchief, wiped her eyes, and held it
+to her mouth, so as not to scream, but it was useless.
+
+A sort of rattle escaped her throat, and she was answered by two other
+profound, heart-breaking sobs; for her two neighbors, Louise and Flora,
+who were kneeling near her, overcome by similar recollections, were
+sobbing by her side, amidst a flood of tears, and as they are
+contagious, _Madame_ soon in turn found that her eyes were wet, and on
+turning to her sister-in-law, she saw that all the occupants of her seat
+were also crying.
+
+Soon, throughout the church, here and there, a wife, a mother, a sister,
+seized by the strange sympathy of poignant emotion, and agitated by
+those handsome ladies on their knees, who were shaken by their sobs,
+was moistening her cambric pocket-handkerchief, and pressing her beating
+heart with her left hand.
+
+Just as the sparks from an engine will set fire to dry grass, so the
+tears of Rosa and of her companions infected the whole congregation in a
+moment. Men, women, old men, and lads in new blouses were soon all
+sobbing, and something superhuman seemed to be hovering over their
+heads; a spirit, the powerful breath of an invisible and all-powerful
+being.
+
+Suddenly a species of madness seemed to pervade the church, the noise of
+a crowd in a state of frenzy, a tempest of sobs and stifled cries. It
+passed through them like gusts of wind which bow the trees in a forest,
+and the priest, paralyzed by emotion, stammered out incoherent prayers,
+without finding words, prayers of the soul, when it soars towards
+heaven.
+
+The people behind him, gradually grew calmer. The cantors, in all the
+dignity of their white surplices, went on in somewhat uncertain voices,
+and the serpent itself seemed hoarse, as if the instrument had been
+weeping; the priest, however, raised his hand, as a sign for them to be
+still, and went and stood on the chancel steps, when everybody was
+silent, immediately.
+
+After a few remarks on what had just taken place, which he attributed to
+a miracle, he continued, turning to the seats where the carpenter's
+guests were sitting:
+
+"I especially thank you, my dear sisters, who have come from such a
+distance, and whose presence among us, whose evident faith and ardent
+piety have set such a salutary example to all. You have edified my
+parish; your emotion has warmed all hearts; without you, this great day
+would not, perhaps, have had this really divine character. It is
+sufficient, at times, that there should be one chosen to keep in the
+flock, to make the whole flock blessed."
+
+His voice failed him again, from emotion, and he said no more, but
+concluded the service.
+
+Then they all left the church as quickly as possible, and the children
+themselves were restless, as they were tired with such a prolonged
+tension of the mind. Besides that, they were hungry, and by degrees they
+all left the churchyard, to see about dinner.
+
+There was a crowd outside, a noisy crowd, a babel of loud voices, where
+the shrill Norman accent was discernible. The villagers formed two
+ranks, and when the children appeared, each family seized its own.
+
+The whole houseful of women caught hold of Constance, surrounded her and
+kissed her, and Rosa was especially demonstrative. At last she took hold
+of one hand, while Madame Tellier held the other, and Raphaele and
+Fernande held up her long muslin petticoat, so that it might not drag in
+the dust; Louise and Flora brought up the rear with Madame Rivet, and
+the child, who was very silent and thoughtful, set off home, in the
+midst of this guard of honor.
+
+The dinner was served in the workshop, on long boards supported by
+trestles, and through the open door they could see all the enjoyment
+that was going on. Everywhere they were feasting, and through every
+window were to be seen tables surrounded by people in their Sunday best,
+and a cheerful noise was heard in every house, while the men were
+sitting in their shirt-sleeves, drinking cider, glass after glass.
+
+In the carpenter's house, their gaiety maintained somewhat of an air of
+reserve, which was the consequence of the emotion of the girls in the
+morning, and Rivet was the only one who was in a good cue, and he was
+drinking to excess. Madame Tellier was looking at the clock every
+moment, for, in order not to lose two days following, they ought to take
+the 3:55 train, which would bring them to Fecamp by dark.
+
+The carpenter tried very hard to distract her attention, so as to keep
+his guests until the next day, but he did not succeed, for she never
+joked when there was business to be done, and as soon as they had had
+their coffee she ordered her girls to make haste and get ready, and
+then, turning to her brother, she said:
+
+"You must have the horse put in immediately," and she herself went to
+finish her last preparations.
+
+When she came down again, her sister-in-law was waiting to speak to her
+about the child, and a long conversation took place, in which, however,
+nothing was settled. The carpenter's wife finished, and pretended to be
+very much moved, and Madame Tellier, who was holding the girl on her
+knees, would not pledge herself to anything definite, but merely gave
+vague promises ... she would not forget her, there was plenty of time,
+and then, they should meet again.
+
+But the conveyance did not come to the door, and the women did not come
+downstairs. Upstairs, they even heard loud laughter, falls, little
+screams, and much clapping of hands, and so, while the carpenter's wife
+went to the stable to see whether the cart was ready, Madame went
+upstairs.
+
+Rivet, who was very drunk, and half undressed, was vainly trying to
+violate Rosa, who was half choking with laughter. The two pumps were
+holding him by the arms and trying to calm him, as they were shocked at
+such a scene after that morning's ceremony; but Raphaele and Fernande
+were urging him on, writhing and holding their sides with laughter, and
+they uttered shrill cries at every useless attempt that the drunken
+fellow made.
+
+The man was furious, his face was red, he was all unbuttoned, and he was
+trying to shake off the two women who were clinging to him, while he was
+pulling Rosa's petticoat with all his might.
+
+But _Madame_, who was very indignant, went up to her brother, seized him
+by the shoulders, and threw him out of the room with such violence that
+he fell against a wall in the passage, and a minute afterwards they
+heard him pumping water onto his head in the yard, and when he came back
+with the cart, he was already quite appeased.
+
+They started off in the same way as they had come the day before, and
+the little white horse started off with his quick, dancing trot. Under
+the hot sun, their fun, which had been checked during dinner, broke out
+again. The girls now were amused at the jolts which the wagon gave,
+pushed their neighbors' chairs, and burst out laughing every moment, for
+they were in the vein for it, after Rivet's vain attempt.
+
+There was a haze over the country, the roads were glaring, and dazzled
+their eyes, and the wheels raised up two trails of dust, which followed
+the cart for a long time along the high road, and presently Fernande,
+who was fond of music, asked Rosa to sing something, and she boldly
+struck up the _Gros Cure de Meudon_, but _Madame_ made her stop
+immediately, as she thought it a song which was very unsuitable for such
+a day, and she added:
+
+"Sing us something of Beranger's." And so, after a moment's hesitation,
+she began Beranger's song, _The Grandmother_, in her worn-out voice, and
+all the girls, and even _Madame_ herself, joined in the chorus:
+
+    "How I regret
+      My dimpled arms,
+    My well-made legs,
+      And my vanished charms."
+
+"That is first rate," Rivet declared, carried away by the rhythm, and
+they shouted the refrain to every verse, while Rivet beat time on the
+shafts with his foot, and on the horse's back with the reins, who, as if
+he himself were carried away by the rhythm, broke into a wild gallop,
+and threw all the women in a heap, one on the top of the other, onto the
+bottom of the conveyance.
+
+They got up, laughing as if they were mad, and the song went on, shouted
+at the top of their voices, beneath the burning sky, among the ripening
+grain, to the rapid gallop of the little horse, who set off every time
+the refrain was sung, and galloped a hundred yards, to their great
+delight, while occasionally a stone breaker by the roadside sat up and
+looked at the wild and shouting female load through his wire spectacles.
+
+When they got out at the station, the carpenter said:
+
+"I am sorry you are going; we might have had some fun together." But
+_Madame_ replied very sensibly: "Everything has its right time, and we
+cannot always be enjoying ourselves." And then he had a sudden
+inspiration:
+
+"Look here, I will come and see you at Fecamp next month." And he gave a
+knowing look, with a bright and roguish eye.
+
+"Come," _Madame_ said, "you must be sensible; you may come if you like,
+but you are not to be up to any of your tricks."
+
+He did not reply, and as they heard the whistle of the train, he
+immediately began to kiss them all. When it came to Rosa's turn, he
+tried to get to her mouth, which she, however, smiling with her lips
+closed, turned away from him each time by a rapid movement of her head
+to one side. He held her in his arms, but he could not attain his
+object, as his large whip, which he was holding in his hand and waving
+behind the girl's back in desperation, interfered with his efforts.
+
+"Passengers for Rouen, take your seats, please!" a guard cried, and they
+got in. There was a slight whistle, followed by a loud whistle, from the
+engine, which noisily puffed out its first jet of steam, while the
+wheels began to turn a little, with a visible effort, and Rivet left the
+station and went to the gate by the side of the line to get another look
+at Rosa, and as the carriage full of human merchandise passed him, he
+began to crack his whip and to jump, while he sang at the top of his
+voice:
+
+    "How I regret
+      My dimpled arms,
+    My well-made legs,
+      And my vanished charms."
+
+And then he watched a white pocket-handkerchief, which somebody was
+waving, as it disappeared in the distance.
+
+
+PART III
+
+They slept the peaceful sleep of a quiet conscience, until they got to
+Rouen, and when they returned to the house, refreshed and rested,
+_Madame_ could not help saying:
+
+"It was all very well, but I was already longing to get home."
+
+They hurried over their supper, and then, when they had put on their
+usual light evening costume, waited for their usual customers, and the
+little colored lamp outside the door told the passers-by that the flock
+had returned to the fold, and in a moment the news spread, nobody knew
+how or by whom.
+
+Monsieur Philippe, the banker's son, even carried his forgetfulness so
+far, as to send a special messenger to Monsieur Tournevau, who was in
+the boson of his family.
+
+The fish-curer used every Sunday to have several cousins to dinner, and
+they were having coffee, when a man came in with a letter in his hand.
+Monsieur Tournevau was much excited, he opened the envelope and grew
+pale; it only contained these words in pencil:
+
+_"The cargo of cod has been found; the ship has come into port; good
+business for you. Come immediately."_
+
+He felt in his pockets, gave the messenger two-pence, and suddenly
+blushing to his ears, he said: "I must go out." He handed his wife the
+laconic and mysterious note, rang the bell, and when the servant came
+in, he asked her to bring him his hat and overcoat immediately. As soon
+as he was in the street, he began to run, and the way seemed to him to
+be twice as long as usual, in consequence of his impatience.
+
+Madame Tellier's establishment had put on quite a holiday look. On the
+ground floor, a number of sailors were making a deafening noise, and
+Louise and Flora drank with one and the other, so as to merit their name
+of the two Pumps more than ever. They were being called for everywhere
+at once; already they were not quite adequate to their business, and the
+night bid fair to be a very jolly one for them.
+
+The upstairs room was full by nine o'clock. Monsieur Vasse, the Judge of
+the Tribunal of Commerce, _Madame's_ usual, but Platonic wooer, was
+talking to her in a corner, in a low voice, and they were both smiling,
+as if they were about to come to an understanding.
+
+Monsieur Poulin, the ex-mayor, was holding Rosa on his knees; and she,
+with her nose close to his, was running her hands through the old
+gentleman's white whiskers.
+
+Tall Fernande, who was lying on the sofa, had both her feet on Monsieur
+Pinipesse, the tax-collector's stomach, and her back on young Monsieur
+Philippe's waistcoat; her right arm was round his neck, while she held a
+cigarette in her left.
+
+Raphaele appeared to be discussing matters with Monsieur Dupuis, the
+insurance agent, and she finished by saying: "Yes, my dear, I will."
+
+Just then, the door opened suddenly, and Monsieur Tournevau came in, who
+was greeted with enthusiastic cries of: "Long live Tournevau!" And
+Raphaele, who was still twirling round, went and threw herself into his
+arms. He seized her in a vigorous embrace, and without saying a word,
+lifting her up as if she had been a feather, he went through the room,
+opened the door at the other end and disappeared.
+
+Rosa was chatting to the ex-mayor, kissing him every moment, and
+pulling both his whiskers at the same time in order to keep his head
+straight.
+
+Fernande and _Madame_ remained with the four men, and Monsieur Philippe
+exclaimed: "I will pay for some champagne; get three bottles, Madame
+Tellier." And Fernande gave him a hug, and whispered to him: "Play us
+a waltz, will you?" So he rose and sat down at the old piano in the
+corner, and managed to get a hoarse waltz out of the entrails of the
+instrument.
+
+The tall girl put her arms round the tax-collector, _Madame_ asked
+Monsieur Vasse to take her in his arms, and the two couples turned
+round, kissing as they danced. Monsieur Vasse, who had formerly danced
+in good society, waltzed with such elegance, that _Madame_ was quite
+captivated.
+
+Frederic brought the champagne; the first cork popped, and Monsieur
+Philippe played the introduction to a quadrille, through which the four
+dancers walked in society fashion, decorously, with propriety,
+deportment, bows and curtsies, and then they began to drink.
+
+Monsieur Philippe next struck up a lively polka, and Monsieur Tournevau
+started off with the handsome Jewess, whom he held up in the air,
+without letting her feet touch the ground. Monsieur Pinipesse and
+Monsieur Vasse had started off with renewed vigor, and from time to time
+one or other couple would stop to toss off a long glass of sparkling
+wine, and that dance was threatening to become never-ending, when Rosa
+opened the door.
+
+"I want to dance," she exclaimed. And she caught hold of Monsieur
+Dupuis, who was sitting idle on the couch, and the dance began again.
+
+But the bottles were empty. "I will pay for one," Monsieur said. "So
+will I," Monsieur Vasse declared. "And I will do the same," Monsieur
+Dupuis remarked.
+
+They all began to clap their hands, and it soon became a regular ball,
+and from time to time, Louise and Flora ran upstairs quickly, had a few
+turns, while their customers downstairs grew impatient, and then they
+returned regretfully to the _cafe_. At midnight they were still dancing.
+
+_Madame_ shut her eyes to what was going on and she had long private
+talks in corners with Monsieur Vasse, as if to settle the last details
+of something that had already been settled.
+
+At last, at one o'clock, the two married men, Monsieur Tournevau and
+Monsieur Pinipesse declared that they were going home, and wanted to
+pay. Nothing was charged for except the champagne, and that only cost
+six francs a bottle, instead of ten, which was the usual price, and when
+they expressed their surprise at such generosity, _Madame_, who was
+beaming, said to them:
+
+"We don't have a holiday every day."
+
+
+
+
+THE BANDMASTER'S SISTER
+
+
+"What a joke!" the bandmaster said, twirling his moustache with the
+foolish smile of a good-looking man, who dangles after women's
+petticoats, in order that he may get on all the quicker.
+
+His comrades' equivocal allusions puzzled him, though they flattered him
+like applause, and he stealthily looked in the large mirrors at the new
+lyres embroidered in gold on the collar of his tunic. They fascinated
+him by their glitter, and half intoxicated by the doubtful champagne
+that he had drunk during dinner, and by the glasses of chartreuse and of
+Bavarian beer which he had imbibed afterwards, and excited by the songs,
+he was indulging in his usual dreams of success.
+
+He saw himself on the platform of a public garden, standing before his
+musicians in a flood of light, and he fancied already that he could hear
+the whispers of women, and feel the caress of their look upon him.
+
+He would be invited even into the drawing-rooms of the _Faubourg Saint
+Germain_, which was so difficult of access. With his handsome, pale
+face, and his wonderful manner of playing Chopin's music, he would
+penetrate every where, and perhaps some romantic heiress would fall in
+love with him, and consent to forget that he was only a poor musician,
+the son of small shopkeepers, who were still in trade at Bayeux.
+
+Lieutenant Varache, who was stirring the punch, shrugged his shoulders,
+and continued in a bantering voice:
+
+"Yes, Monsieur Parisel, they are sure to ask you whether you have just
+joined the regiment, or whether you have a mistress ..."
+
+"What do I know?"
+
+"But they say that you have, and that her eyes grow so bright when she
+speaks to you, that a man would forfeit three months' pay for a glance
+of them, by Jove!"
+
+Another traced her likeness in a few words, and described her as if she
+had been some knick-knack for sale at an auction. Her hair came low on
+her forehead like a golden net, her skin was dazzlingly white, while her
+bright eyes threw out glances that were like those flashes of summer
+lightning which dart across the sky on a calm night in June.
+
+Her delicate figure, and she did not look very strong, recalled a plant
+that has grown too rapidly. She was a droll creature, on the whole, who
+at times looked as if she had made a mistake in the door, who buried
+herself in the shade, hid herself, and did not surrender either her
+heart or her body, and only left the impression of a statue on the bed
+in which she slept, who appeared delighted with the ignoble business she
+carried on, and who allured men, and surpassed the common streetwalkers
+in shamelessness.
+
+Parisel, however, was not listening to them any longer.
+
+He was terribly vexed at meeting with such a common-place adventure at
+the first start, and to come across that girl on his road, who would
+make him loose, and soil him with unclean love. She would lower him, and
+bring him down to the level of rollicking troopers, who are welcome
+guests in houses of bad character.
+
+"Well," one of them said suddenly, "suppose we go and finish the night
+at that establishment; it will be far jollier, and the chief will not be
+obliged to cudgel his brains to remember the name of the girl he loves!"
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The officers pushed open the door of the saloon, where a servant was
+lighting the chandelier, and Marchessy called out in a loud voice, and
+amidst bursts of laughter:
+
+"Here, Lucie! We have brought your sweetheart to you!"
+
+She came in first, slowly, and wrapped in a transparent muslin
+dressing-gown, and stopped, as if the beating of her heart were choking
+her. The bandmaster did not move or say a word; he resembled a duellist,
+who sees his adversary advancing towards him and taking aim at him, and
+who is waiting for death.
+
+Great drops of perspiration rolled down his face, and all the blood had
+left it, while the woman looked at him, and did not appear to recognize
+him, although her eyes wore a look of triumphant pleasure, and when he
+started back, and turned his head away, she said to him, in a mocking
+voice:
+
+"What, my dear, are you not going to kiss me, after a whole year? ... I
+must have altered very much, very much indeed ... Do not my mouth, and
+this mark by the side of my ear, bring something to your mind?"
+
+And Varache, who had just lit a cigar, muttered: "Are you going to act
+a play until to-morrow?"
+
+Then Lucie threw herself on to a sofa, and with her chin in her hands,
+and in the posture of a chimera on the look out for the pleasures she
+wishes, continued gravely:
+
+"We lived at the end of a quiet street behind the cathedral, a street in
+which pots of carnations stood on the window ledges, through which the
+seminarists went twice a day, as if it had been a procession, and where
+I was bored to death. Our parents' shop was cold and dark; my mother
+thought of nothing but of going to all the services, and of attending
+the _novenas_, while my father bent over the counter. There was nobody
+to pet me, to advise me, or to teach me what life really was, and
+besides that, I had the instinctive feeling that they cared for nobody
+in this world but my brother.
+
+"The first kiss that touched my lips nearly sent me mad, and I had not
+the force to resist or to say _no_. I did not even ask the man who
+seduced me to marry me, to promise me what men do promise girls. We met
+in a booth at the fair, and I used to go to meet him every evening in a
+meadow bordered by poplar trees. He had a situation as clerk or
+collector, I believe, and when he was sent to another town, I was
+already three months in the family way. My people soon found it out, and
+forced me to acknowledge everything, and they locked me up like a
+prisoner who wished to escape from jail.
+
+"My brother was home for his holidays--do you remember now, Monsieur
+Parisel? He had just been appointed second head clerk, was reckoning on
+still further speedy advancement, and was bursting with pride. He was
+harder and more inexorable than the two old people towards me, poor
+forsaken girl as I was, although they had never left their home. He
+spoke about his future, which would be compromised, of the disgrace
+which would fall on all the family, went into a rage, arid pitied
+neither my tears nor my prayers, and treated me with the cruelty of a
+hangman.
+
+"And they sent me a long way off, like a servant who has committed a
+theft, and condemned me to be confined at a farm in a village, where the
+peasants treated me harshly. The child died, but the mother lived
+through everything.
+
+"One does not have good luck very frequently, confound it, and the only
+thing that I could do was to return evil, to strike at the coward whom I
+hated, to dishonor and to lower his name, to stick to the fellow who
+strutted about in his uniform, and who had won the game, from garrison
+to garrison, as if I had been vermin. That is why I, of my own accord,
+came to this house, where one belongs to everybody, and have become
+almost more vicious than any of the other girls, and why I have told you
+this unentertaining story.
+
+"I say, you fellows, who will pay ten francs for the bandmaster's
+sister? Upon my honor, you will not regret your money!"
+
+His comrades got Parisel out of the house. He resisted for a week, but
+then sold everything he had, borrowed the money to pay Lucie's debts,
+and tried in vain to free himself from that weight, and to get her
+expelled from the town, but she always returned. She was as implacable
+towards him as a gerfalcon that is devouring its prey, and as the
+adventure had got wind, and was even talked about at the soldiers' mess,
+and as the scandal increased every day, the colonel forced the
+bandmaster to resign.
+
+When Lucie heard the news, she looked vexed, and, said spitefully:
+
+"I had hoped that he would have blown his brains out!"
+
+
+
+
+FALSE ALARM
+
+
+"I have a perfect horror of pianos," Fremecourt said, "of those hateful
+boxes that fill up a drawing-room, and which have not even the soft
+sound and the queer shape of the mahogany or veneered spinets, to which
+our grandmothers sighed out exquisite, long-forgotten ballads, and
+allowed their fingers to run over the keys, while around them there
+floated a delicate odor of powder and muslin, and some little _Abbe_ or
+other turned over the leaves, and was continually making mistakes, as he
+was looking at the patches close to the lips on the white skin of the
+player instead of at the music.
+
+"I wish there were a tax upon them, or that some evening, during a riot,
+the people would make huge bonfires of them, which would illuminate the
+whole town. They simply exasperate me, and affect my nerves, and make me
+think of the tortures those poor girls must suffer, who are condemned
+not to stir for hours, but to keep on constantly strumming away at the
+chromatic scales and monotonous arpeggios, and to have no other object
+in life except to win a prize at the _Conservatoire_.
+
+"Their incoherent music suggests to me the sufferings of those who are
+ill, abandoned, wounded, as it proceeds from every floor of every house,
+and irritates you, nearly drives you mad, and makes you break out into
+ironical fits of laughter.
+
+"And yet when that madcap Lalie Spring honored me with her love, as I
+never can refuse anything to a woman who smells of fresh scent, and who
+has a large store of promises in her looks, and who puts out her red,
+smiling lips immediately, as if she were going to offer you handsel
+money, I bought a piano, so that she might strum upon it to her heart's
+content. I got it, however, on the hire-purchase system, and paid so
+much a month, like _grisettes_[9] do for their furniture.
+
+[Footnote 9: Work-girl, a name applied to those whose virtue is not too
+rigorous.--TRANSLATOR.]
+
+"At that time, I had the apartments I had so long dreamed of: warm,
+elegant, light, well-arranged, with two entrances, and an incomparable
+porter's wife; she had been canteen-keeper in a Zouave regiment, and
+knew everything and understood everything at a wink.
+
+"It was the kind of apartment from which a woman has not the courage to
+escape, so as to avoid temptation, but becomes weak, and rolls herself
+up on the soft, eider down cushions like a cat, and so is appeased, and
+in spite of herself, thinks of sin at the sight of the low, wide couch,
+which is so suitable for caresses, of the heavy curtains, which quite
+deaden the sound of voices and of laughter, and of the flowers that
+scent the air, and whose smell lingers on the folds of the hangings.
+
+"They were rooms in which a woman forgets time, where she begins by
+accepting a cup of tea and nibbling a sweet cake, and abandons her
+fingers timidly and with regret to other fingers which tremble, and are
+hot, and so by degrees she loses her head and succumbs.
+
+"I do not know whether the piano brought us ill luck, but Lalie had not
+even time to learn four songs before she disappeared like the wind, just
+as she had come, _flick-flack_, good-night, good-bye; perhaps from
+spite, because she had found letters from other women on my table,
+perhaps to renew her advertisement, as she was not one of those to hang
+onto one man and become a fixture.
+
+"I had not been in love with her, certainly, but yet it always has some
+effect on a man; it breaks a spring when a woman leaves you, and you
+think that you must start again, risk it, and go in for forbidden sport
+in which one is exposed to knocks, common sport that one has been
+through a hundred times before, and which provides you with nothing to
+show for it.
+
+"Nothing is more unpleasant than to lend your apartments to a friend, to
+have to say to yourself that someone is going to disturb the mysterious
+intimacy which really exists between the actual owner and his furniture,
+the soul of those past kisses which floats in the air; that the room
+whose tints you connect with some recollection, some dream, some sweet
+vision, and whose colors you have tried to make harmonize with certain
+fair-haired, pink-skinned girls, is going to become a common-place
+lodging, like the rooms in an ordinary lodging house, which are suitable
+to hidden crime and to evanescent love affairs.
+
+"However, poor Stanis had begged me so urgently to do him that service;
+he was so very much in love with Madame de Frejus, and among the
+characters in the play there was a brute of a husband who was terribly
+jealous and suspicious; one of those Othellos who have always a flea in
+their ear, and come back unexpectedly from shooting or the club, who
+pick up pieces of torn paper, listen at doors, smell out meetings with
+the nose of a detective, and seem to have been sent into the world only
+to be cuckolds, but who know better than most how to lay a snare, and to
+play a nasty trick--that when I went to Venice, I consented to let him
+have my room.
+
+"I will leave you to guess whether they made up for lost time, although,
+after all, it is no business of yours. My journey, however, which was
+only to have lasted a few weeks--just long enough to benefit by the
+change of air, to rid my brain of the image of my last mistress, and
+perhaps to find another among that strange mixture of society which one
+meets there, a medley of American, Slav, Viennese and Italian women, who
+instill a little artificial life into that old city, which is asleep
+amidst the melancholy silence of the lagoons--was prolonged, and Stanis
+was as much at home in my rooms as he was in his own.
+
+"Madame Piquignolles, the retired canteen-keeper, took great interest in
+this adventure, watched over their little love affair, and, as she used
+to say, she was on guard as soon as they arrived one after the other,
+the marchioness covered with a thick veil, and slipping in as quickly as
+possible, always uneasy, and afraid that Monsieur de Frejus might be
+following her, and Stanis with the assured and satisfied look of an
+amorous husband, who is going to meet his little wife after having been
+away from home for a few days.
+
+"Well, one day during one of those calm moments when his beloved one,
+fresh from her bath, and impregnated with the coolness of the water, was
+pressing close to her lover, reclining in his arms, and smiling at him
+with half closed eyes, at one of those moments when people do not speak,
+but continue their dream, the sentinel, without even asking leave,
+suddenly burst into the room, for worthy Madame Piquignolles was in a
+terrible fright.
+
+"A few minutes before, a well-dressed gentleman, followed by two others
+of seedy appearance, but who looked very strong, and fit to knock
+anybody down, had questioned her in a rough manner, and cross-questioned
+her, and tried to turn her inside out, as she said, asking her whether
+Monsieur de Frejus lived on the first floor, without giving her any
+explanation, and when she declared that there was nobody occupying the
+apartments then, as her lodger was not in France, Monsieur de
+Frejus--for it could certainly be nobody but he--had burst out into an
+evil laugh, and said: 'Very well; I shall go and fetch the Police
+Commissary of the district, and he will make you let us in!'
+
+"And as quickly as possible, while she was telling her story, now in a
+low, and then in a shrill voice, the woman picked up the marchioness'
+dress, cloak, lace-edged drawers, silk petticoat, and little varnished
+shoes, pulled her out of bed, without giving her time to let her know
+what she was doing, or to moan, or to have a fit of hysterics, and
+carried her off, as if she had been a doll, with all her pretty toggery,
+to a large, empty cupboard in the dining room, that was concealed by
+Flemish tapestry. 'You are a man... Try to get out of the mess,' she
+said to Stanis as she shut the door; 'I will be answerable for Madame.'
+And the enormous woman, who was out of breath by hurrying upstairs as
+she had done, and whose kind, large red face was dripping with
+perspiration, while her ample bosom shook beneath her loose jacket, took
+Madame de Frejus onto her knees as if she had been a baby, whose nurse
+was trying to quiet her.
+
+"She felt the poor little culprit's heart beating as if it were going to
+burst, while shivers ran over her skin, which was so soft and delicate
+that the porter's wife was afraid that she would hurt it with her coarse
+hands. She was struck with wonder at the cambric chemise, which a gust
+of wind would have carried off as if it had been a pigeon's feather, and
+by the delicate odor of that scarce flower which filled the narrow
+cupboard, and which rose up in the darkness from that supple body, that
+was impregnated with the warmth of the bed.
+
+"She would have liked to be there, in that profaned room, and to tell
+them in a loud voice--with her hands upon her lips like at the time when
+she used to serve brandy to her comrades at _Daddy l'Arb's_--that they
+had no common sense, that they were none of them good for much, neither
+the Police Commissary, the husband nor the subordinates, to come and
+torment a pretty young thing, who was having a little bit of fun, like
+that. It was a nice job, to get over the wall in that way, to be absent
+from the second call of names, especially when they were all of the same
+sort, and were glad of five francs an hour! She had certainly done quite
+right to get out sometimes and to have a sweetheart, and she was a
+charming little thing, and that she would say, if she were called before
+the Court as a witness!
+
+"And she took Madame de Frejus in her arms to quiet her, and repeated
+the same thing a dozen times, whispered pretty things to her, and
+interrupted her occasionally to listen whether they were not searching
+all the nooks and corners of the apartment. 'Come, come,' she said, 4
+do not distress yourself. Be calm, my dear...It hurts me to hear you cry
+like that.... There will be no mischief done, I will vouch for it.'
+
+"The marchioness, who was nearly fainting, and who was prostrate with
+terror, could only sob out: 'Good heavens! Good heavens!'
+
+"She scarcely seemed to be conscious of anything; her head seemed
+vacant, her ears buzzed, and she felt benumbed, like one does when one
+goes to sleep in the snow.
+
+"Oh! Only to forget everything, as her love dream was over, to go out
+quickly, like those little rose-colored tapers at Nice, on Shrove
+Tuesday evening.
+
+"Oh! Not to awake any more, as the to-morrow would come in, black and
+sad, because a whole array of barristers, ushers, solicitors and judges
+would be against her, and disturb her usual quietude, would torment her,
+cover her with mud, as her delicious, amorous adventure--her
+first--which had been so carefully enveloped in mystery, and had been
+kept so secret behind closed shutters and thick veils, would become an
+everyday episode of adultery, which would get wind, and be discussed
+from door to door; the lilac had faded, and she was obliged to bid
+farewell to happiness, as if to an old friend who was going far, very
+far away, never to return!
+
+"Suddenly, however, she started and sat up, with her neck stretched out
+and her eyes fixed, while the excanteen-keeper, who was trembling with
+emotion, put her hands to her left ear, which was her best, like a
+speaking trumpet, and tried to hear the cries which succeeded each other
+from room to room, amidst a noise of opening and shutting of doors.
+
+"'Ah! upon my word, I am not blind....It is Monsieur de Tavernay who is
+applying again, and making all that noise....Don't you hear, _Mame
+Piquignolles, Mame Piquignolles!_ Saved, saved!' And she dashed out of
+the cupboard like an unwieldy mass, with her cap all on one side, an
+anxious look and heavy legs.
+
+"Tavernay was still quite pale, and in a panting voice he cried out to
+them: 'Nothing serious, only that fool Fremecourt, who lent me the
+rooms, has forgotten to pay for his piano for the last five months, a
+hundred francs a month....You understand ...they came to claim it, and
+as we did not reply ...why, they fetched the Police Commissary, and so,
+in the name of the law....
+
+"'A nice fright to give one!' Madame Piquignolles said, throwing herself
+onto a chair. 'Confound the nasty piano!'
+
+"It may be useless to add, that the marchioness has quite renounced
+_trifles_, as our forefathers used to say, and would deserve a prize for
+virtue, if the Academy would only show itself rather more gallant
+towards pretty women, who take crossroads in order to become virtuous.
+
+"Emotions like that cure people of running risks of that kind!"
+
+
+
+
+WIFE AND MISTRESS
+
+
+It was not only her long, silky curls, which covered her small,
+fairy-like head, like a golden halo, nor her beautiful complexion, nor
+her mouth, which was like some delicate shell, nor was it her supreme
+innocence, which was shown by her sudden blushes, and by her somewhat
+awkward movements, nor was it her ingenious questions which had assailed
+and conquered George d'Harderme's heart. He had a peculiar temper, and
+any appearance of a yoke frightened him and put him to flight
+immediately, and his unstable heart was ready to yield to any
+temptation, and he was incapable of any lasting attachment, while a
+succession of women had left no more traces on it than on the seashore,
+which is constantly being swept by the waves.
+
+It was not the dream of a life of affection, of peace, the want of
+loving and of being loved, which a fast man so often feels between
+thirty and forty. His insurmountable lassitude of that circle of
+pleasure in which he has turned, like a horse in a circus, the voids in
+his existence which the marriage of his bachelor friends cause, and
+which in his selfishness he looks upon as desertion, and whom he,
+nevertheless, envies, which had at last induced him to listen to the
+prayers and advice of his old mother, and to marry Mademoiselle Suzanne
+de Gouvres; but the vision that he had had when he saw her playing with
+quite little children, covering them with kisses, and looking at them
+with ecstacy in her limpid eyes, and in hearing her talk of the
+pleasures and the anguish that they must feel who are mothers in the
+fullest sense of the word-the vision of a happy home where a man feels
+that he is living again in others of that house, which is full of
+laughter and of song, and seems as if it were full of birds.
+
+As a matter of fact, he loved children, like some men love animals, and
+he was interested in them, as in some delightful spectacle, and they
+attracted him.
+
+He was very gentle, kind and thoughtful with them, invented games for
+them, took them on his knees, was never tired of listening to their
+chatter, or of watching the development of their instincts, of their
+intellect, and of their little, delicate souls.
+
+He used to go and sit in the Parc Monceau, and in the squares, to watch
+them playing and romping and prattling round him, and one day, as a
+joke, somebody, a jealous mistress, or some friends in joke, had sent
+him a splendid wet nurse's cap, with long, pink ribbons.
+
+At first, he was under the influence of the charm that springs from the
+beginning of an intimacy, from the first kisses, and devoted himself
+altogether to that amorous education which revealed a new life to him,
+as it were, and enchanted him.
+
+He thought of nothing except of increasing the ardent love that his wife
+bestowed on him, and lived in a state of perpetual adoration. Suzanne's
+feelings, the metamorphosis of that virginal heart, which was beginning
+to glow with love, and which vibrated, her passion, her modesty, her
+sensations, were all delicious surprises to him.
+
+He felt that feverish pleasure of a traveler who has discovered some
+marvelous Eden, and loses his head over it, and, at times, with a long
+affectionate and proud look at her, which grew even warmer on looking
+into Suzanne's limpid, blue eyes, he would put his arms round her waist,
+and pressing her to him so strongly that it hurt the young woman, he
+exclaimed:
+
+"Oh! I am quite sure that nowhere on earth are there two people who love
+each other as we do, and who are as happy as you and I are, my darling!"
+
+Months of uninterrupted possession and enchantment succeeded each other
+without George altering, and without any lassitude mingling with the
+ardor of their love, or the fire of their affection dying out.
+
+Then, however, suddenly he ceased to be happy, and, in spite of all his
+efforts to hide his invincible lowness of spirits, he became another
+man, restless, being irritated at nothing, morose, and bored at
+everything and everywhere; whimsical, and never knowing what he wanted.
+
+But there was certainly something that was now poisoning that affection
+which had formerly been his delight, which was coming more and more
+between him and his wife every day, and which was giving him a distaste
+for home.
+
+By degrees, that vague suffering assumed a definite shape in his heart,
+got implanted and fixed there, like a nail. He had not attained his
+object, and he felt the weight of chains, understood that he could never
+get used to such an existence, that he could not love a woman who seemed
+incapable of becoming a mother, who lowered herself to the part of a
+lawful mistress, and who was not faithful to him.
+
+Alas! To awake from such a dream, to say to himself that he was reduced
+to envying the good fortune of others, that he should never cover a
+little, curly, smiling head with kisses, where some striking likeness,
+some undecided gleams of growing intellect fill a man with joy, but that
+he would be obliged to take the remainder of his journey in solitude,
+heart-broken, with nothing but old age around him; that no branch would
+again spring from the family tree, and that on his death-bed he should
+not have that last consolation of pressing his dear ones, for whom he
+struggled and made so many sacrifices, in his failing arms, and who were
+sobbing with grief, but that soon he should be the prey of indifferent
+and greedy heirs, who were discounting his approaching death like some
+valuable security!
+
+George had not told Suzanne the feelings which were tormenting him, and
+took care that she should not see his state of unhappiness, and he did
+not worry her with trying questions, that only end in some violent and
+distressing scene.
+
+But she was too much of a woman, and she loved her husband too much, not
+to guess what was making him so gloomy, and was imperiling their love.
+
+And every month there came a fresh disappointment, and hope was again
+deferred. She, however, persisted in believing that their wish would be
+granted, and grew ill with this painful waiting, and refused to believe
+that she should never be a mother.
+
+She would have looked upon it as a humiliation either to consult a
+medical man, or to make a pilgrimage to some shrine, like so many women
+did, in their despair, and her proud, loyal and loving nature at last
+rebelled against that hostility, which showed itself in the angry
+outbursts, the painful silence, and the haughty coldness of the man who
+could, however, have done anything he liked with her, by a little
+kindness.
+
+With death in her soul, she had a presentiment of the way of the cross,
+which is an end of love, of all the bitterness, which sooner or later
+would end in terrible quarrels, and in words which would put an
+impassable barrier between them.
+
+At last, one evening, when George d'Hardermes had lost his temper, had
+wounded her by equivocal words and bad jokes, Suzanne, who was very
+pale, and who was clutching the arms of her easy chair convulsively,
+interrupted him with the accents of farewell in her melancholy face:
+
+"As you do not love me any more, why not tell me so, at once, instead of
+wounding me like this by small, traitorous blows, and, above all, why
+continue to live together?...You want your liberty, and I will give it
+to you; you have your fortune, and I have mine. Let us separate without
+a scandal and without a lawsuit, so that, at least, a little friendship
+may survive our love...I shall leave Paris and go and live in the
+country with my mother.... God is my witness, however, that I still love
+you, my poor George, as much as ever, and that I shall remain your wife,
+whether I am with you, or separated from you!"
+
+George hesitated for a few moments before replying, with an uneasy, sad
+look on his face, and then said, turning away his head:
+
+"Yes, perhaps it will be best for both of us!"
+
+They voluntarily broke their marriage contract, as she had heroically
+volunteered to do. She kept her resolution, exiled herself, buried
+herself in obscurity, accepted the trial with calm fortitude, and was as
+resigned as only faithful and devoted souls can be.
+
+They wrote to each other, and she deluded herself, pursued the chimera
+that George would return to her, would call her back to his side, would
+escape from his former associates, would understand of what deep love he
+had voluntarily deprived himself, and would love her again as he had
+formerly loved her; and she resisted all the entreaties and the advice
+of her friends, to cut such a false position short, and to institute a
+suit for divorce against her husband, as the issue would be certain.
+
+He, at the end of a few months of solitude, of evanescent love affairs,
+when to beguile his loneliness, a man passes from the arms of one woman
+to those of another, had set up a new home, and had tied himself to a
+woman whom he had accidentally met at a party of friends, and who had
+managed to please him and to amuse him.
+
+His deserted wife was naturally not left in ignorance of the fact, and,
+stifling her jealousy and her grief, she put on a smile, and thought
+that it would be the same with this one as it had been with all his
+other ephemeral mistresses, whom her husband had successively got rid
+of.
+
+Was not that, after all, the best thing to bring about the issue which
+she longed and hoped for? Would not that doubtful passion, that close
+intimacy certainly make Monsieur d'Hardermes compare the woman he
+possessed with the woman he had formerly had, and cause him to invoke
+that lost paradise and that heart full of forgiveness, of love and of
+goodness, which had not forgotten him, but which would respond to his
+first appeal?
+
+And that confidence of hers in a happier future, which neither all the
+proofs of that connection, in which Monsieur d'Hardermes was becoming
+more and more involved, and which her friends so kindly furnished her
+with, nor the disdainful silence with which he treated all her gentle,
+indulgent letters could shake, had something touching, angelic in it,
+and reminded those who knew her well, of certain passages in the _Lives
+of the Saints_.
+
+At length, however, the sympathy of those who had so often tried to save
+the young woman, to cure her, and to open her eyes, became exhausted,
+and, left to herself, Suzanne proudly continued her dream, and absorbed
+herself in it.
+
+Two interminable years had passed since she had lived with Monsieur
+d'Hardermes, and since he had put that hateful mistress in her place.
+She had lost all trace of them, knew nothing about him, and, in spite of
+everything, did not despair of seeing him again, and regaining her hold
+over him, who could tell when, or by what miracle, but surely before
+those eyes which he had so loved were tired of shedding tears, and her
+fair hair, which he had so often covered with kisses, had grown white.
+
+And the arrival of the postman every morning and evening, made her start
+and shiver with nervousness.
+
+One day, however, when she was going to Paris, Madame d'Hardermes found
+herself alone in the ladies' carriage, into which she had got in a
+hurry, with a peasant woman in her Sunday best, who had a child with
+pretty pink cheeks and rosy lips, and which was like the dimpled cherubs
+that one sees in pictures of the Assumption of the Virgin Mary, on her
+lap.
+
+The nurse said affectionate words to the child in a coaxing voice,
+wrapped it up in the folds of her large cloak, sometimes gave it a
+noisy, hearty kiss, and it beat the air with little hands, and crowed
+and laughed with those pretty, attractive babyish movements, that
+Suzanne could not help exclaiming: "Oh! the pretty little thing!" and
+taking it into her arms.
+
+At first the child was surprised at the strange face, and for a moment,
+seemed as if it were going to cry; but it became reassured immediately,
+smiled at the stranger who looked at it so kindly, inhaled the delicate
+scent of the iris in the bodice of her dress, with dilated nostrils, and
+cuddled up against her.
+
+The two women began to talk, and, without knowing why, Madame
+d'Hardermes questioned the nurse, asked her where she came from, and
+where she was taking the little thing to.
+
+The other, rather flattered that Suzanne admired the child and took an
+interest in it, replied, somewhat vaingloriously, that she lived at
+_Bois-le-Roy_, and that her husband was a wagoner.
+
+The child had been entrusted to their care by some people in Paris, who
+appeared very happy, and extremely well off. And the nurse added in a
+drawling voice:
+
+"Perhaps, Madame, you know my master and mistress, Monsieur and Madame
+d'Hardermes?"
+
+Suzanne started with surprise and grief, and grew as pale as if all her
+blood were streaming from some wound, and thinking that she had not
+heard correctly, with a fixed look and trembling lips, she said,
+slowly, as if every word hurt her throat:
+
+"You said, Monsieur and Madame d'Hardermes?"
+
+"Yes; do you know them?"
+
+"I, yes...formerly...but it is a long time ago."
+
+She could scarcely speak, and was as pale as death; she hardly knew what
+she was saying, with her eyes on this pretty child, which George must be
+so fond of.
+
+She saw him, as if in a window which had suddenly been lifted up, where
+everything had been dark before, with their arms round each other, and
+radiant with happiness, with that fair head, that divine dawn, the
+living, smiling proof of their love, between them.
+
+They would never leave each other; they were already almost as good as
+married, and were robbing her of the name which she had defended and
+guarded as a sacred deposit.
+
+She would never succeed in breaking such bonds. It was a shipwreck where
+nothing could survive, and where the waves did not even drift some
+shapeless waif and stray ashore.
+
+And great tears rolled down her cheeks, one by one, and wet her veil.
+
+The train stopped at the station, and the nurse scarcely liked to ask
+Suzanne for the child, who was holding it against her heaving bosom, and
+kissing it as if she intended to smother it, and she said:
+
+"I suppose the baby reminds you of one you have lost, my poor, dear
+lady, but the loss can be repaired at your age, surely; a second is as
+good as a first, and if one does not do oneself justice..."
+
+Madame d'Hardermes gave her back the child, and hurried out straight
+ahead of her, like a hunted animal, and threw herself into the first cab
+that she saw...
+
+She sued for a divorce, and obtained it.
+
+
+
+
+MAD[10]
+
+[Footnote 10: This manuscript was found among the papers of Viscount
+Jacques de X---- who committed suicide a few years ago, in his room in
+an hotel at Piombieres.--R.M.]
+
+
+PART I
+
+For days and days, nights and nights, I had dreamt of that first kiss,
+which was to consecrate our engagement, and I knew not on what spot I
+should put my lips, that were madly thirsting for her beauty and her
+youth. Not on her forehead, that was accustomed to family caresses, nor
+on her light hair, which mercenary hands had dressed, nor on her eyes,
+whose turned up lashes looked like little wings, because that would have
+made me think of the farewell caress which closes the eyelids of some
+dead woman whom one has adored, nor her lovely mouth, which I will not,
+which I must not possess until that divine moment when Elaine will at
+last belong to me altogether and for always, but on that delicious
+little dimple which comes in one of her cheeks when she is happy, when
+she smiles, and which excited me as much as her voice did with
+languorous softness, on that evening when our flirtation began, at the
+Souverette's.
+
+Our parents had gone away, and were walking slowly under the chestnut
+trees in the garden, and had left us alone together for a few minutes. I
+went up to her and took both her hands into mine, which were trembling,
+and gently drawing her close to me, I whispered:
+
+"How happy I am, Elaine, and how I love you!" and I kissed her almost
+timidly, on the dimple. She trembled, as if from the pain of a burn,
+blushed deeply and with an affectionate look, she said: "I love you
+also, Jacques, and I am very happy!"
+
+That embarrassment, that sudden emotion which revealed the perfect
+spotlessness of a pure mind, the instinctive recoil of virginity, that
+childlike innocence, that blush of modesty, delighted me above
+everything as a presage of happiness. It seemed to me as if I were
+unworthy of her; I was almost ashamed of bringing her, and of putting
+into her small, saint-like hands the remains of a damaged heart, that
+had been polluted by debauchery, that miserable thing which had served
+as a toy for unworthy mistresses, which was intoxicated with lies, and
+felt as if it would die of bitterness and disgust....
+
+
+PART II
+
+How quickly she has become accustomed to me, how suddenly she has turned
+into a woman and become metamorphosed; already she no longer is at all
+like the artless girl, the sensitive child, to whom I did not know what
+to say, and whose sudden questions disconcerted me!
+
+She is coquettish, and there is seduction in her attitudes, in her
+gestures, in her laugh and in her touch. One might think that she was
+trying her power over me, and that she guesses that I no longer have any
+will of my own. She does with me whatever she likes, and I am quite
+incapable of resisting the beautiful charm that emanates from her, and I
+feel carried away by her caressing hands, and so happy that I am at
+times frightened at the excess of my own felicity.
+
+My life now passes amidst the most delicious of punishments, those
+afternoons and evenings that we spend together, those unconstrained
+moments when, sitting on the sofa together, she rests her head on my
+shoulder, holds my hands and half shuts her beautiful eyes while we
+settle what our future life shall be, when I _cover_ her with kisses and
+inhale the odor of all those little hairs that are as fine as silk and
+are like a halo round her imperial brow, excite me, unsettle me, kill
+me, and yet I feel inclined to shed tears, when the time comes for us to
+part, and I really only exist when I am with Elaine.
+
+I can scarcely sleep; I see her rise up in the darkness, delicate, fair
+and pink, so supple, so elegant with her small waist and tiny hands and
+feet, her graceful head and that look of mockery and of coaxing which
+lies in her smile, that brightness of dawn which illuminates her looks,
+that when I think that she is going to become my wife, I feel inclined
+to sing, and to shout out my amorous folly into the silence of the
+night.
+
+Elaine also seems to be at the end of her strength, has grown languid
+and nervous; she would like to wipe out the fortnight that we still have
+to wait, and so little does she hide her longing, that one of her
+uncles, Colonel d'Orthez, said after dinner the other evening: "By Jove,
+my children, one would take you for two soldiers who are looking forward
+to their furlough!"
+
+
+PART III
+
+I do not know what I felt, or whence those fears came which so suddenly
+assailed me, and took possession of my whole being like a flight of
+poisoned arrows. The nearer the day approached that I am so ardently
+longing for, on which Elaine would take my name and belong to me, the
+more anxious, nervous and tormented by the uncertainty of the morrow, I
+feel.
+
+I love, and I am passionately loved, and few couples start on the
+unknown journey of a totally new life and enter into matrimony with such
+hopes, and the same assurance of happiness, as we two.
+
+I have such faith in the girl I am going to marry, and have made her
+such vows of love, that I should certainly kill myself without a
+moment's hesitation if anything were to happen to separate us, to force
+us to a correct but irremediable rupture, or if Elaine were seized by
+some illness which carried her off quickly; and yet I hesitate, I am
+afraid, for I know that many others have made shipwreck, lost their love
+on the way, disenchanted their wives and have themselves been
+disenchanted in those first essays of possession, during that first
+night of tenderness and of intimacy.
+
+What does Elaine expect in her vague innocence, which has been lessened
+by the half confidences of married friends, by semi-avowals, by all the
+kisses of this sort of apprenticeship which is a court of love; what
+does she possess, what does she hope for? Will her refined, delicate,
+vibrating nature bend to the painful submission of the initial embrace;
+will she not rebel against that ardent attack that wounds and pains? Oh!
+to have to say to oneself that it must come to that, to lower the most
+ideal of affections, to think that one is risking one's whole future
+happiness at such a hazardous game, that the merest trifle might make a
+woman completely ridiculous or hopeful, and make an idolized woman laugh
+or cry!
+
+I do not know a more desirable, prettier or more attractive being in the
+whole world than Elaine; I am worn out by feverish love, I thirst for
+her lips and I wish every particle of her being to belong to me; I love
+her ardently, but I would willingly give half that I possess to have got
+through this ordeal, to be a week older, _and still happy_!...
+
+
+PART IV
+
+My mother-in-law took me aside yesterday, while they were dancing, and
+with tears in her eyes, she said in a tremulous voice:
+
+"You are going to possess the most precious object that we possess here,
+and what we love best.... I beg you to always spare the slightest
+unhappiness, and to be kind and gentle towards her.... I count on your
+uprightness and affection to guide her and protect her in this dangerous
+life in Paris."... And then, giving way to her feelings more and more,
+she added: "I do not think that you suppose that I have tried to
+instruct her in her new duties or to disturb her charming innocence,
+which has been my work; when two persons worship each other like you two
+do, a girl learns what she is ignorant of, so quickly and so well!"
+
+I very nearly burst out laughing in her face, for such a theatrical
+phrase appeared to me both ridiculous and doubtful. So that respectable
+woman had always been a passive, pliable, inert object, who never had
+one moment of vibration, of tender emotion in her husband's arms, and I
+understood why, as I wasted at the clubs, he escaped from her as soon as
+possible and made other connections which cost him dear, but in which he
+found at least some appearance of love.
+
+Oh! to call that supreme bliss of possession, which makes human beings
+divine and which transports them far from everything, that despotic pain
+of virginity, which guesses, which waits, which longs for those
+mysterious, unknown, brief sufferings that contain the germs of future
+pleasure, the only happiness of which one never tires, a duty!
+
+And that piece of advice, at the last moment, which was as common-place
+and natural, and which I ought to have expected, enervated me, and, in
+spite of myself, plunged me into a state of perplexity, from which I
+could not extricate myself. I remembered those absurd stories which we
+hear among friends, after a good dinner. What would be that last trial
+of our love for her and for me, and could that love which then was my
+whole life, come out of the ordeal lessened or increased tenfold? And
+when I looked at the couch on which Elaine, my adored Elaine, was
+sitting, with her head half-hidden behind the feathers of her fan, she
+whispered in a rather vexed voice:
+
+"How cross you look, my dear Jacques? Is the fact of your getting
+married the cause of it? And you have such a mocking look on your face.
+If the thought of it terrifies you too much, there is still time to say
+no!"
+
+And delighted, bewitched by her caressing looks, I said in a low voice,
+almost into her small ear:
+
+"I adore you; and these last moments that still separate us from each
+other, seem centuries to me, my dear Elaine!"
+
+
+PART V
+
+There were tiresome ceremonies yesterday, and to-day, which I went
+through almost mechanically.
+
+First, there is the yes before the mayor at the civil ceremony,[11] like
+some everyday response in church, which one is in a hurry to get over,
+and which has almost the suggestion of an imperious law, to which one is
+bound to submit, and of a state of bondage, which will, perhaps, be very
+irksome, since the whole of existence is made up of chances.
+
+[Footnote 11: Civil marriages are obligatory in France, though usually
+followed by the religious rite.--TRANSLATOR.]
+
+And then the service in church, with the decorated altar, the voices of
+the choir, the solemn music of the organ, the unctuous address of the
+old priest who marks his periods, who seemed quite proud of having
+prepared Elaine for confirmation, and then the procession to the vestry,
+the shaking hands, and the greetings of people whom you scarcely see,
+and whom you do, or do not recognize.
+
+Under the long tulle veil, which almost covered her, with the symbolical
+orange flowers on her bright, light hair, in her white dress, with her
+downcast eyes and her graceful figure, Elaine looked to me like a
+_Psyche_, whose innocent heart was vowed to love. I felt how vain and
+artificial all this form was, how little this show counted before this
+_Kiss_, the triumphant, revealing, maddening Kiss, which rivets the
+flesh of the wife to the lips and all the flesh of the husband, which
+turns the Immaculate youth of the virgin into a woman, and consecrates
+it to tender caresses, to dreams and to future ecstacies, through the
+sufferings of a rape.
+
+
+PART VI
+
+Elaine loves me, as much as I adore her.
+
+She left her parental abode, as if she was going to some festivity,
+without turning round toward all that she had left behind her in the way
+of affection and recollection, and without even a farewell tear, which
+the first kiss effaces, on her long turned-up lashes.
+
+She looked like a bird which had escaped from its cage, and does not
+know where to settle, which beats its wings in the intoxication of the
+light, and which warbles incessantly. She repeated the same words, as if
+she had been rather intoxicated, and her laugh sounded like the cooing
+of a pigeon, and looking into my eyes, with her eyes full of languor,
+and her arms round my neck like a bracelet, and with her burning cheek
+against mine, she suddenly exclaimed:
+
+"I say, my darling, would you not give ten years of your life to have
+already got to the end of the journey?"
+
+And that passionate question so disconcerted me, that I did not know
+what to reply, and my brain reeled, as if I had been at the edge of a
+precipice. Did she already know what her mother had not told her? Had
+she already learned what she ought to have been ignorant of? And had
+that heart, which I used to compare to _the Vessel of Election_, of
+which the litanies of Our Lady speak, already been damaged?
+
+Oh! white veils, that hide the blushes, the half-closed eyes and the
+trembling lips of some _Psyche_, oh! little hands which you raised in
+an attitude of prayer toward the lighted and decorated altar, oh!
+innocent and charming questions, which delighted me to the depths of my
+being, and which seemed to me to be an absolute promise of happiness,
+were you nothing but a lie, and a wonderfully well acted piece of
+trickery?
+
+But was I not wrong, and an idiot, to allow such thoughts to take
+possession of me, and to poison my deep, absorbing love, which was now
+my only law and my only object, by odious and foolish suggestions? What
+an abject and miserable nature I must have, for such a simple,
+affectionate, natural question to disturb me so, when I ought
+immediately to have replied to Elaine's question, with all my heart that
+belonged to hear:
+
+"Yes, ten or twenty years, because you are my happiness, my desire, my
+love!"
+
+
+PART VII
+
+I did not choose to wait until she woke up, I sprang from the bed, where
+Elaine was still sleeping, with her disheveled hair lying on the
+lace-edged pillows. Her complexion was almost transparent, her lips were
+half open, as if she were dreaming, and she seemed so overcome with
+sleep, that I felt much emotion when I looked at her.
+
+I drank four glasses of mild champagne, one after the other, as quickly
+as I could, but it did not quench my thirst. I was feverish and would
+have given anything in the world for something to interest me suddenly
+and have absorbed me and lifted me out of that slough in which my heart
+and my brain were being engulfed, as if in a quicksand. I did not
+venture to avow to myself what was making me so dejected, what was
+torturing me and driving me mad with grief, or to scrutinize the muddy
+bottom of my present thoughts sincerely and courageously, to question
+myself and to pull myself together.
+
+It would have been so odious, so infamous, to harbor such suspicions
+unjustly, to accuse that adorable creature who was not yet twenty, whom
+I loved, and _who seemed to love me_, without having certain proofs,
+that I felt that I was blushing at the idea that I had any doubt of her
+innocence. Ah! Why did I marry?
+
+I had a sufficient income to enable me to live as I liked, to pay
+beautiful women who pleased me, whom I chanced to meet, and who amused
+me, and who sometimes gave me unexpected proofs of affection, but I had
+never allowed myself to be caught altogether, and in order to keep my
+heart warm, I had some romantic and sentimental friendships with women
+in society, some of those delightful flirtations which have an
+appearance of love, which fill up the idleness of a useless life with a
+number of unexpected sensations, with small duties and vague subtle
+pleasures!
+
+And was I now going to be like one of those ships which an unskillful
+turn of the helm runs ashore as it is leaving the harbor? What terrible
+trials were awaiting me, what sorrows and what struggles?
+
+A chaffing friend said to me one night in joke at the club, when I had
+just broken one of those banks, which form an epoch in a player's life:
+
+"If I were in your place, Jacques, I should distrust such runs of luck
+as that, for one always has to pay for them sooner or later!"
+
+Sooner or later!
+
+I half opened the bedroom door gently. Elaine was in one of those heavy
+sleeps that follow intoxication. Who could tell whether, when she opened
+her eyes and called me, surprised at not finding herself in my arms, her
+whole being would not become languid, and suddenly sink into a state of
+prostration? I wanted to reason with myself, and bring myself face to
+face with those cursed suggestions, as one does with a skittish horse
+before some object that frightens it, and to evoke the recollection of
+every hour, every minute of that first night of love, and to extract the
+secret from her....
+
+Elaine's looks and radiant smile were overflowing with happiness, and
+she had the air of a conqueror who is proud of his triumph, for she was
+now a _woman_ already, and we had _at least been alone_ in this
+modernized country house, which had been redecorated and smartened up to
+serve as the frame for our affection! She hardly seemed to know what she
+was saying or doing, and ran from room to room in her light morning
+dress of mauve crape, without exactly knowing where to sit, and almost
+dazzled by the light of the lamps that had large shades in the shape of
+rose leaves over them.
+
+There was no embarrassment, no hesitation, no shamefaced looks, no
+recoiling from the arms that were stretched out to her, or from the lips
+that begged; none of those delightful little pieces of awkwardness which
+show a virgin soul free from all perversion, in her manner of sitting on
+my knees, or putting her bare arms round my neck, and of offering me the
+back of her neck and her lips to kiss, but she laughed nervously, and
+her supple form trembled when I kissed her passionately on various
+places, and she said things to me that were suitable for being whispered
+on the pillows, while a strange languor overshadowed her eyes, and
+dilated her nostrils.
+
+And suddenly with a mocking gesture, which seemed to bid defiance to the
+supper that was laid on a small table, cold meat of various kinds,
+plates of fruit and of cakes, the ice pail, from which the neck of a
+bottle of champagne protruded, she said merrily:
+
+"I am not at all hungry, dear; let us have supper later! what do you
+say?"
+
+She half turned round to the large bed, which seemed to be quite ready
+for us, and which looked white in the shadow of the recess in which it
+stood, with its two white, untouched, almost solemn pillows. She was not
+smiling any more; there was a bluish gleam in her eyes, like that of
+burning alcohol, and I lost my head. Elaine did not try to escape, and
+did not utter a complaint.
+
+Oh! that night of torture and delight, that night which ought never to
+have ended!
+
+I determined that I would be as patient as a policeman who is trying to
+discover the traces of a crime, that I would investigate the past of
+this girl, about which I knew nothing, as I should be sure to discover
+some proof, some important reminiscence, some servant who had been her
+accomplice.
+
+And yet I adored her, my pretty, my divine Elaine, and I would consent
+no matter to what if only she were what I dreamt her, what I wished her
+to be, if only this nightmare would go and no longer rise up between her
+and me.
+
+When she woke up, she spoke to me in her coaxing voice.... Oh! her
+kisses, again her kisses, always her kisses, in spite of everything!
+
+Oh! to have believed blindly, to have believed on my knees that she was
+not lying, that she was not making a mockery of my tenderness, and that
+she had never belonged, and never would belong, to any one but me!
+
+
+PART VIII
+
+I wished that I could have transformed myself into one of those crafty,
+unctuous priests, to whom women confess their most secret faults, to
+whom they entrust their souls and frequently ask for advice, and that
+Elaine would have come and knelt at the grating of the confessional,
+where I should press her closely with questions, and gradually extract
+sincere confidences from her.
+
+As soon as I am by the side of a young or old woman now, I try to give
+our conversation a ticklish turn; I forget all reserve and I try to make
+her talk of those jokes which nettle, those words of double meaning
+which excite, and to lead her up to the only subject that interests and
+holds me, to find out what she feels in her body as well as in her
+heart, on that night, when for the first time, she has to undergo the
+nuptial ordeal. Some do not appear to understand me, blush, leave me as
+if I were some unpleasant, ill-mannered person, and had offended them;
+as if I had tried to force open the precious casket in which they keep
+their sweetest recollections.
+
+Others, on the other hand, understand me only too well, scent something
+equivocal and ridiculous, though they do not exactly know what, make me
+go on, and finally get out of the difficulty by some subtle piece of
+impertinence, and a burst of chaffing laughter.
+
+Two or three at most, and they were those pretty little upstarts who
+talk at random, and brag about their vice, and whom one could soon not
+leave a leg to stand upon, were one to take the trouble, have related
+their impressions to me with ironical complaisance, and I found nothing
+in what they told me that reassured me, nor could I discover anything
+serious, true or moving in it.
+
+That supreme initiation amused them as much as if it had been a scene
+from a comedy; the small amount of affection that they felt for the man
+with whom their existence had been associated grew less and evaporated
+altogether--and they remembered nothing about it except its ridiculous
+and hateful side, and described it as a sort of pantomime in which they
+played a bad part. But these did not love and were not adored like
+Elaine was. They married either from interest, or that they might not
+remain old maids, that they might have more liberty and escape from
+troublesome guardianship.
+
+Foolish dolls, without either heart or head, they had neither that
+almost diseased nervosity, nor that requirement for affection, nor that
+instinct of love which I discovered in my wife's nature, and which
+attracted me, at the same time that it terrified me.
+
+Besides, who could convince me of my errors? Who could dissipate that
+darkness in which I was lost? What miracle could restore _all_ my belief
+in her again?
+
+
+PART IX
+
+Elaine felt that I was hiding something from her, that I was unhappy,
+that, as it were, some threatening obstacle had risen up between her and
+me, that some insupportable suspicion was oppressing me, torturing me
+and keeping me from her arms, was poisoning and disturbing that
+affection in which I had hoped to find fresh youth, absolute happiness,
+my dream of dreams.
+
+She never spoke to me about it, however, but seemed to recoil from a
+definite explanation, which might make shipwreck of her love. She
+surrounded me with endearing attentions, and appeared to be trying to
+make my life so pleasant to me, that nothing in the world could draw me
+from it! And she would certainly cure me, if this madness of mine, were
+not, alas! like those wounds which are constantly reopening, and which
+no balm can heal.
+
+But, at times, I lived again, I imagined that her caresses had exorcised
+me, that I was saved, that doubt was no longer gnawing at my heart, that
+I was going to adore her again, like I used to adore her. I used to
+throw myself at her knees and put my lips on her little hands which she
+abandoned to me, I looked at her lovely, limpid eyes as if they had been
+a piece of a blue sky that appeared amidst black storm clouds, and I
+whispered, with something like a sob in my throat:
+
+"You love me, do you not, with all your heart; you love me as much as I
+love you; tell me so again, my dear love; tell me that, and nothing but
+that!"
+
+And she used to reply eagerly, with a smile of joy on her lips:
+
+"Do you not know it? Do you not see every moment that I love you, that
+you have taken entire possession of me, and that I only live for you and
+by you?"
+
+And her kisses gave me new life, and intoxicated me, like when one
+returns from a long journey and had been in peril and is despaired of
+ever seeing some beloved object again, and one meets with a sort of
+frenzied embrace, and forgets everything in that divine feeling that one
+is going to die of happiness....
+
+
+PART X
+
+But these were only ephemeral clear spots in our sky, and the cries
+which accompanied them only grew more bitter and terrible. I knew that
+Elaine was growing more and more uneasy at the apparent strangeness of
+my character, that she suffered from it and that it affected her nerves,
+that the existence to which I was condemning her in spite of myself,
+that all this immoderate love of mine, followed by fits of inexplicable
+coldness and of low spirits, disconcerted her, so that she was no longer
+the same, and kept away from me. She could not hide her grief, and was
+continually worrying me with questions of affectionate pity. She
+repeated the same things over and over again, with hateful persistence.
+She had vexed me, without knowing it! Was I already tired of my married
+life, and did I regret my lost liberty? Had I any private troubles which
+I had not told her of; heavy debts which I did not know how to pay; was
+it family matters or some former connection with a woman that I had
+broken off suddenly, and that now threatened to create a scandal? Was I
+being worried by anonymous letters? What was it, in a word; what was it?
+
+My denials only exasperated her, so that she sulked in silence, while
+her brain worked and her heart grew hard towards me; but could I, as a
+matter of fact, tell her of my suspicions which were filling my life
+with gloom and annihilating me? Would it not be odious and vile to
+accuse her of such a fall, without any proofs or any clue, and would she
+ever forget such an insult?
+
+I almost envied those unfortunate wretches who had the right to be
+jealous, who had to fight against a woman's coquettes and light
+behavior, and who had to defend their honor that was threatened by some
+poacher on the preserves of love. They had a target to aim at; they knew
+their enemies and knew what they were doing, while I was wounding in a
+land of terrible mirages, was struggling in the midst of vague
+suppositions, and was causing my own troubles and was enraged with her
+past, which was, I felt sure, as white and pure as any bridal veil.
+
+Ah! It would be better to blow my brains out, I thought to myself, than
+to prolong such a situation! I had had enough of it. I scarcely lived,
+and I wished to know all that Elaine had done before we became engaged.
+I wanted to know whether I was the first or the second, and I determined
+to know it, even if I had to sacrifice years of my life in inquiry, and
+to lower myself to compromising words and acts, and to every species of
+artifice and to spend everything that I possessed!
+
+She might believe whatever she liked, for after all, I should only laugh
+at it. We might have been so happy, and there were so many who envied
+me, and who would gladly have consented to take my place!
+
+
+PART XI
+
+I no longer knew where I was going, but was like a train going at full
+speed through a dense fog, and which in vain disturbs the perfect
+silence of the sleeping country with its puffing and shrill whistles;
+when the driver cannot distinguish the changing lights of the discs, nor
+the signals, and when soon some terrible crash will send the train off
+the rails, and the carriages will become a heap of ruins.
+
+I was afraid of going mad, and at times I asked myself whether any of my
+family had shown any signs of mental aberration, and had been locked up
+in a lunatic asylum, and whether the life of constant fast pleasures, of
+turning night into day and of frequent violent emotions, that I had led
+for years, had not at last affected my brain. If I had believed in
+anything, and in the science of the occult, which haunts so many
+restless brains, I should have imagined that some enemy was bewitching
+me and laying invisible snares for me, that he was suggesting those
+actions which were quite unworthy of the frank, upright and well-bred
+man that I was, and was trying to destroy the happiness of which she and
+I had dreamt.
+
+For a whole week I devoted myself to that hateful business of playing
+the spy, and to those inquiries which were killing me. I had succeeded
+in discovering the lady's maid who had been in Elaine's service before
+we were married, and whom she loved as if she had been her foster
+sister, who used to accompany her whenever she went out, when she went
+to visit the poor and when she went for a walk, who used to wake her
+every morning, do her hair and dress her. She was young and rather
+pretty, and one saw that Paris had improved her and given her a polish,
+and that she knew her difficult business from end to end.
+
+I had found out, however, that her virtue was only apparent, especially
+since she had changed employers; that she was fond of going to the
+public balls, and that she divided her favors between a man who came
+from her part of the country, and who was a sergeant in a dragoon
+regiment, and a footman, and that she spent all her money on horse races
+and on dress. I felt sure that I should be able to make her talk and get
+the truth out of her, either by money or cunning, and so I asked her to
+meet me early one morning in a quiet square.
+
+She listened to me first of all in astonishment, without replying yes or
+no, as if she did not understand what I was aiming at, or with what
+object I was asking her all these questions about her former mistress;
+but when I offered her a few hundred francs to loosen her tongue, as I
+was impatient to get the matter over and pretended to know that she had
+managed interviews for Elaine with her lovers, that they were known and
+being followed, that she was in the habit of frequenting quiet
+bachelors' quarters, from which she returned late, the sly little wench
+frowned angrily, shrugged her shoulders and exclaimed:
+
+"What pigs some men are to have such ideas, and cause such an excellent
+person as Mademoiselle Elaine any unhappiness. Look here, you disgust me
+with your banknotes and your dirty stories, and I don't choose to say
+what you ought to wear on your head!"
+
+She turned her back on me and hurried off, and her insolence, that
+indignant reply which she had given me, rejoiced me to the depths of my
+heart, like soothing balm that lulls the pain.
+
+I should have liked to have called her back, and told her that it was
+all a joke, that I was devotedly in love with my wife, that I was always
+on the watch to hear her praised, but she was already out of sight, and
+I felt that I was ridiculous and mean, that I had lowered myself by what
+I had done, and I swore that I would profit by such a humiliating
+lesson, and for the future show myself to Elaine as the trusting and
+ardent husband that she deserved, and I thought myself cured, altogether
+cured....
+
+And yet, I was again the prey to the same bad thoughts, to the same
+doubts, and persuaded that that girl had lied to me just like all other
+women lie when they are on the defensive, that she made fun of me, that
+perhaps _some one_ had foreseen this scene and had told her what to say
+and made sure of her silence, just as her complicity had been gained.
+Thus I shall always knock up against some barrier, and struggle in this
+wretched darkness, and this mire from which I cannot extricate myself!
+
+
+PART XII
+
+Nobody knew anything. Neither the Superior of the Convent where she had
+been brought up until she was sixteen, nor the servants who had waited
+on her, nor the governesses who had finished her education, could
+remember that Elaine had been difficult to check or teach, or that she
+had had any other ideas than those of her age. She had certainly shown
+no precocious coquetry and disquieting instincts; she had had no
+equivocal cousinly relationships, when if the bridle is left on their
+neck at all, and one of them has learned at school what love is, the two
+big children yield to the fatal law of sex, and begin the inevitable
+eclogue of Daphne and Chole over again.
+
+However, Oh! I felt it too much for it to be nothing but a chimera and a
+mirage, it was no _virgin_ who threw her arms round my neck so lovingly,
+and who returned my first kisses so _deliciously_, who was attracted by
+my society, who gave no signs of surprise and uttered no complaint, who
+appeared to forget everything when in my society. No, no, a thousand
+times no, that could not have been a pure woman.
+
+I ought to have cast off that intoxication which was bewitching me, and
+to have rushed out of the room where such a lie was being consummated; I
+ought to have profited by her moments of amiable weakness, while she was
+incapable of collecting her thoughts, when she would with tears have
+confessed an old fault, for which the unhappy girl had not, perhaps,
+been altogether responsible. Perhaps by my entreaties, or even perhaps
+by violence, in terror at my furious looks, when my features would have
+been distorted by rage, and my hands clenched in spite of myself in a
+gesture of menace and of murder, I might have forced her to open her
+heart, to show me its defilement, and to tell me this sad love episode.
+
+How do I know whether her disconsolateness might not have moved me to
+pity, whether I should not have wept with her at the heavy cross that we
+both of us had to bear, whether I should not have forgiven her and
+opened my arms wide, so that she might have thrown herself into them
+like into a peaceful refuge?
+
+Would not any man, or vicious collegian on the lookout for innocent
+girls, have perceived her nervousness, her vice? Would he not have
+hypnotized her, as it were, by amorous touches, by skillful caresses and
+reduced her to the absolute passiveness of an animal, who had been taken
+unawares, without any care for the morrow, or what the consequences of
+such a fault might be?
+
+Or was I completely her dupe and the dupe of a villain? Had she loved,
+and did she still love the man who had first possessed her, who had been
+her first lover? Who could tell me, or come to my aid? Who could give me
+the proofs, the real, undeniable proofs, either that I was an infamous
+wretch to suspect Elaine, whom I ought to have worshiped with my eyes
+shut, or that she was guilty, that she had lied, and that I had the
+right to cast her out of my life and to treat her like a worthless
+woman!
+
+
+PART XIII
+
+If I had married when I was quite young, before I had wallowed in the
+mire of Paris, from which one can never afterwards free oneself, for
+heart and body both retain indelible marks of it, if I had not been the
+plaything of a score of mistresses, who disgusted me with belief in any
+woman, if I had not been weaned from supreme illusions, and surfeited
+with everything to the marrow, should I have these abominable ideas?
+
+I waited almost until I was beginning to decline in life, before I took
+the right path and sought refuge in port; before going to what is pure
+and virtuous, and before listening to the continual advice of those who
+love me, I passed too suddenly from those lies, from those ephemeral
+enjoyments, from that satiety which depraves us, from vice in which one
+tries to acquire renewed strength and vigor, and to discover some new
+and unknown sensation, to the pure sentimentalities of an engagement, to
+the unspeakable delights of a life that was common to two, to that kind
+of amorous first communion which ought to constitute married life.
+
+If, instead of getting involved in an engagement and forming any
+resolution so quickly, as I had been afraid that somebody else would be
+beforehand with me and to rob me of Elaine's heart, or of relapsing into
+my former habits, if instead of lacking moral strength and character
+enough, in case I might have had to wait, if I had backed out without
+entering into any engagement and without having bound my life to that of
+the adorable girl whom chance had thrown in my way, it would surely have
+been far better if I had waited, prepared myself, questioned myself, and
+accustomed myself to that metamorphosis; if I had purified myself and
+forgotten the past, like in those retreats which precede the solemn
+ceremony, when pious souls pronounce their indissoluble vows?
+
+The reaction had been too sudden and violent for such a convalescent as
+I was. I worked myself up, and pictured to myself something so white, so
+virginal, so paradisical, such complete ignorance, such unconquerable
+modesty and such delicious awkwardness, that Elaine's gayety, her
+unconstraint, her fearlessness, and her passionate kisses bewildered me,
+roused my suspicions and filled me with anguish.
+
+And yet I know how all, or nearly all, girls are educated in these days,
+and that the ignorant, simple ones only exist on the stage, and I know
+also that they hear and learn too many things both at home and in
+society, not to have the intuition of the results of love.
+
+Elaine loves me with all her heart, for she has told me so time after
+time, and she repeats it to me more ardently than ever when I take her
+into my arms and appear happy. She must have seen that her beauty had,
+in a manner, converted me; that in order to possess her I had renounced
+many seductions and a long life of enjoyment; and, perhaps, she would no
+longer please me if she was _too much of the little girl_, and that she
+would appear ridiculous to me if she showed her fears by any entreaty,
+and gesture, or any sigh.
+
+As the people in the South say, she would have acted the brave woman,
+and boasted, so that no complaint might betray her, and have imparted
+the wild tenderness of a jealous heart to her kisses, and have attempted
+a struggle, which would certainly have been useless, against those
+recollections of mine, with which she thought I must be filled, in spite
+of myself.
+
+I accused myself, so that I might no longer accuse her. I studied my
+malady; I knew quite well that I was wrong, and I wished to be wrong, I
+measured the stupidity and the disgrace of such suspicions, and,
+nevertheless, in spite of everything, they assailed me again, watched me
+traitorously and I was carried away and devoured by them.
+
+Ah! Was there in the whole world, even among the most wretched beggars
+that were dying of starvation, whom nature squeezes in a vice, as it
+were, or among the victims of love, anybody who could say that he was
+more wretched than I?
+
+
+PART XIV
+
+This morning Count de Saulnac, who was lunching here, told us a terrible
+story of a rape, for which a man is to be tried in a few days.
+
+A charming girl of eighteen grew languid, and became so pale and morose,
+her cheeks were so wax-like, her eyes so sunken and she had altogether
+such a look of anemia, that her parents grew uneasy and took her to a
+doctor who lived near them. He examined her carefully, said vaguely what
+was the matter with her, spoke of an illness that required assiduous
+care and attention, and advised the worthy couple to bring the poor girl
+to him every day for a month.
+
+As they were not well off enough to keep a servant, and each had their
+work to attend to, the husband as an employee in a public office and his
+wife as cashier in a milliner's shop, and did not dream of any evil, and
+were further reassured by the charitable, unctuous and austere looks of
+the doctor, they allowed their daughter to go and consult him by
+herself.
+
+The old man made much of her, tried to make her get over her shyness,
+adroitly made her tell him all about her usual life, took a long time in
+sounding her chest, helped her to dress and undress, in a very paternal
+way, gave her a potion and was so thoughtful and caressing, that the
+poor girl blushed and felt quite uncomfortable at it all. He soon saw
+that he should obtain nothing from her innocence, but that she would
+resist his slightest attempts at improper familiarity, and as he was
+extremely taken with the delicate and amusing girl, and with her
+charming person, the wretch sent her to sleep with a few magnetic
+passes, and outraged her.
+
+She awoke without being conscious of what had happened, and only felt
+rather more listless than usual, like she used to do when there was
+thunder in the air. From that time, the doctor put longer intervals
+between her visits, and soon, after having prescribed insignificant
+remedies for her, he told her that she was quite cured, and that there
+was no occasion for her to come and see him any more. Two months passed,
+and the girl, who at first had seemed much better and more lively,
+relapsed into a state of prostration which had so alarmed them, dragged
+herself about more than she walked, and seemed to be succumbing under
+some heavy burden.
+
+As they had not paid the old doctor's bill, and as they were afraid that
+he would ask them for it if they went to see him again, her father took
+the girl to Beaujon, and they thought that he should have gone mad with
+despair and shame when one of the house-surgeons, without mincing his
+words, told them in a chaffing manner, that she was in the family way.
+
+_In the family way!_ What did he mean by that? And by whom?
+
+They were small, thoroughly respectable and upright shopkeepers, and
+this made them cruel. They tormented the poor girl, to make her
+acknowledge her fault and tell them the name of her seducer. It was of
+no use for her to bemoan herself, to throw herself at their feet, to
+tear her hair in desperation, and to swear that no man in the world had
+ever touched her lips; in vain, did she exclaim indignantly that it was
+impossible that such a dreadful thing could be; that the man had made a
+mistake or was joking with them. In vain, did she try to calm them, and
+to soften them by her entreaties; they turned away their heads, and had
+only one reply to make:
+
+"His name, his name!"
+
+When she saw that her figure was altering, she was at length undeceived,
+and became like an imprisoned animal, did not speak and cowered
+motionless in the darkest corners, and did not even rebel at the blows,
+which marked her pale, passive face. She carefully thought over every
+minute in the past few months, and did her utmost to fill up the voids
+in her memory, and at last she guessed who the guilty person was.
+
+Then, in despair, she scribbled on a scrap of paper:
+
+"I swear to you, my dear parents, that I have nothing to reproach myself
+with. The old doctor treated me so strangely, that I often felt inclined
+to run out of the consulting room. One day he put me to sleep, and
+perhaps it was he who...."
+
+And not having the courage to finish the lamentable sentence, she went
+and drowned herself, and the parents had the doctor, who had forgotten
+all about that old story, arrested, and in his examination he confessed
+the crime....
+
+With an evil look on her face, such as I have never seen before, and
+with vibrating nostrils, Elaine exclaimed in a hard voice:
+
+"To think that such a monster was not sent to the guillotine!"
+
+_Can she also have suffered the same thing?_
+
+
+PART XV
+
+But unless Elaine was a monster of wickedness, unless she had no heart
+and knew how to lie and to deceive as well as a girl whose only pleasure
+consists in making all those who are captivated by her beauty, play the
+laughable part of dupes, unless that mask of youth concealed a most
+polluted soul, if there had been any unhappy episode in her life, if she
+had endured the horrors of violation, and gone through all the horrors
+of desolation, fear and shame, would not something visible, something
+disgusting, attacks of low spirits, and of gloom, and disgust with
+everything have remained, which would have shown the progress of some
+mysterious malady, the gradual weakening of the brain and the
+enlargement of an incurable wound?
+
+She would have cried occasionally, would have been lost in thought and
+become confused when spoken to, she would scarcely have taken any
+interest in anything that happened, either at home or elsewhere. Kisses
+would have become torture to her, and would have only excited a fever of
+revolt in her inanimate being.
+
+I fancy that I can see such a victim of inexorable Destiny, as if she
+were a consumptive woman whose days are numbered, and who knows it. She
+smiles feebly when any one tries to get her out of her torpor, to amuse
+her and to instill a little hope into her soul. She does not speak, but
+remains sitting silently at a window for whole days together, and one
+might think that her large, dreamy eyes are looking at strange sights in
+the depths of the sky, and see a long, attractive road there. But
+Elaine, on the contrary, thought of nothing but of amusing herself, of
+enjoying life and of laughing, and added all the tricks of a girl who
+has just left school, to her seductive grace of a young woman. She
+carried men away with her; she was most seductive, and loving seemed to
+be her creation. She thought of nothing but of little coquettish acts
+that made her more adorable, and of tender innuendos that triumph over
+everything, that bring men to their knees and tempt them.
+
+It was thus that I formerly dreamt of the woman who was to be my wife,
+and this was the manner in which I looked on life in common; and now
+this perpetual joy irritates me like a challenge, like some piece of
+insolent boasting, and those lips that seek mine, and which offer
+themselves so alluringly and coaxingly to me, make me sad and torture
+me, as if they breathed nothing but a Lie.
+
+Ah! If she had been the lover of another man before marriage, if she had
+belonged to some one else besides me, it could only have been from love,
+without altogether knowing what she wanted or what she was doing! And,
+now, because she had acquired a name by marriage, because she had
+accidentally extricated herself from that false step and thought she had
+won the game, now that she fancied that I had not perceived anything,
+that I adored her and possessed her absolutely!
+
+How wretched I was! Should I never be able to escape from that night
+which was growing darker and darker, which was imprisoning me, driving
+me mad and raising an increasing and impenetrable barrier between Elaine
+and me. Would not she, in the end, be the stronger, she whom I loved so
+dearly, would not she envelope me in so much love, that at last I should
+again find the happiness that I had lost, as if it were a calm, sunlit
+haven, and thus forget this horrible nightmare when I fell on my knees
+before her beauty, with a contrite heart and pricked by remorse, and
+happy to give myself to her for ever, altogether and more passionately
+than at the divine period of our betrothal.
+
+
+PART XVI
+
+Even the sight of our bedroom became painful to me. I was frightened of
+it; I was uncomfortable there, and felt a kind of repulsion in going
+there. It seemed to me as if Elaine were repeating a part that someone
+else had taught her, and I almost hoped that in a moment of
+forgetfulness she would allow her secret to escape her, and pronounce
+some name that was not mine, and I used to keep awake, with my ears on
+the alert, in the hope that she might betray herself in her sleep and
+murmur some revealing word, as she recalled the past, and my temples
+throbbed and my whole body trembled with excitement.
+
+But when this was over and I saw her sleeping peacefully as a little
+girl who was tired with playing, with parted lips and disheveled hair,
+and measured the full extent of the stupidity of my hatred and the
+sacrilegious madness of my jealousy, my heart softened and I fell into
+such a state of profound and absolute distress that I thought I should
+have died of it, and large drops of cold perspiration ran down my cheeks
+and tears fell from my eyes, and I got up, so that my sobs might not
+disturb her rest and wake her.
+
+As this could not continue, however, I told her one day that I felt so
+exhausted and ill that I should prefer to sleep in my own room. She
+appeared to believe me and merely said:
+
+"As you please, my dear!" but her blue eyes suddenly assumed such an
+anxious, such a grieved look, that I turned my head aside, so as not to
+see them....
+
+
+PART XVII
+
+I was again in the old house, _and without her_, in the old house where
+Elaine used to spend all her holidays, in the room whose shutters had
+not been opened since our departure, seven months ago.
+
+Why did I go there, where the calm of the country, the silence of the
+solitude and my recollections, irritated me and recalled my trouble,
+where I suffered even more than I did in Paris, and where I thought of
+Elaine every moment I seemed to see her and to hear her, in a species of
+hallucination.
+
+What did her letters that I had taken out of her writing table, which
+she had used as a girl, what did her ball cards which were stuck round
+her looking glass, in which she used to admire herself formerly, what
+did her dresses, her dressing gowns, and the dusty furniture whose
+repose my trembling hands violated, tell me? Nothing, and always
+nothing.
+
+At table, I used to speak with the worthy couple who had never left the
+mansion and who appeared to look upon themselves as its second masters,
+with the apparent good nature of a man who was in love with his wife and
+who wished only to speak about her, who took an interest in the smallest
+detail of her childhood and youth, with all the jovial familiarity which
+encourages peasants to talk, and when a few glasses of white wine had
+loosened their tongues they would talk about her, whom they loved as if
+she had been their child, and at other times I used to question the
+farmers, when they came to settle their accounts.
+
+Had Elaine the bridle on her neck like so many girls had; did she like
+the country, were the peasants fond of her, and did she show any
+preference for one or the other? Were many people invited for the
+shooting, and did she visit much with the other ladies in the
+neighborhood?
+
+And they drank with their elbows resting on the table in front of me,
+uttered her praises in a voice as monotonous as a spinning wheel, lost
+themselves in endless, senseless chatter which made me yawn in spite of
+myself, and told me her girlish tricks which certainly did not disclose
+what was haunting me, the traces of that first love, that perilous
+flirtation, that foolish escapade in which Elaine might have been
+seduced.
+
+Old and young men and women, spoke of her with something like devotion,
+and all said how kind and charitable she was, and as merry as a bird on
+a bright day; they said she pitied their wretchedness and their
+troubles, and was still the young girl in spite of her long dresses, and
+fearing nothing, while even the animals loved her.
+
+She was almost always alone, and was never troubled with any companions;
+she seemed to shun the house, hide herself in the park when the bell
+announced some unexpected visits, and when one of her aunts, Madame de
+Pleissac, said to her one day:
+
+"Do you think that you will ever find a husband with your stand-offish
+manners?"
+
+She replied with a burst of laughter:
+
+"Oh! Very well, then, Auntie, I shall do without one!"
+
+She had never given a hand to spiteful chatter or to slander, and had
+not flirted with the best looking young man in the neighborhood, any
+more than she had with the officers who stayed at the _chateau_ during
+the maneuver, or the neighbors, who came to see her parents. And some of
+them even old men, whom years of work had bent like vine-stalks and had
+tanned like the leather bottles which are used by caravans in the East,
+used to say with tears in their dim eyes:
+
+"Ah! When you married our young lady, we all said that there would not
+be a happier man in the whole world than you!"
+
+Ought I to have believed them? Were they not simple, frank souls, who
+were ignorant of wiles and of lies, who had no interest in deceiving me,
+who had lived near Elaine while she was growing up and becoming a woman,
+and who had been familiar with her?
+
+Could I be the only one who doubted Elaine, the only one who accused her
+and suspected her, I who loved her so madly, I, whose only hope, only
+desire, only happiness she was? May heaven guide me on this bad road on
+which I have lost my way, where I am calling for help and where my
+misery is increasing every day, and grant me the infinite pleasure of
+being able to enjoy her caresses without any ill feeling, and to be able
+to love her, as she loves me. And if I must expiate my old faults, and
+this infamous doubt which I am ashamed of not being immediately able to
+cast from me, if I must pay for my unmerited happiness with usury, I
+hope that I may be given to death as a prey, only provided that I might
+belong to her, idolize her, believe in her kisses, believe in her beauty
+and in her love, for one hour, for even a few moments!
+
+
+PART XVIII
+
+To-day I suddenly remembered a funny evening which I spent when I was a
+bachelor, at Madame d'Ecoussens, where all of us, some with secret and
+insurmountable agony, and others with absolute indifference, went into
+one of the small rooms where a female professor of palmistry, who was
+then in vogue, and whose name I have forgotten, had installed herself.
+
+When it came to my turn to sit opposite to her, as if I had been going
+to make my confession, she took my hands into her long, slender fingers,
+felt them, squeezed them and triturated them, as if they had been a lump
+of wax, which she was about to model into shape.
+
+Severely dressed in black, with a pensive face, thin lips and almost
+copper-colored eyes and neither young nor old, this woman had something
+commanding, imperious, disturbing about her, and I must confess that my
+heart beat more violently than usual while she looked at the lines in my
+left hand through a strong magnifying glass, where the mysterious
+characters of some satanic conjuring look appear, and form a capital M.
+
+She was interesting, occasionally discovered fragments of my past and
+gave mysterious hints, as if her looks were following the strange roads
+of Destiny in those unequal, confused curves. She told me in brief words
+that I should have and had had some opportunities, that I was wasting my
+physical, more than my moral strength in all kinds of love affairs that
+did not last long, and that the day when I really loved, or when, to
+use her expression, I was fairly caught, would be to me the prelude of
+intense sufferings, a real way of the Cross and of an illness of which I
+should never be cured. Then, as she examined my line of life, that which
+surrounds the thick part of the thumb, the lady in black suddenly grew
+gloomy, frowned and appeared to hesitate to go on to the end and
+continue my horoscope, and said very quickly:
+
+"Your line of life is magnificent, monsieur; you will live to be sixty
+at least, but take care not to spend it too freely or to use it
+immoderately; beware of strong emotions and of any passional crisis, for
+I remark a gap there in the full vigor of your age, and that gap, that
+incurable malady which I mentioned to you, in the line of your
+heart...."
+
+I mastered myself, in order not to smile, and took my leave of her, but
+everything that she foretold has been realized, and I dare not look at
+that sinister gap which she saw in my line of life, _for that gap can
+only mean madness_!
+
+Madness, my poor, dear adored Elaine!
+
+
+PART XIX
+
+I became as bad and spiteful as if the spirit of hatred had possession
+of me, and envied those whose life was too happy, and who had no cares
+to trouble them. I could not conceal my pleasure when one of those
+domestic dramas occurred, in which hearts bleed and are broken, in which
+odious treachery and bitter sufferings are brought to light.
+
+Divorce proceedings with their miserable episodes, with the wranglings
+of the lawyers and all the unhappiness that they revealed and which
+exposed the vanity of dreams, the tricks of women, the lowness of some
+minds, the foul animal that sits and slumbers in most hearts, attracted
+me like a delightful play, a piece which rivets one from the first to
+the last act. I listened greedily to passionate letters, those mad
+prayers whose secrets some lawyer violates and which he reads aloud in a
+mocking tone, and which he gives pell-mell to the bench and to the
+public, who have come to be amused or excited and to stare at the
+victims of love.
+
+I followed those romances of adultery which were unfolded chapter by
+chapter, in their brutal reality, of things that had actually occurred,
+and for the first time I forgot my own unhappiness in them. Sometimes
+the husband and wife were there, as if they wished to defy each other,
+to meet in some last encounter, and pale and feverish they watched each
+other, devoured each other with their eyes, hiding their grief and their
+misery. Sometimes again, the lover or the mistress were there and tore
+their gloves in their rage, wishing to rush at the bar to defend their
+love, to bring forward accusations in their turn, and would tell the
+advocate that he was lying, and would threaten him and revile him with
+all their indignant nature. Friends, however, would restrain them, would
+whisper something to them in a low voice, press their hands like after a
+funeral, and try to appease them.
+
+It seemed to me, as if I were looking at a heap of ruins, or breathing
+in the odor of an ambulance, in which dying men were groaning, and that
+those unhappy people were assuaging my trouble somewhat, and taking
+their share of it.
+
+I used to read the advertisements in the Agony Columns in the
+newspapers, where the same exalted phrases used to recur, where I read
+the same despairing _adieux_, earnest requests for a meeting, echoes of
+past affection, and vain vows; and all this relieved me, vaguely
+appeased me, and made me think less about myself, that hateful,
+incurable _I_ which I longed to destroy!
+
+
+PART XX
+
+As the heat was very oppressive, and there was not a breath of wind,
+after dinner she wanted to go for a drive in the _Bois de Boulogne_ and
+we drove in the victoria towards the bridge at Suresne.
+
+It was getting late, and the dark drives looked like deserted
+labyrinths, and cool retreats where one would have liked to have stopped
+late, where the very rustle of the leaves seems to whisper amorous
+temptations, and there was seduction in the softness of the air and in
+the infinite music of the silence.
+
+Occasionally, lights were to be seen among the trees, and the crescent
+of the new moon shone like a half-opened gold bracelet in the serene
+sky, and the green sward, the copses and the small lakes, which gave an
+uncertain reflection of the surrounding objects, came into sight
+suddenly, out of the shade, and the intoxicating smell of the hay and of
+the flower beds rose from the earth as if from a sachet.
+
+We did not speak, but the jolts of the carriage occasionally brought us
+quite close together, and as if I were being attracted by some
+irresistible force, I turned to Elaine and saw that her eyes were
+filled with tears, and that she was very pale, and my whole body
+trembled when I looked at her. Suddenly, as if she could not bear this
+state of affairs any longer, she threw her arms round my neck, and with
+her lips almost touching mine, she said:
+
+"Why do you not love me any longer? Why do you make me so unhappy? What
+have I done to you, Jacques?"
+
+She was at my mercy, she was undergoing the influence of the charm of
+one of those moonlight nights which unbrace women's nerves, make them
+languid, and leave them without a will and without strength, and I
+thought that she was going to tell me everything and to confess
+everything to me, and I had to master myself, not to kiss her on her
+sweet coaxing lips, but I only replied coldly:
+
+"Do you not know, Elaine?... Did you not think that sooner or later I
+should discover everything that you have been trying to hide from me?"
+
+She sat up in terror, and repeated as if she were in a profound stupor:
+
+"What have I been trying to hide from you?"
+
+I had said too much, and was bound to go on to the end and to finish,
+even though I repented of it ever afterwards, and amidst the noise of
+the carriage I said in a hoarse voice:
+
+"Is it not your fault if I have become estranged from you, shall not I
+be the only one to be unhappy, I who loved you so dearly, who believed
+in you, and whom you have deceived, and condemned to take another man's
+mistress?"
+
+Elaine closed my mouth with my fingers, and panting, with dilated eyes
+and with such a pale face that I thought she was going to faint, she
+said hoarsely:
+
+"Be quiet, be quiet, you are frightening me,... frightening me as if you
+were a madman...."
+
+Those words froze me, and I shivered as if some phantoms were appearing
+among the trees and showing me the place that had been marked out for me
+by Destiny, and I felt inclined to jump from the carriage and to run to
+the river, which was calling to me yonder in a maternal voice, and
+inviting me to an eternal sleep, eternal repose, but Elaine called out
+to the coachman:
+
+"We will go home, Firmin; drive as fast as you can!"
+
+We did not exchange another word, and during the whole drive Elaine
+sobbed convulsively, though she tried to hide the sound with her pocket
+handkerchief, and I understood that it was all finished _and that I had
+killed our love_....
+
+
+PART XXI
+
+Yes, all was finished and stupidly finished, without the decisive
+explanation, in which I should find strength to escape from a hateful
+yoke, and to repudiate the woman who had allured me with false caresses,
+and who no longer ought to bear my name.
+
+It was either that, or else, who knows, the happiness, the peace, the
+love which was not troubled by any evil afterthoughts, that absolute
+love that I dreamt of between Elaine and myself when I asked for her
+hand, and which I was still continually dreaming of with the despair of
+a condemned soul far from Paradise, and from which I was suffering, and
+which would kill me.
+
+She prevented me from speaking; with her trembling hand she checked
+that flow of frenzied words which were about to come from my pained
+heart, those terrible accusations which an imperious, resistless force
+incited me to utter, and those terrified words which escaped from her
+pale lips, froze me again, and penetrated to my marrow as if they had
+been some piercing wind.
+
+In spite of it all, I was in full possession of my reason, I was not in
+a passion, and I could not have looked like a fool.
+
+What could she have seen unusual in my eyes that frightened her, what
+inflections were there in my voice for such an idea suddenly to arise in
+her brain? Suppose she had not make a mistake, suppose I no longer knew
+what I was saying nor what I was doing, and really had that terrible
+malady that she had mentioned, and which I cannot repeat!
+
+It seems to me now as if I could see myself in a mirror of anguish,
+altogether changed, as if my head were a complete void at times and
+became something sonorous, and then was struck violent, prolonged blows
+from a heavy clapper, as if it had been a bell, which fills it with
+tumultuous deafening vibrations, from a kind of loud tocsin and from
+monotonous peals, that were succeeded by the silence of the grave.
+
+And the voice of recollection, a voice which tells me Elaine's
+mysterious history, which speaks to me only of her, which recalls that
+initial night, that strange night of happiness and of grief, when I
+doubted her fidelity, when I doubted her heart as well as I did herself,
+passes slowly through this silence all at once, like the voice of
+distant music.
+
+Alas! Suppose she had not made a mistake!
+
+
+PART XXII
+
+I must be an object of hatred to her, and I left home without writing
+her a line, without trying to see her, without wishing her good-bye. She
+may pity me or she may hate me, but she certainly does not love me any
+longer, and I have myself buried that love, for which I would formerly
+have given my whole life. As she is young and pretty, however, Elaine
+will soon console herself for these passing troubles with some soul that
+is the shadow of her own, and will replace me, if she has not done that
+already, and will seek happiness in adultery.
+
+What are she and her lover plotting? What will they try to do to prevent
+me from interfering with them? What snares will they set for me so that
+I may go and end my miserable life in some dungeon, from which there is
+no release?
+
+But that is impossible; it can never be; Elaine belongs to me altogether
+and forever; she is my property, my chattel, my happiness. I adore her,
+I want her all to myself, _even though she be guilty_, and I will never
+leave her again for a moment, I will still stick to her petticoats, I
+will roll at her feet, and ask her pardon, for I thirst for her kisses
+and her love.
+
+To-night in a few hours, I shall be with her, I shall go into _our_ room
+and lie in _our_ bed, and I will cover the cheeks of my fair-haired
+darling with such kisses, that she will no longer think me mad, and if
+she cries out, if she defends herself and spurns me, I shall kill her; I
+have made up my mind to that.
+
+I know that I shall strike her with the Arab knife that is on one of the
+console-tables, in our room among other knick-knacks. I see the spot
+where I shall plunge in the sharp blade, into the nape of her neck,
+which is covered with little soft pale golden curls, that are the same
+color as the hair of her head. It attracted me so at one time, during
+the chaste period of our engagement, that I used to wish to bite it, as
+if it had been some fruit. I shall do it some day in the country, when
+she is bathed in a ray of sunlight, which makes her look dazzling in her
+pink muslin dress, some day on a towing-path, when the nightingales are
+singing, and the dragonflies, with their reflections of blue and silver
+are flying about.
+
+There, there, I shall skillfully plunge it in up to the hilt, like those
+who know how to kill....
+
+
+PART XXIII
+
+And after I had killed her, what then?
+
+As the judges would not be able to explain such an extraordinary crime
+to themselves, they would of course say that I was mad, medical men
+would examine me and would immediately agree that I ought at once to be
+kept under supervision, taken care of and placed in a lunatic asylum.
+
+And for years, perhaps, because I was strong, and because such a
+vigorous animal would survive the calamity intact, although my intellect
+might give way, I should remain a prey to these chimeras, carry that
+fixed idea of her lies, her impurity and her shame about with me, that
+would be my one recollection, and I should suffer unceasingly.
+
+I am writing all this perfectly coolly and in full possession of my
+reason; I have perfect prescience of what my resolve entails, and of
+this blind rush towards death. I feel that my very minutes are numbered,
+and that I no longer have anything in my skull, in which some fire,
+though I do not quite know what it is, is burning, except a few
+particles of what used to be my brain.
+
+Just as a short time ago, I should certainly have murdered Elaine, if
+she had been with me, when invisible hands seemed to be pushing me
+towards her, inaudible voices ordered me to commit that murder, it is
+surely most probable that I shall have another crisis, and will there be
+any awakening from that?
+
+Ah! It will be a thousand times better, since Destiny has left me a
+half-open door, to escape from life before it is too late, before the
+free, sane, strong man that I am at present, becomes the most pitiable,
+the most destructive, the most dangerous of human wrecks!
+
+May all these notes of my misery fall into Elaine's hands some day, may
+she read them to the end, pity and absolve me, and for a long time mourn
+for me!
+
+_(Here ends Jacques' Journal.)_
+
+
+
+
+AN UNFORTUNATE LIKENESS
+
+
+During one of those sudden changes of the electric light, which at one
+time throws rays of exquisite pale pink, at another a liquid gold, as if
+it had been filtered through the light hair of a woman, and at another,
+rays of a bluish hue with strange tints, such as the sky assumes at
+twilight, in which the women with their bare shoulders looked like
+living flowers--it was on the night of the first of January at
+Montonirail's, the refined painter of great undulating _poses_ figures,
+of brilliant dresses, of Parisian prettiness--that tall Pescarelle, whom
+some called _Pussy_, though I do not know why, suddenly said in a low
+voice:
+
+"Well, people were not altogether mistaken, in fact, were only half
+wrong when they coupled my name with that of pretty Lucy Plonelle. She
+had captivated my heart, just as a bird-catcher on a frosty morning
+catches an imprudent wren on a limed twig, and she might have done
+whatever she liked with me.
+
+"I was under the charm of her enigmatical and mocking smile, where her
+teeth had a cruel look between her red lips, and glistened as if they
+were ready to bite and to heighten the pleasure of the most delightful,
+the most voluptuous kiss, by pain.
+
+"I loved everything in her, her feline suppleness, her slow looks, which
+seemed to glide from her half-closed lids, full of promises and
+temptation, her somewhat extreme elegance, and her hands, her long,
+delicate, white hands, with blue veins, like the bloodless hands of a
+female saint in a stained glass window, and her slender fingers, on
+which only the large drops of blood of a ruby glittered.
+
+"I would have given her all my remaining youth and vigor to have laid my
+burning hands onto the nape of her cool round neck, and to feel that
+bright, silky, golden mane enveloping me and caressing my skin. I was
+never tired of hearing her disdainful, petulant voice, those vibrations
+which sounded as if they proceeded from clear glass, and that music,
+which at times, became hoarse, harsh and fierce, like the loud, sonorous
+calls of the Valkyries.
+
+"Oh! Good heavens! to be her lover, to be her chattel, to belong to her,
+to devote one's whole existence to her, to spend one's last half-penny
+and to go under in misery, only to have the glory, the happiness of
+possessing the splendid beauty, the sweetness of her kisses, the pink,
+and the white of her demon-like soul all to myself, were it only for a
+few months!
+
+"It makes you laugh, I know, to think that I should have been caught
+like that, I who give such good, prudent advice to my friends, who fear
+love as I do those quicksands and shoals which appear at low tide and in
+which one is swallowed up and disappears!
+
+"But who can answer for himself, who can defend himself against such a
+danger, against the magnetic attraction that comes from such a woman?
+Nevertheless, I got cured, and perfectly cured, and that, quite
+accidentally, and this is how the enchantment, which was apparently so
+infrangible, was broken.
+
+"On the first night of a play, I was sitting in the stalls close to
+Lucy, whose mother had accompanied her, as usual, and they occupied the
+front of a box, side by side. From some insurmountable attraction, I
+never ceased looking at the woman whom I loved with all the force of my
+being. I feasted my eyes on her beauty, I saw nobody except her in the
+theater, and did not listen to the piece that was being performed on the
+stage.
+
+"Suddenly, however, I felt as if I had received a blow from a dagger in
+my heart, and I had an insane hallucination. Lucy had moved and her
+pretty head was in profile, in the same attitude and with the same lines
+as her mother. I do not know what shadow, or what play of light had
+hardened and altered the color of her delicate features and destroyed
+their ideal prettiness, but the more I looked at them both, the one who
+was young, and the one who was old, the greater that distressing
+resemblance became.
+
+"I saw Lucy growing older and older, striving against those accumulating
+years which bring wrinkles in the face, produce a double chin and crow's
+feet, and spoil the mouth. _They almost looked like twins._
+
+"I suffered so that I almost thought I should have gone mad, and, in
+spite of myself, instead of shaking off this feeling and make my escape
+out of the theater, far away into the noise and life on the boulevards,
+I persisted in looking at the other, at the old one, in scanning her
+over, in judging her, in dissecting her with my eyes; I got excited over
+her flabby cheeks, over those ridiculous dimples, that were half-filled
+up, over that treble chin, that hair which must have been dyed, those
+eyes which had no more brightness in them, and that nose which was a
+caricature of Lucy's beautiful, attractive little nose.
+
+"I had the prescience of the future. I loved her, and I should love her
+more and more every day, that little sorceress who had so despotically
+and so quickly conquered me. I should not allow any participation or any
+intrigue from the day she gave herself to me, and when once we had been
+so intimately connected, who could tell whether, just as I was defending
+myself against it most, the legitimate termination--marriage--might not
+come?
+
+"Why not give one's name to a woman whom one loves, and of whom one is
+sure? The reason was, that I should be tied to a disfigured, ugly
+creature with whom I should not venture to be seen in public, as my
+friends would leer at her with laughter in their eyes, and with pity in
+their hearts for the man who was accompanying those remains."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+"And so, as soon as the curtain had fallen, without saying good-day or
+good-evening, I had myself driven to the _Moulin Rouge_, and there I
+picked up the first woman I came across, and remained in her company
+until late next day."
+
+"Well," Florise d'Anglet exclaimed, "I shall never take Mamma to the
+theater with me again, for men are really getting too mad!"
+
+
+
+
+THE NEW SENSATION
+
+
+That little Madame d'Ormonde certainly had the devil in her, but above
+all, a fantastic, baffling brain, through which the most unheard of
+caprices passed, in which ideas danced and jostled each other, like
+those pieces of different colored glass in a kaleidoscope, which form
+such strange figures when they have been shaken, in which _Parisine_ was
+fermenting to such an extent--you know, _Parisine_, the analysis of
+which Roqueplan lately gave--that the most learned members of _The
+Institute_ would have wasted his science and his wisdom if he had tried
+to follow her slips and her subterfuges.
+
+That was, very likely, the reason why she attracted, retained and
+infatuated even those who had paid their debt to implacable love, who
+thought that they were strong and free from those passions under the
+influence of which men lose their heads, and that they were beyond the
+reach of woman's perfidious snares. Or, perhaps, it was her small, soft,
+delicate, white hands, which always smelled of some subtle, delicious
+perfume, and whose small fingers men kissed almost with devotion, almost
+with absolute pleasure. Or, was it her silky, golden hair, her large,
+blue eyes, full of enigmas, of curiosity, of desire, her changeable
+mouth, which was quite small and infantine at one moment, when she was
+pouting, and smiling and as open as a rose that is unfolding in the sun,
+when she opened it in a laugh, and showed her pearly teeth, so that it
+became a target for kisses? Who will ever be able to explain that kind
+of magic and sorcery which some _Chosen Women_ exercise over all men,
+that despotic authority, against which nobody would think of rebelling?
+
+Among the numerous men who had entreated her, who were anxiously waiting
+for that wonderful moment when her heart would beat, when his mocking
+companion would grow tired and abandon herself to the pleasure of loving
+and of being loved, would become intoxicated with the honey of caresses,
+and would no longer refuse her lips to kisses, like some restive animal
+that fears the yoke, none had so made up his mind to win the game, and
+to pursue this deceptive siege, as much as Xavier de Fontrailles. He
+marched straight for his object with a patient energy and a strength of
+will which no checks could weaken, and with the ardent fervor of a
+believer who has started on a long pilgrimage, and who supports all the
+suffering of the long journey with the fixed and consoling idea that one
+day he will be able to throw himself on his knees at the shrine where he
+wishes to worship, and to listen to the divine words which will be a
+Paradise to him.
+
+He gave way to Madame d'Ormonde's slightest whims, and did all he could
+never to bore her, never to hurt her feelings, but really to become a
+friend whom she could not do without, and of whom, in the end, a woman
+grows more jealous than she does of her husband, and to whom she
+confesses everything, her daily worries and her dreams of the future.
+
+She would very likely have suffered and wept, and have felt a great void
+in her existence if they had separated for ever, if he had disappeared,
+and she would not have hesitated to defend him, even at the risk of
+compromising herself, and of passing as his mistress, if any one had
+attacked him in her presence, and sometimes she used to say with a
+sudden laughing sadness in her voice:
+
+"If I were really capable of loving for five minutes consecutively, I
+should love you."
+
+And when they were walking in the _Bois de Boulogne_, while the Victoria
+was waiting near Armenonville, during their afternoon talks when, as he
+used to say, they were hanging over the abyss until they both grew
+giddy, and spoke of love madly and ceaselessly--returning to the subject
+constantly, and impregnating themselves with it--Madame d'Ormonde would
+occasionally produce one of her favorite theories. Yes, she certainly
+understood possession of the beloved object, that touch of madness which
+seizes you from head to foot, which makes your blood hot, and which
+makes you forget everything else in a man's embraces, in that supreme
+pleasure which overwhelms you, and which rivets two beings together for
+ever, by the heart and by the brain. But only at some unexpected moment,
+in a strange place, with a touch of something novel about it, which one
+would remember all one's life, something amusing and almost maddening,
+which one had been in search of for a long time, and which imparted a
+flavor of curry, as it were, into the common-place flavor of immorality.
+
+And Xavier de Fontrailles did all he could to discover such a place, but
+failed successively in a bachelor's lodgings with silk tapestry, like a
+boudoir of the seventeenth century, in a villa hidden like a nest among
+trees and rose bushes, with a Japanese house furnished in an
+extraordinary fashion and very expensively, with latticed windows from
+which one could see the sea, in an old melancholy palace, from which one
+could see the Grand Canal, in rooms, in hotels, in queer quarters, in
+private rooms, in restaurants, and in small country houses in the
+recesses of woods.
+
+Madame d'Ormonde went on her way without turning her head, but Xavier,
+alas! became more and more amorous, as amorous as an overgrown schoolboy
+who has never hitherto had any conversation with a woman, and who is
+amorous enough to pick up the flowers that fall from her bodice, and to
+be lost and unhappy as soon as he does not see her, or hear her soft,
+cooing voice, and see her smile....
+
+One evening, however, he had gone with her to the fair at Saint Cloud,
+and went into three shows, deafened by the noise of the organs, the
+whistling of the machinery of the round-abouts, and the hubbub of the
+crowd that came and went among the booths that were illuminated by
+paraffin lamps. As they were passing in front of a somnambulist's van,
+Monsieur de Fontrailles stopped and said to Madame d'Ormonde:
+
+"Would you like to have our fortune told?"
+
+It was a very fine specimen of its kind, and had, no doubt, been far and
+wide. Placards and portraits, bordered by advertisements, hung above the
+shaky steps, and the small windows with their closed shutters, were
+almost hidden by boxes of sweet basil and mignonette, while an old, bald
+parrot, with her feathers all ruffled, was asleep just outside.
+
+The fortune teller was sitting on a chair, quietly knitting a stocking,
+and on their approach she got up, went up to Madame d'Ormonde and said
+in an unctuous voice:
+
+"I reveal the present, the past and the future, and even the name of the
+future husband or wife, and of deceased relations, as well as my
+client's present and future circumstances. I have performed before
+crowned heads. The Emperor of Brazil came to me, with the illustrious
+poet, Victor Hugo.... My charge is five francs for telling your fortune
+from the cards or by your hand, and twenty francs for the whole lot....
+Would you like the lot, Madame?"
+
+Madame d'Ormonde gave vent to a burst of sonorous laughter, like a
+street girl, who is amusing herself, but they went in and Monsieur de
+Fontrailles opened the glass door which was covered by a heavy red
+curtain. When they got in, the young woman uttered an exclamation of
+surprise. The interior of the van was full of roses, arranged in the
+most charming manner as if for a lovers' meeting. On a table covered
+with a damask cloth, and which was surrounded by piles of cushions, a
+supper was waiting for chance comers, and at the other end, concealed by
+heavy hangings, one could see a large, wide bed, one of those beds which
+give rise to sinister suggestions!
+
+Xavier had shut the door again, and Madame d'Ormonde looked at him in a
+strange manner, with rather flushed cheeks, palpitating nostrils, and a
+look in her eyes, such as he had never seen in them before, and in a
+very low voice, while his heart beat violently, and he whispered into
+her ear:
+
+"Well, does the decoration please you this time?"
+
+She replied by holding up her lips to him, and then filled two glasses
+with extra dry champagne, which was as pale as the skin of a fair woman,
+and said almost as if she had already been rather drunk:
+
+"I am decidedly worth a big stake!"
+
+It was in this fashion that Madame d'Ormonde, for the first and last
+time, deceived her husband; and it was at the fair at Saint Cloud, in a
+somnambulist's van.
+
+
+
+***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE WORKS OF GUY DE MAUPASSANT,
+VOLUME II (OF 8)***
+
+
+******* This file should be named 17375.txt or 17375.zip *******
+
+
+This and all associated files of various formats will be found in:
+https://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/1/7/3/7/17375
+
+
+
+Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions
+will be renamed.
+
+Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no
+one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation
+(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without
+permission and without paying copyright royalties.  Special rules,
+set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to
+copying and distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to
+protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark.  Project
+Gutenberg is a registered trademark, and may not be used if you
+charge for the eBooks, unless you receive specific permission.  If you
+do not charge anything for copies of this eBook, complying with the
+rules is very easy.  You may use this eBook for nearly any purpose
+such as creation of derivative works, reports, performances and
+research.  They may be modified and printed and given away--you may do
+practically ANYTHING with public domain eBooks.  Redistribution is
+subject to the trademark license, especially commercial
+redistribution.
+
+
+
+*** START: FULL LICENSE ***
+
+THE FULL PROJECT GUTENBERG LICENSE
+PLEASE READ THIS BEFORE YOU DISTRIBUTE OR USE THIS WORK
+
+To protect the Project Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting the free
+distribution of electronic works, by using or distributing this work
+(or any other work associated in any way with the phrase "Project
+Gutenberg"), you agree to comply with all the terms of the Full Project
+Gutenberg-tm License (available with this file or online at
+https://gutenberg.org/license).
+
+
+Section 1.  General Terms of Use and Redistributing Project Gutenberg-tm
+electronic works
+
+1.A.  By reading or using any part of this Project Gutenberg-tm
+electronic work, you indicate that you have read, understand, agree to
+and accept all the terms of this license and intellectual property
+(trademark/copyright) agreement.  If you do not agree to abide by all
+the terms of this agreement, you must cease using and return or destroy
+all copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in your possession.
+If you paid a fee for obtaining a copy of or access to a Project
+Gutenberg-tm electronic work and you do not agree to be bound by the
+terms of this agreement, you may obtain a refund from the person or
+entity to whom you paid the fee as set forth in paragraph 1.E.8.
+
+1.B.  "Project Gutenberg" is a registered trademark.  It may only be
+used on or associated in any way with an electronic work by people who
+agree to be bound by the terms of this agreement.  There are a few
+things that you can do with most Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works
+even without complying with the full terms of this agreement.  See
+paragraph 1.C below.  There are a lot of things you can do with Project
+Gutenberg-tm electronic works if you follow the terms of this agreement
+and help preserve free future access to Project Gutenberg-tm electronic
+works.  See paragraph 1.E below.
+
+1.C.  The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation ("the Foundation"
+or PGLAF), owns a compilation copyright in the collection of Project
+Gutenberg-tm electronic works.  Nearly all the individual works in the
+collection are in the public domain in the United States.  If an
+individual work is in the public domain in the United States and you are
+located in the United States, we do not claim a right to prevent you from
+copying, distributing, performing, displaying or creating derivative
+works based on the work as long as all references to Project Gutenberg
+are removed.  Of course, we hope that you will support the Project
+Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting free access to electronic works by
+freely sharing Project Gutenberg-tm works in compliance with the terms of
+this agreement for keeping the Project Gutenberg-tm name associated with
+the work.  You can easily comply with the terms of this agreement by
+keeping this work in the same format with its attached full Project
+Gutenberg-tm License when you share it without charge with others.
+
+1.D.  The copyright laws of the place where you are located also govern
+what you can do with this work.  Copyright laws in most countries are in
+a constant state of change.  If you are outside the United States, check
+the laws of your country in addition to the terms of this agreement
+before downloading, copying, displaying, performing, distributing or
+creating derivative works based on this work or any other Project
+Gutenberg-tm work.  The Foundation makes no representations concerning
+the copyright status of any work in any country outside the United
+States.
+
+1.E.  Unless you have removed all references to Project Gutenberg:
+
+1.E.1.  The following sentence, with active links to, or other immediate
+access to, the full Project Gutenberg-tm License must appear prominently
+whenever any copy of a Project Gutenberg-tm work (any work on which the
+phrase "Project Gutenberg" appears, or with which the phrase "Project
+Gutenberg" is associated) is accessed, displayed, performed, viewed,
+copied or distributed:
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+1.E.2.  If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is derived
+from the public domain (does not contain a notice indicating that it is
+posted with permission of the copyright holder), the work can be copied
+and distributed to anyone in the United States without paying any fees
+or charges.  If you are redistributing or providing access to a work
+with the phrase "Project Gutenberg" associated with or appearing on the
+work, you must comply either with the requirements of paragraphs 1.E.1
+through 1.E.7 or obtain permission for the use of the work and the
+Project Gutenberg-tm trademark as set forth in paragraphs 1.E.8 or
+1.E.9.
+
+1.E.3.  If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is posted
+with the permission of the copyright holder, your use and distribution
+must comply with both paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 and any additional
+terms imposed by the copyright holder.  Additional terms will be linked
+to the Project Gutenberg-tm License for all works posted with the
+permission of the copyright holder found at the beginning of this work.
+
+1.E.4.  Do not unlink or detach or remove the full Project Gutenberg-tm
+License terms from this work, or any files containing a part of this
+work or any other work associated with Project Gutenberg-tm.
+
+1.E.5.  Do not copy, display, perform, distribute or redistribute this
+electronic work, or any part of this electronic work, without
+prominently displaying the sentence set forth in paragraph 1.E.1 with
+active links or immediate access to the full terms of the Project
+Gutenberg-tm License.
+
+1.E.6.  You may convert to and distribute this work in any binary,
+compressed, marked up, nonproprietary or proprietary form, including any
+word processing or hypertext form.  However, if you provide access to or
+distribute copies of a Project Gutenberg-tm work in a format other than
+"Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other format used in the official version
+posted on the official Project Gutenberg-tm web site (www.gutenberg.org),
+you must, at no additional cost, fee or expense to the user, provide a
+copy, a means of exporting a copy, or a means of obtaining a copy upon
+request, of the work in its original "Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other
+form.  Any alternate format must include the full Project Gutenberg-tm
+License as specified in paragraph 1.E.1.
+
+1.E.7.  Do not charge a fee for access to, viewing, displaying,
+performing, copying or distributing any Project Gutenberg-tm works
+unless you comply with paragraph 1.E.8 or 1.E.9.
+
+1.E.8.  You may charge a reasonable fee for copies of or providing
+access to or distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works provided
+that
+
+- You pay a royalty fee of 20% of the gross profits you derive from
+     the use of Project Gutenberg-tm works calculated using the method
+     you already use to calculate your applicable taxes.  The fee is
+     owed to the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark, but he
+     has agreed to donate royalties under this paragraph to the
+     Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation.  Royalty payments
+     must be paid within 60 days following each date on which you
+     prepare (or are legally required to prepare) your periodic tax
+     returns.  Royalty payments should be clearly marked as such and
+     sent to the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation at the
+     address specified in Section 4, "Information about donations to
+     the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation."
+
+- You provide a full refund of any money paid by a user who notifies
+     you in writing (or by e-mail) within 30 days of receipt that s/he
+     does not agree to the terms of the full Project Gutenberg-tm
+     License.  You must require such a user to return or
+     destroy all copies of the works possessed in a physical medium
+     and discontinue all use of and all access to other copies of
+     Project Gutenberg-tm works.
+
+- You provide, in accordance with paragraph 1.F.3, a full refund of any
+     money paid for a work or a replacement copy, if a defect in the
+     electronic work is discovered and reported to you within 90 days
+     of receipt of the work.
+
+- You comply with all other terms of this agreement for free
+     distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm works.
+
+1.E.9.  If you wish to charge a fee or distribute a Project Gutenberg-tm
+electronic work or group of works on different terms than are set
+forth in this agreement, you must obtain permission in writing from
+both the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation and Michael
+Hart, the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark.  Contact the
+Foundation as set forth in Section 3 below.
+
+1.F.
+
+1.F.1.  Project Gutenberg volunteers and employees expend considerable
+effort to identify, do copyright research on, transcribe and proofread
+public domain works in creating the Project Gutenberg-tm
+collection.  Despite these efforts, Project Gutenberg-tm electronic
+works, and the medium on which they may be stored, may contain
+"Defects," such as, but not limited to, incomplete, inaccurate or
+corrupt data, transcription errors, a copyright or other intellectual
+property infringement, a defective or damaged disk or other medium, a
+computer virus, or computer codes that damage or cannot be read by
+your equipment.
+
+1.F.2.  LIMITED WARRANTY, DISCLAIMER OF DAMAGES - Except for the "Right
+of Replacement or Refund" described in paragraph 1.F.3, the Project
+Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation, the owner of the Project
+Gutenberg-tm trademark, and any other party distributing a Project
+Gutenberg-tm electronic work under this agreement, disclaim all
+liability to you for damages, costs and expenses, including legal
+fees.  YOU AGREE THAT YOU HAVE NO REMEDIES FOR NEGLIGENCE, STRICT
+LIABILITY, BREACH OF WARRANTY OR BREACH OF CONTRACT EXCEPT THOSE
+PROVIDED IN PARAGRAPH F3.  YOU AGREE THAT THE FOUNDATION, THE
+TRADEMARK OWNER, AND ANY DISTRIBUTOR UNDER THIS AGREEMENT WILL NOT BE
+LIABLE TO YOU FOR ACTUAL, DIRECT, INDIRECT, CONSEQUENTIAL, PUNITIVE OR
+INCIDENTAL DAMAGES EVEN IF YOU GIVE NOTICE OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH
+DAMAGE.
+
+1.F.3.  LIMITED RIGHT OF REPLACEMENT OR REFUND - If you discover a
+defect in this electronic work within 90 days of receiving it, you can
+receive a refund of the money (if any) you paid for it by sending a
+written explanation to the person you received the work from.  If you
+received the work on a physical medium, you must return the medium with
+your written explanation.  The person or entity that provided you with
+the defective work may elect to provide a replacement copy in lieu of a
+refund.  If you received the work electronically, the person or entity
+providing it to you may choose to give you a second opportunity to
+receive the work electronically in lieu of a refund.  If the second copy
+is also defective, you may demand a refund in writing without further
+opportunities to fix the problem.
+
+1.F.4.  Except for the limited right of replacement or refund set forth
+in paragraph 1.F.3, this work is provided to you 'AS-IS', WITH NO OTHER
+WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO
+WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTIBILITY OR FITNESS FOR ANY PURPOSE.
+
+1.F.5.  Some states do not allow disclaimers of certain implied
+warranties or the exclusion or limitation of certain types of damages.
+If any disclaimer or limitation set forth in this agreement violates the
+law of the state applicable to this agreement, the agreement shall be
+interpreted to make the maximum disclaimer or limitation permitted by
+the applicable state law.  The invalidity or unenforceability of any
+provision of this agreement shall not void the remaining provisions.
+
+1.F.6.  INDEMNITY - You agree to indemnify and hold the Foundation, the
+trademark owner, any agent or employee of the Foundation, anyone
+providing copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in accordance
+with this agreement, and any volunteers associated with the production,
+promotion and distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works,
+harmless from all liability, costs and expenses, including legal fees,
+that arise directly or indirectly from any of the following which you do
+or cause to occur: (a) distribution of this or any Project Gutenberg-tm
+work, (b) alteration, modification, or additions or deletions to any
+Project Gutenberg-tm work, and (c) any Defect you cause.
+
+
+Section  2.  Information about the Mission of Project Gutenberg-tm
+
+Project Gutenberg-tm is synonymous with the free distribution of
+electronic works in formats readable by the widest variety of computers
+including obsolete, old, middle-aged and new computers.  It exists
+because of the efforts of hundreds of volunteers and donations from
+people in all walks of life.
+
+Volunteers and financial support to provide volunteers with the
+assistance they need, is critical to reaching Project Gutenberg-tm's
+goals and ensuring that the Project Gutenberg-tm collection will
+remain freely available for generations to come.  In 2001, the Project
+Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation was created to provide a secure
+and permanent future for Project Gutenberg-tm and future generations.
+To learn more about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation
+and how your efforts and donations can help, see Sections 3 and 4
+and the Foundation web page at https://www.gutenberg.org/fundraising/pglaf.
+
+
+Section 3.  Information about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive
+Foundation
+
+The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation is a non profit
+501(c)(3) educational corporation organized under the laws of the
+state of Mississippi and granted tax exempt status by the Internal
+Revenue Service.  The Foundation's EIN or federal tax identification
+number is 64-6221541.  Contributions to the Project Gutenberg
+Literary Archive Foundation are tax deductible to the full extent
+permitted by U.S. federal laws and your state's laws.
+
+The Foundation's principal office is located at 4557 Melan Dr. S.
+Fairbanks, AK, 99712., but its volunteers and employees are scattered
+throughout numerous locations.  Its business office is located at
+809 North 1500 West, Salt Lake City, UT 84116, (801) 596-1887, email
+business@pglaf.org.  Email contact links and up to date contact
+information can be found at the Foundation's web site and official
+page at https://www.gutenberg.org/about/contact
+
+For additional contact information:
+     Dr. Gregory B. Newby
+     Chief Executive and Director
+     gbnewby@pglaf.org
+
+Section 4.  Information about Donations to the Project Gutenberg
+Literary Archive Foundation
+
+Project Gutenberg-tm depends upon and cannot survive without wide
+spread public support and donations to carry out its mission of
+increasing the number of public domain and licensed works that can be
+freely distributed in machine readable form accessible by the widest
+array of equipment including outdated equipment.  Many small donations
+($1 to $5,000) are particularly important to maintaining tax exempt
+status with the IRS.
+
+The Foundation is committed to complying with the laws regulating
+charities and charitable donations in all 50 states of the United
+States.  Compliance requirements are not uniform and it takes a
+considerable effort, much paperwork and many fees to meet and keep up
+with these requirements.  We do not solicit donations in locations
+where we have not received written confirmation of compliance.  To
+SEND DONATIONS or determine the status of compliance for any
+particular state visit https://www.gutenberg.org/fundraising/donate
+
+While we cannot and do not solicit contributions from states where we
+have not met the solicitation requirements, we know of no prohibition
+against accepting unsolicited donations from donors in such states who
+approach us with offers to donate.
+
+International donations are gratefully accepted, but we cannot make
+any statements concerning tax treatment of donations received from
+outside the United States.  U.S. laws alone swamp our small staff.
+
+Please check the Project Gutenberg Web pages for current donation
+methods and addresses.  Donations are accepted in a number of other
+ways including including checks, online payments and credit card
+donations.  To donate, please visit:
+https://www.gutenberg.org/fundraising/donate
+
+
+Section 5.  General Information About Project Gutenberg-tm electronic
+works.
+
+Professor Michael S. Hart was the originator of the Project Gutenberg-tm
+concept of a library of electronic works that could be freely shared
+with anyone.  For thirty years, he produced and distributed Project
+Gutenberg-tm eBooks with only a loose network of volunteer support.
+
+Project Gutenberg-tm eBooks are often created from several printed
+editions, all of which are confirmed as Public Domain in the U.S.
+unless a copyright notice is included.  Thus, we do not necessarily
+keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper edition.
+
+Most people start at our Web site which has the main PG search facility:
+
+     https://www.gutenberg.org
+
+This Web site includes information about Project Gutenberg-tm,
+including how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary
+Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to
+subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks.
+