Chapter 18
It would be difficult to give you all the details of our new
life. It was made up of a series of little childish events,
charming for us but insignificant to any one else. You know what
it is to be in love with a woman, you know how it cuts short the
days, and with what loving listlessness one drifts into the
morrow. You know that forgetfulness of everything which comes of
a violent confident, reciprocated love. Every being who is not
the beloved one seems a useless being in creation. One regrets
having cast scraps of one's heart to other women, and one can not
believe in the possibility of ever pressing another hand than
that which one holds between one's hands. The mind admits neither
work nor remembrance; nothing, in short, which can distract it
from the one thought in which it is ceaselessly absorbed. Every
day one discovers in one's mistress a new charm and unknown
delights. Existence itself is but the unceasing accomplishment of
an unchanging desire; the soul is but the vestal charged to feed
the sacred fire of love.
We often went at night-time to sit in the little wood above the
house; there we listened to the cheerful harmonies of evening,
both of us thinking of the coming hours which should leave us to
one another till the dawn of day. At other times we did not get
up all day; we did not even let the sunlight enter our room.
The curtains were hermetically closed, and for a moment the
external world did not exist for us. Nanine alone had the right
to open our door, but only to bring in our meals and even these
we took without getting up, interrupting them with laughter and
gaiety. To that succeeded a brief sleep, for, disappearing into
the depths of our love, we were like two divers who only come to
the surface to take breath.
Nevertheless, I surprised moments of sadness, even tears, in
Marguerite; I asked her the cause of her trouble, and she
answered:
"Our love is not like other loves, my Armand. You love me as if I
had never belonged to another, and I tremble lest later on,
repenting of your love, and accusing me of my past, you should
let me fall back into that life from which you have taken me. I
think that now that I have tasted of another life, I should die
if I went back to the old one. Tell me that you will never leave
me!"
"I swear it!"
At these words she looked at me as if to read in my eyes whether
my oath was sincere; then flung herself into my arms, and, hiding
her head in my bosom, said to me: "You don't know how much I love
you!"
One evening, seated on the balcony outside the window, we looked
at the moon which seemed to rise with difficulty out of its bed
of clouds, and we listened to the wind violently rustling the
trees; we held each other's hands, and for a whole quarter of an
hour we had not spoken, when Marguerite said to me:
"Winter is at hand. Would you like for us to go abroad?"
"Where?"
"To Italy."
"You are tired of here?"
"I am afraid of the winter; I am particularly afraid of your
return to Paris."
"Why?"
"For many reasons."
And she went on abruptly, without giving me her reasons for
fears:
"Will you go abroad? I will sell all that I have; we will go and
live there, and there will be nothing left of what I was; no one
will know who I am. Will you?"
"By all means, if you like, Marguerite, let us travel," I said.
"But where is the necessity of selling things which you will be
glad of when we return? I have not a large enough fortune to
accept such a sacrifice; but I have enough for us to be able to
travel splendidly for five or six months, if that will amuse you
the least in the world."
"After all, no," she said, leaving the window and going to sit
down on the sofa at the other end of the room. "Why should we
spend money abroad? I cost you enough already, here."
"You reproach me, Marguerite; it isn't generous."
"Forgive me, my friend," she said, giving me her hand. "This
thunder weather gets on my nerves; I do not say what I intend to
say."
And after embracing me she fell into a long reverie.
Scenes of this kind often took place, and though I could not
discover their cause, I could not fail to see in Marguerite signs
of disquietude in regard to the future. She could not doubt my
love, which increased day by day, and yet I often found her sad,
without being able to get any explanation of the reason, except
some physical cause. Fearing that so monotonous a life was
beginning to weary her, I proposed returning to Paris; but she
always refused, assuring me that she could not be so happy
anywhere as in the country.
Prudence now came but rarely; but she often wrote letters which I
never asked to see, though, every time they came, they seemed to
preoccupy Marguerite deeply. I did not know what to think.
One day Marguerite was in her room. I entered. She was writing.
"To whom are you writing?" I asked. "To Prudence. Do you want to
see what I am writing?"
I had a horror of anything that might look like suspicion, and I
answered that I had no desire to know what she was writing; and
yet I was certain that letter would have explained to me the
cause of her sadness.
Next day the weather was splendid.' Marguerite proposed to me to
take the boat and go as far as the island of Croissy. She seemed
very cheerful; when we got back it was five o'clock.
"Mme. Duvernoy has been here," said Nanine, as she saw us enter.
"She has gone again?" asked Marguerite.
"Yes, madame, in the carriage; she said it was arranged."
"Quite right," said Marguerite sharply. "Serve the dinner."
Two days afterward there came a letter from Prudence, and for a
fortnight Marguerite seemed to have got rid of her mysterious
gloom, for which she constantly asked my forgiveness, now that it
no longer existed. Still, the carriage did not return.
"How is it that Prudence does not send you back your carriage?" I
asked one day.
"One of the horses is ill, and there are some repairs to be done.
It is better to have that done while we are here, and don't need
a carriage, than to wait till we get back to Paris."
Prudence came two days afterward, and confirmed what Marguerite
had said. The two women went for a walk in the garden, and when I
joined them they changed the conversation. That night, as she was
going, Prudence complained of the cold and asked Marguerite to
lend her a shawl.
So a month passed, and all the time Marguerite was more joyous
and more affectionate than she ever had been. Nevertheless, the
carriage did not return, the shawl had not been sent back, and I
began to be anxious in spite of myself, and as I knew in which
drawer Marguerite put Prudence's letters, I took advantage of a
moment when she was at the other end of the garden, went to the
drawer, and tried to open it; in vain, for it was locked. When I
opened the drawer in which the trinkets and diamonds were usually
kept, these opened without resistance, but the jewel cases had
disappeared, along with their contents no doubt.
A sharp fear penetrated my heart. I might indeed ask Marguerite
for the truth in regard to these disappearances, but it was
certain that she would not confess it.
"My good Marguerite," I said to her, "I am going to ask your
permission to go to Paris. They do not know my address, and I
expect there are letters from my father waiting for me. I have no
doubt he is concerned; I ought to answer him."
"Go, my friend," she said; "but be back early." I went straight
to Prudence.
"Come," said I, without beating about the bush, "tell me frankly,
where are Marguerite's horses?"
"Sold."
"The shawl?"
"Sold."
"The diamonds?"
"Pawned."
"And who has sold and pawned them?"
"Why did you not tell me?"
"Because Marguerite made me promise not to."
"And why did you not ask me for money?"
"Because she wouldn't let me."
"And where has this money gone?"
"In payments."
"Is she much in debt?"
"Thirty thousand francs, or thereabouts. Ah, my dear fellow,
didn't I tell you? You wouldn't believe me; now you are
convinced. The upholsterer whom the duke had agreed to settle
with was shown out of the house when he presented himself, and
the duke wrote next day to say that he would answer for nothing
in regard to Mlle. Gautier. This man wanted his money; he was
given part payment out of the few thousand francs that I got from
you; then some kind souls warned him that his debtor had been
abandoned by the duke and was living with a penniless young man;
the other creditors were told the same; they asked for their
money, and seized some of the goods. Marguerite wanted to sell
everything, but it was too late, and besides I should have
opposed it. But it was necessary to pay, and in order not to ask
you for money, she sold her horses and her shawls, and pawned her
jewels. Would you like to see the receipts and the pawn tickets?"
And Prudence opened the drawer and showed me the papers.
"Ah, you think," she continued, with the insistence of a woman
who can say, I was right after all, "ah, you think it is enough
to be in love, and to go into the country and lead a dreamy,
pastoral life. No, my friend, no. By the side of that ideal life,
there is a material life, and the purest resolutions are held to
earth by threads which seem slight enough, but which are of iron,
not easily to be broken. If Marguerite has not been unfaithful to
you twenty times, it is because she has an exceptional nature. It
is not my fault for not advising her to, for I couldn't bear to
see the poor girl stripping herself of everything. She wouldn't;
she replied that she loved you, and she wouldn't be unfaithful to
you for anything in the world. All that is very pretty, very
poetical, but one can't pay one's creditors in that coin, and now
she can't free herself from debt, unless she can raise thirty
thousand francs."
"All right, I will provide that amount."
"You will borrow it?"
"Good heavens! Why, yes!"
"A fine thing that will be to do; you will fall out with your
father, cripple your resources, and one doesn't find thirty
thousand francs from one day to another. Believe me, my dear
Armand, I know women better than you do; do not commit this
folly; you will be sorry for it one day. Be reasonable. I don't
advise you to leave Marguerite, but live with her as you did at
the beginning. Let her find the means to get out of this
difficulty. The duke will come back in a little while. The Comte
de N., if she would take him, he told me yesterday even, would
pay all her debts, and give her four or five thousand francs a
month. He has two hundred thousand a year. It would be a position
for her, while you will certainly be obliged to leave her. Don't
wait till you are ruined, especially as the Comte de N. is a
fool, and nothing would prevent your still being Marguerite's
lover. She would cry a little at the beginning, but she would
come to accustom herself to it, and you would thank me one day
for what you had done. Imagine that Marguerite is married, and
deceive the husband; that is all. I have already told you all
this once, only at that time it was merely advice, and now it is
almost a necessity."
What Prudence said was cruelly true.
"This is how it is," she went on, putting away the papers she had
just shown me; "women like Marguerite always foresee that some
one will love them, never that they will love; otherwise they
would put aside money, and at thirty they could afford the luxury
of having a lover for nothing. If I had only known once what I
know now! In short, say nothing to Marguerite, and bring her back
to Paris. You have lived with her alone for four or five months;
that is quite enough. Shut your eyes now; that is all that any
one asks of you. At the end of a fortnight she will take the
Comte de N., and she will save up during the winter, and next
summer you will begin over again. That is how things are done, my
dear fellow!"
And Prudence appeared to be enchanted with her advice, which I
refused indignantly.
Not only my love and my dignity would not let me act thus, but I
was certain that, feeling as she did now, Marguerite would die
rather than accept another lover.
"Enough joking," I said to Prudence; "tell me exactly how much
Marguerite is in need of."
"I have told you: thirty thousand francs."
"And when does she require this sum?"
"Before the end of two months."
"She shall have it."
Prudence shrugged her shoulders.
"I will give it to you," I continued, "but you must swear to me
that you will not tell Marguerite that I have given it to you."
"Don't be afraid."
"And if she sends you anything else to sell or pawn, let me
know."
"There is no danger. She has nothing left."
I went straight to my own house to see if there were any letters
from my father. There were four.
