Camille (La Dame aux Camilias)
“And what is this plan?”
“I can’t tell you yet, but I can tell you what the result would be. The
result would be that in a month I should be free, I should have no more
debts, and we could go and spend the summer in the country.”
“And you can’t tell me by what means?”
“No, only love me as I love you, and all will succeed.”
“And have you made this plan all by yourself?”
“Yes.”
“And you will carry it out all by yourself?”
“I alone shall have the trouble of it,” said Marguerite, with a smile
which I shall never forget, “but we shall both partake its benefits.”
I could not help flushing at the word benefits; I thought of Manon
Lescaut squandering with Desgrieux the money of M. de B.
I replied in a hard voice, rising from my seat:
“You must permit me, my dear Marguerite, to share only the benefits of
those enterprises which I have conceived and carried out myself.”
“What does that mean?”
“It means that I have a strong suspicion that M. de G. is to be your
associate in this pretty plan, of which I can accept neither the cost
nor the benefits.”
“What a child you are! I thought you loved me. I was mistaken; all
right.”
She rose, opened the piano and began to play the “Invitation à la
Valse”, as far as the famous passage in the major which always stopped
her. Was it through force of habit, or was it to remind me of the day
when we first met? All I know is that the melody brought back that
recollection, and, coming up to her, I took her head between my hands
and kissed her. “You forgive me?” I said.
“You see I do,” she answered; “but observe that we are only at our
second day, and already I have had to forgive you something. Is this
how you keep your promise of blind obedience?”
“What can I do, Marguerite? I love you too much and I am jealous of the
least of your thoughts. What you proposed to me just now made me
frantic with delight, but the mystery in its carrying out hurts me
dreadfully.”
“Come, let us reason it out,” she said, taking both my hands and
looking at me with a charming smile which it was impossible to resist,
“You love me, do you not? and you would gladly spend two or three
months alone with me in the country? I too should be glad of this
_solitude à deux_, and not only glad of it, but my health requires it.
I can not leave Paris for such a length of time without putting my
affairs in order, and the affairs of a woman like me are always in
great confusion; well, I have found a way to reconcile everything, my
money affairs and my love for you; yes, for you, don’t laugh; I am
silly enough to love you! And here you are taking lordly airs and
talking big words. Child, thrice child, only remember that I love you,
and don’t let anything disturb you. Now, is it agreed?”
“I agree to all you wish, as you know.”
“Then, in less than a month’s time we shall be in some village, walking
by the river side, and drinking milk. Does it seem strange that
Marguerite Gautier should speak to you like that? The fact is, my
friend, that when this Paris life, which seems to make me so happy,
doesn’t burn me, it wearies me, and then I have sudden aspirations
toward a calmer existence which might recall my childhood. One has
always had a childhood, whatever one becomes. Don’t be alarmed; I am
not going to tell you that I am the daughter of a colonel on half-pay,
and that I was brought up at Saint-Denis. I am a poor country girl, and
six years ago I could not write my own name. You are relieved, aren’t
you? Why is it you are the first whom I have ever asked to share the
joy of this desire of mine? I suppose because I feel that you love me
for myself and not for yourself, while all the others have only loved
me for themselves.
“I have often been in the country, but never as I should like to go
there. I count on you for this easy happiness; do not be unkind, let me
have it. Say this to yourself: ‘She will never live to be old, and I
should some day be sorry for not having done for her the first thing
she asked of me, such an easy thing to do!’”
What could I reply to such words, especially with the memory of a first
night of love, and in the expectation of a second?
An hour later I held Marguerite in my arms, and, if she had asked me to
commit a crime, I would have obeyed her.
At six in the morning I left her, and before leaving her I said: “Till
to-night!” She kissed me more warmly than ever, but said nothing.
During the day I received a note containing these words:
“DEAR CHILD: I am not very well, and the doctor has ordered quiet. I
shall go to bed early to-night and shall not see you. But, to make up,
I shall expect you to-morrow at twelve. I love you.”
My first thought was: She is deceiving me!
A cold sweat broke out on my forehead, for I already loved this woman
too much not to be overwhelmed by the suspicion. And yet, I was bound
to expect such a thing almost any day with Marguerite, and it had
happened to me often enough with my other mistresses, without my taking
much notice of it. What was the meaning of the hold which this woman
had taken upon my life?
Then it occurred to me, since I had the key, to go and see her as
usual. In this way I should soon know the truth, and if I found a man
there I would strike him in the face.
Meanwhile I went to the Champs-Elysées. I waited there four hours. She
did not appear. At night I went into all the theatres where she was
accustomed to go. She was in none of them.
At eleven o’clock I went to the Rue d’Antin. There was no light in
Marguerite’s windows. All the same, I rang. The porter asked me where I
was going.
“To Mlle. Gautier’s,” I said.
“She has not come in.”
“I will go up and wait for her.”
“There is no one there.”
Evidently I could get in, since I had the key, but, fearing foolish
scandal, I went away. Only I did not return home; I could not leave the
street, and I never took my eyes off Marguerite’s house. It seemed to
me that there was still something to be found out, or at least that my
suspicions were about to be confirmed.
About midnight a carriage that I knew well stopped before No. 9. The
Comte de G. got down and entered the house, after sending away the
carriage. For a moment I hoped that the same answer would be given to
him as to me, and that I should see him come out; but at four o’clock
in the morning I was still awaiting him.
I have suffered deeply during these last three weeks, but that is
nothing, I think, in comparison with what I suffered that night.
Chapter XIV
When I reached home I began to cry like a child. There is no man to
whom a woman has not been unfaithful, once at least, and who will not
know what I suffered.
I said to myself, under the weight of these feverish resolutions which
one always feels as if one had the force to carry out, that I must
break with my amour at once, and I waited impatiently for daylight in
order to set out forthwith to rejoin my father and my sister, of whose
love at least I was certain, and certain that that love would never be
betrayed.
However, I did not wish to go away without letting Marguerite know why
I went. Only a man who really cares no more for his mistress leaves her
without writing to her. I made and remade twenty letters in my head. I
had had to do with a woman like all other women of the kind. I had been
poetizing too much. She had treated me like a school-boy, she had used
in deceiving me a trick which was insultingly simple. My self-esteem
got the upper hand. I must leave this woman without giving her the
satisfaction of knowing that she had made me suffer, and this is what I
wrote to her in my most elegant handwriting and with tears of rage and
sorrow in my eyes:
“MY DEAR MARGUERITE: I hope that your indisposition yesterday was not
serious. I came, at eleven at night, to ask after you, and was told
that you had not come in. M. de G. was more fortunate, for he presented
himself shortly afterward, and at four in the morning he had not left.
“Forgive me for the few tedious hours that I have given you, and be
assured that I shall never forget the happy moments which I owe to you.
“I should have called to-day to ask after you, but I intend going back
to my father’s.
“Good-bye, my dear Marguerite. I am not rich enough to love you as I
would nor poor enough to love you as you would. Let us then forget, you
a name which must be indifferent enough to you, I a happiness which has
become impossible.
“I send back your key, which I have never used, and which might be
useful to you, if you are often ill as you were yesterday.”
As you will see, I was unable to end my letter without a touch of
impertinent irony, which proved how much in love I still was.
I read and reread this letter ten times over; then the thought of the
pain it would give to Marguerite calmed me a little. I tried to
persuade myself of the feelings which it professed; and when my servant
came to my room at eight o’clock, I gave it to him and told him to take
it at once.
“Shall I wait for an answer?” asked Joseph (my servant, like all
servants, was called Joseph).
“If they ask whether there is a reply, you will say that you don’t
know, and wait.”
I buoyed myself up with the hope that she would reply. Poor, feeble
creatures that we are! All the time that my servant was away I was in a
state of extreme agitation. At one moment I would recall how Marguerite
had given herself to me, and ask myself by what right I wrote her an
impertinent letter, when she could reply that it was not M. de G. who
supplanted me, but I who had supplanted M. de G.: a mode of reasoning
which permits many women to have many lovers. At another moment I would
recall her promises, and endeavour to convince myself that my letter
was only too gentle, and that there were not expressions forcible
enough to punish a woman who laughed at a love like mine. Then I said
to myself that I should have done better not to have written to her,
but to have gone to see her, and that then I should have had the
pleasure of seeing the tears that she would shed. Finally, I asked
myself what she would reply to me; already prepared to believe whatever
excuse she made.
Joseph returned.
“Well?” I said to him.
“Sir,” said he, “madame was not up, and still asleep, but as soon as
she rings the letter will be taken to her, and if there is any reply it
will be sent.”
She was asleep!
Twenty times I was on the point of sending to get the letter back, but
every time I said to myself: “Perhaps she will have got it already, and
it would look as if I have repented of sending it.”
As the hour at which it seemed likely that she would reply came nearer,
I regretted more and more that I had written. The clock struck, ten,
eleven, twelve. At twelve I was on the point of keeping the appointment
as if nothing had happened. In the end I could see no way out of the
circle of fire which closed upon me.
Then I began to believe, with the superstition which people have when
they are waiting, that if I went out for a little while, I should find
an answer when I got back. I went out under the pretext of going to
lunch.
Instead of lunching at the Café Foy, at the corner of the Boulevard, as
I usually did, I preferred to go to the Palais Royal and so pass
through the Rue d’Antin. Every time that I saw a woman at a distance, I
fancied it was Nanine bringing me an answer. I passed through the Rue
d’Antin without even coming across a commissionaire. I went to Very’s
in the Palais Royal. The waiter gave me something to eat, or rather
served up to me whatever he liked, for I ate nothing. In spite of
myself, my eyes were constantly fixed on the clock. I returned home,
certain that I should find a letter from Marguerite.
The porter had received nothing, but I still hoped in my servant. He