Camille (La Dame aux Camilias)
except Prudence and Julie Duprat, of whom I have spoken to you, and to
whom Marguerite was afterward to give the touching narrative that I
have there.
I passed whole days at the feet of my mistress. We opened the windows
upon the garden, and, as we watched the summer ripening in its flowers
and under the shadow of the trees, we breathed together that true life
which neither Marguerite nor I had ever known before.
Her delight in the smallest things was like that of a child. There were
days when she ran in the garden, like a child of ten, after a butterfly
or a dragon-fly. This courtesan who had cost more money in bouquets
than would have kept a whole family in comfort, would sometimes sit on
the grass for an hour, examining the simple flower whose name she bore.
It was at this time that she read Manon Lescaut, over and over again. I
found her several times making notes in the book, and she always
declared that when a woman loves, she can not do as Manon did.
The duke wrote to her two or three times. She recognised the writing
and gave me the letters without reading them. Sometimes the terms of
these letters brought tears to my eyes. He had imagined that by closing
his purse to Marguerite, he would bring her back to him; but when he
had perceived the uselessness of these means, he could hold out no
longer; he wrote and asked that he might see her again, as before, no
matter on what conditions.
I read these urgent and repeated letters, and tore them in pieces,
without telling Marguerite what they contained and without advising her
to see the old man again, though I was half inclined to, so much did I
pity him, but I was afraid lest, if I so advised her she should think
that I wished the duke, not merely to come and see her again, but to
take over the expenses of the house; I feared, above all, that she
might think me capable of shirking the responsibilities of every
consequence to which her love for me might lead her.
It thus came about that the duke, receiving no reply, ceased to write,
and that Marguerite and I continued to live together without giving a
thought to the future.
Chapter XVIII
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 anyone 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?”
“I.”
“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