The Awakening, and Selected Short Stories
for whatever crumbs of sympathy and comfort she might be pleased to
vouchsafe.
Mrs. Pontellier liked to sit and gaze at her fair companion as she
might look upon a faultless Madonna.
“Could any one fathom the cruelty beneath that fair exterior?” murmured
Robert. “She knew that I adored her once, and she let me adore her. It
was ‘Robert, come; go; stand up; sit down; do this; do that; see if the
baby sleeps; my thimble, please, that I left God knows where. Come and
read Daudet to me while I sew.’”
“_Par exemple!_ I never had to ask. You were always there under my
feet, like a troublesome cat.”
“You mean like an adoring dog. And just as soon as Ratignolle appeared
on the scene, then it _was_ like a dog. ‘_Passez! Adieu! Allez
vous-en!_’”
“Perhaps I feared to make Alphonse jealous,” she interjoined, with
excessive naïveté. That made them all laugh. The right hand jealous of
the left! The heart jealous of the soul! But for that matter, the
Creole husband is never jealous; with him the gangrene passion is one
which has become dwarfed by disuse.
Meanwhile Robert, addressing Mrs Pontellier, continued to tell of his
one time hopeless passion for Madame Ratignolle; of sleepless nights,
of consuming flames till the very sea sizzled when he took his daily
plunge. While the lady at the needle kept up a little running,
contemptuous comment:
“_Blagueur—farceur—gros bête, va!_”
He never assumed this seriocomic tone when alone with Mrs. Pontellier.
She never knew precisely what to make of it; at that moment it was
impossible for her to guess how much of it was jest and what proportion
was earnest. It was understood that he had often spoken words of love
to Madame Ratignolle, without any thought of being taken seriously.
Mrs. Pontellier was glad he had not assumed a similar role toward
herself. It would have been unacceptable and annoying.
Mrs. Pontellier had brought her sketching materials, which she
sometimes dabbled with in an unprofessional way. She liked the
dabbling. She felt in it satisfaction of a kind which no other
employment afforded her.
She had long wished to try herself on Madame Ratignolle. Never had that
lady seemed a more tempting subject than at that moment, seated there
like some sensuous Madonna, with the gleam of the fading day enriching
her splendid color.
Robert crossed over and seated himself upon the step below Mrs.
Pontellier, that he might watch her work. She handled her brushes with
a certain ease and freedom which came, not from long and close
acquaintance with them, but from a natural aptitude. Robert followed
her work with close attention, giving forth little ejaculatory
expressions of appreciation in French, which he addressed to Madame
Ratignolle.
“_Mais ce n’est pas mal! Elle s’y connait, elle a de la force, oui._”
During his oblivious attention he once quietly rested his head against
Mrs. Pontellier’s arm. As gently she repulsed him. Once again he
repeated the offense. She could not but believe it to be
thoughtlessness on his part; yet that was no reason she should submit
to it. She did not remonstrate, except again to repulse him quietly but
firmly. He offered no apology. The picture completed bore no
resemblance to Madame Ratignolle. She was greatly disappointed to find
that it did not look like her. But it was a fair enough piece of work,
and in many respects satisfying.
Mrs. Pontellier evidently did not think so. After surveying the sketch
critically she drew a broad smudge of paint across its surface, and
crumpled the paper between her hands.
The youngsters came tumbling up the steps, the quadroon following at
the respectful distance which they required her to observe. Mrs.
Pontellier made them carry her paints and things into the house. She
sought to detain them for a little talk and some pleasantry. But they
were greatly in earnest. They had only come to investigate the contents
of the bonbon box. They accepted without murmuring what she chose to
give them, each holding out two chubby hands scoop-like, in the vain
hope that they might be filled; and then away they went.
The sun was low in the west, and the breeze soft and languorous that
came up from the south, charged with the seductive odor of the sea.
Children freshly befurbelowed, were gathering for their games under the
oaks. Their voices were high and penetrating.
Madame Ratignolle folded her sewing, placing thimble, scissors, and
thread all neatly together in the roll, which she pinned securely. She
complained of faintness. Mrs. Pontellier flew for the cologne water and
a fan. She bathed Madame Ratignolle’s face with cologne, while Robert
plied the fan with unnecessary vigor.
The spell was soon over, and Mrs. Pontellier could not help wondering
if there were not a little imagination responsible for its origin, for
the rose tint had never faded from her friend’s face.
She stood watching the fair woman walk down the long line of galleries
with the grace and majesty which queens are sometimes supposed to
possess. Her little ones ran to meet her. Two of them clung about her
white skirts, the third she took from its nurse and with a thousand
endearments bore it along in her own fond, encircling arms. Though, as
everybody well knew, the doctor had forbidden her to lift so much as a
pin!
“Are you going bathing?” asked Robert of Mrs. Pontellier. It was not so
much a question as a reminder.
“Oh, no,” she answered, with a tone of indecision. “I’m tired; I think
not.” Her glance wandered from his face away toward the Gulf, whose
sonorous murmur reached her like a loving but imperative entreaty.
“Oh, come!” he insisted. “You mustn’t miss your bath. Come on. The
water must be delicious; it will not hurt you. Come.”
He reached up for her big, rough straw hat that hung on a peg outside
the door, and put it on her head. They descended the steps, and walked
away together toward the beach. The sun was low in the west and the
breeze was soft and warm.
VI
Edna Pontellier could not have told why, wishing to go to the beach
with Robert, she should in the first place have declined, and in the
second place have followed in obedience to one of the two contradictory
impulses which impelled her.
A certain light was beginning to dawn dimly within her,—the light
which, showing the way, forbids it.
At that early period it served but to bewilder her. It moved her to
dreams, to thoughtfulness, to the shadowy anguish which had overcome
her the midnight when she had abandoned herself to tears.
In short, Mrs. Pontellier was beginning to realize her position in the
universe as a human being, and to recognize her relations as an
individual to the world within and about her. This may seem like a
ponderous weight of wisdom to descend upon the soul of a young woman of
twenty-eight—perhaps more wisdom than the Holy Ghost is usually pleased
to vouchsafe to any woman.
But the beginning of things, of a world especially, is necessarily
vague, tangled, chaotic, and exceedingly disturbing. How few of us ever
emerge from such beginning! How many souls perish in its tumult!
The voice of the sea is seductive; never ceasing, whispering,
clamoring, murmuring, inviting the soul to wander for a spell in
abysses of solitude; to lose itself in mazes of inward contemplation.
The voice of the sea speaks to the soul. The touch of the sea is
sensuous, enfolding the body in its soft, close embrace.
VII
Mrs. Pontellier was not a woman given to confidences, a characteristic
hitherto contrary to her nature. Even as a child she had lived her own
small life all within herself. At a very early period she had
apprehended instinctively the dual life—that outward existence which
conforms, the inward life which questions.
That summer at Grand Isle she began to loosen a little the mantle of
reserve that had always enveloped her. There may have been—there must
have been—influences, both subtle and apparent, working in their
several ways to induce her to do this; but the most obvious was the
influence of Adèle Ratignolle. The excessive physical charm of the
Creole had first attracted her, for Edna had a sensuous susceptibility
to beauty. Then the candor of the woman’s whole existence, which every
one might read, and which formed so striking a contrast to her own
habitual reserve—this might have furnished a link. Who can tell what
metals the gods use in forging the subtle bond which we call sympathy,
which we might as well call love.
The two women went away one morning to the beach together, arm in arm,
under the huge white sunshade. Edna had prevailed upon Madame
Ratignolle to leave the children behind, though she could not induce
her to relinquish a diminutive roll of needlework, which Adèle begged
to be allowed to slip into the depths of her pocket. In some
unaccountable way they had escaped from Robert.
The walk to the beach was no inconsiderable one, consisting as it did
of a long, sandy path, upon which a sporadic and tangled growth that
bordered it on either side made frequent and unexpected inroads. There
were acres of yellow camomile reaching out on either hand. Further away
still, vegetable gardens abounded, with frequent small plantations of
orange or lemon trees intervening. The dark green clusters glistened
from afar in the sun.
The women were both of goodly height, Madame Ratignolle possessing the
more feminine and matronly figure. The charm of Edna Pontellier’s
physique stole insensibly upon you. The lines of her body were long,
clean and symmetrical; it was a body which occasionally fell into
splendid poses; there was no suggestion of the trim, stereotyped
fashion-plate about it. A casual and indiscriminating observer, in
passing, might not cast a second glance upon the figure. But with more
feeling and discernment he would have recognized the noble beauty of
its modeling, and the graceful severity of poise and movement, which
made Edna Pontellier different from the crowd.
She wore a cool muslin that morning—white, with a waving vertical line
of brown running through it; also a white linen collar and the big
straw hat which she had taken from the peg outside the door. The hat
rested any way on her yellow-brown hair, that waved a little, was
heavy, and clung close to her head.
Madame Ratignolle, more careful of her complexion, had twined a gauze
veil about her head. She wore dogskin gloves, with gauntlets that
protected her wrists. She was dressed in pure white, with a fluffiness
of ruffles that became her. The draperies and fluttering things which
she wore suited her rich, luxuriant beauty as a greater severity of
line could not have done.
There were a number of bath-houses along the beach, of rough but solid
construction, built with small, protecting galleries facing the water.
Each house consisted of two compartments, and each family at Lebrun’s
possessed a compartment for itself, fitted out with all the essential
paraphernalia of the bath and whatever other conveniences the owners
might desire. The two women had no intention of bathing; they had just
strolled down to the beach for a walk and to be alone and near the
water. The Pontellier and Ratignolle compartments adjoined one another
under the same roof.
Mrs. Pontellier had brought down her key through force of habit.
Unlocking the door of her bath-room she went inside, and soon emerged,
bringing a rug, which she spread upon the floor of the gallery, and two
huge hair pillows covered with crash, which she placed against the
front of the building.
The two seated themselves there in the shade of the porch, side by
side, with their backs against the pillows and their feet extended.
Madame Ratignolle removed her veil, wiped her face with a rather
delicate handkerchief, and fanned herself with the fan which she always