GENERAL PODOI.
If I were a writer of the naturalistic school--that is, if I were
without care for modesty or the choice of words--I should need here to
summon physiology to my aid to paint in all its brutality the love that
the Princess Olsdorf and Paul Meyrin felt for each other; and the lines
that I should devote to this study, and the scenes that it would
involve, would give their distinctive note to the book. They would
probably make it successful, thanks to the unhealthy curiosity by which
even the freshest readers are tainted nowadays, for we live in a strange
age, when cynicism reigns alike in letters, art, business, and politics.
Cynicism is indeed the only sovereign that our pseudo-republic is
willing to accept.
In truth, license has never been so unbridled; never has mediocrity gone
so far, impudence mounted so high, or indifferent work, dramatic and
literary, had so much success, if cleverly launched. Our country,
formerly known for its gallantry and good taste, has become the kingdom
of what is common and vulgar.
This new state of things is due to many causes--the _abandon_ of
religion, the scandalous rapidity with which fortunes have been won, the
eager desire to enjoy everything, and also--it is needful that one
should dare to say it--the invasion of those numberless Southerners who
have carried everything with a high hand, and brought with them into the
society they have gained a footing in, the vanity, the extravagance, and
the boastfulness inherent in their natures. A Gascon or a Provencal may,
of course, be an upright, worthy, and intelligent man, a devoted
friend--I have known many with these qualities, but too often they are
lacking. One might suppose they were incompatible with the terrible
accent of these men, their epileptic gestures, their rage for loud
talking, for calling people by their names, and for talking of their own
affairs to everybody. And if the Southerner is a Jew, too, the case is
worse than ever, for then no place or reward is safe from his greed.
To put against the few men of wit, the occasional writers of the first
order, the two or three poets that the South has given us, what noisy,
insolent, troublesome _parvenus_ Paris owes to it! It would seem that
everything is these people's, of right. They slip in everywhere,
shamelessly, jostling one another, greedy of place and honor rather than
avaricious. Such of them as are not poets or musicians are
hair-dressers, or croupiers at gambling-tables, or statesmen.
This calamitous invasion has come upon us chiefly from the right bank of
the Garonne, and the sea-coast; for further inland, toward the
mountainous country, these Southerners are of another kind--almost a
different race. First they have a less marked accent, and, second, some
indisputable qualities are theirs.
One class of these new-comers are of no particular country. They come
from everywhere--from South America as well as from the banks of the
Nile; from the Gulf of Mexico as well as from the far East; and the sore
that eats into our very marrow is owing to the enthusiastic welcome
Paris gives to their high-sounding names and suspicious fortunes.
Lacking all the good points of the Southerners, whose faults usually
spring from exuberant vigor and fancifulness, these foreigners take
Paris for a kind of modern Capua. They are the dealers in commonplace,
the readers of obscene works, the originators of every debauchery.
The result is seen in voice and gesture, in a freedom of bearing and a
frivolity which, in great part, are the cause of our social fall, and,
as a consequence, of the success achieved by erotic books, written in a
language scarcely intelligible, and by unhealthy volumes which, stinking
at one and the same time of the sewer and of opoponax, might have been
printed at Lesbos.
Now, as I have no ambition to write one of these books, I will only say
what is needful to make myself understood of the passion which had
brought Lise Olsdorf and Paul Meyrin together. What I wish to sketch is
the moral depths into which a woman quickly sinks when, yielding to her
animal desires alone, she throws herself blindly and recklessly into the
arms of a man who is of neither her world, race, nor education.
Love, in the pure acceptation of the word, even when it is not
legitimate, must occasion an exchange of lofty sentiments, sacrifices,
and devotion between those who feel it for one another. It outlives all
trials; in the pride of its abnegation it will provoke them on occasion.
Passion, on the contrary, when the soul is a stranger to it, is made up
of egotism and material gratifications.
In such a case, in the hands of a man who knows he is more desired than
loved, the woman is no longer an adorable companion in life who
encourages and consoles, a faithful friend whose joy doubles our joys.
She becomes an instrument of pleasure, whose jealous owner would have
not only all her moments of _abandon_, but all her smiles and her most
trifling thoughts. She must live for him alone, please him only, be
beautiful before him alone. Destroying the aspirations of the woman who
has thus rashly given herself up to him, her master soon makes of her a
slave, whose heart, stifled by its surroundings, ere long ceases to
beat. And when the day of satiety and _abandon_ comes, there remains of
the ideal creature of God nothing but a worthless woman, soiled in her
own eyes, and fated thenceforward to lead a life of weariness and
disgust.
But Lise Olsdorf, abandoning herself to the fierce passion that had
seized upon her, could not imagine that perhaps such a future loomed
before her. The many hunting excursions of the prince left her
practically at full liberty, for when the male guests of Pampeln were
away hunting, there remained at the chateau scarcely any one but
middle-aged, placid people, who retired early, and who, for that matter,
on account of the very reputation of the princess, did not dream of
spying upon her.
Moreover, there was an excellent excuse for the lovers being for hours
at a time together. The day after that which had settled their fate, the
painter had begun the portrait of the mistress of Pampeln, and
everybody--Pierre Olsdorf more than any one else--was interested in this
work, which promised to be noteworthy.
Under the empire of his passion for her, Paul Meyrin had at first wished
to paint the princess as Diana the Huntress, her hair in a Grecian knot,
her shoulders bare, her bust scarcely veiled; but, on seeing a sketch of
the future picture, Lise Olsdorf was alarmed. It seemed to her that
everything in it betrayed at once the painter's love for her, and she
begged him not to go on with the work. Paul consented, but on condition
that his model, re-enacting for him the shamelessness of the Italian
princess for Canova, would let him some day secretly, for themselves
alone, reproduce on canvas the splendor of all her beauty. And Lise,
having promised in a passionate embrace, Paul Meyrin, going from one
extreme to the other, painted her in a riding-habit, severely chaste.
Within a fortnight the portrait was nearly finished, and the prince, who
naturally suspected nothing of his conjugal misfortunes, thanked Paul
Meyrin, and authorized him to take the portrait to Paris for hanging in
the next exhibition.
At each hour passed with Paul, the princess's love increased. It was in
some sort purified by the admiration she felt for the artist at his
work.
While the sittings lasted, at liberty to see him for a long time every
day, she loved him better and less wantonly; but, wishful as the painter
was to linger with his work, prudence obliged him at last to admit that
he had finished, and consequently to put an end to the daily interviews
in private. Then Lise's passion retook its first fierce form.
Deprived of the interviews in the course of which, satisfied and
glutted, she could gather a store of calmness for the rest of the day,
she became jealous, troubled, rash. Soon she was so little mistress of
herself that General Podoi's wife, helped by her own experience in like
affairs, guessed at a part, at least, of what was going on.
Alarmed--not in her virtue, but in her affection, which was wholly of
pride--for her daughter, as to the consequences that might follow upon
such an intrigue, the ex-Countess Barineff watched the princess more
closely. It was soon impossible to have any doubt of her relations with
the handsome foreigner, for one evening her mother caught them almost in
each other's arms in the great alley of Pampeln, which had been the
scene of the declaration of their love.
The general's wife was, as we have said, a woman of energy. The next
morning, before breakfast, wasting no time in beating about the bush,
she appeared in Paul Meyrin's room, without having her visit announced
beforehand.
Astonished, to begin with, by her appearance, the artist was very soon
still more so by her speech, for without preamble or oratorical devices
she said:
"Monsieur, I come to ask you to bid adieu to the other guests this very
day, and to leave Pampeln. You will write to the prince, who is away and
will not be back before night, that you have had letters from Paris
summoning you to return at once."
"I do not understand you, madame," stammered the young man.
"You had better, however, without forcing me to explain further. I
introduced you to Prince Olsdorf, and I am therefore in some degree
answerable for your behavior under his roof. This responsibility is
already too great, and I desire not to be any longer under it."
"But, madame, were the prince to believe the excuse I should make,
following your advice, for my sudden leave-taking, there are others who
perhaps would be less credulous."
"That is no concern of mine. You may tell them what you like. The best
way would be to say nothing--to anybody; but you must go. Give me your
promise."
"Must?"
"You know well that I have the right--that it is my duty--to speak
thus."
"And if I refuse to obey?"
"If you refuse, in ten minutes' time two of General Podoi's friends will
wait on you with a challenge--discreet friends who will find reasons for
a duel that will compromise nobody but myself. The shame of fighting
with an old man will be yours, and then you can not stay here."
That good fellow Podoi had little idea that the woman who bore his name
was at that moment disposing of his life so calmly. Still, she knew that
there was no need to consult her husband in any event, and that in a
delicate case of the kind she would find him, as he always was, ready to
obey any wish of hers.
Much embarrassed, and knowing not how to get himself out of this
downright trap, Paul Meyrin was silent. He was sure that he had to do
with a woman that would not give way.
"Come, now," the ex-Countess Barineff went on, dryly, "will you or will
you not go?"
"I will go," replied the painter, bowing.
"This evening?"
"You will surely grant me a respite of twenty-four hours. I promise I
will start to-morrow morning."
"No, you must go to-day, before the prince returns. There are horses and
a carriage at your disposal to take you to Mittau. You will do well to
go thence straight to Paris. If your stay in Russia were heard of here,
after your sudden departure from Pampeln, it might give rise to
questions. I want to avoid that."
The tone she had spoken these words in did not suffer Paul to hesitate.
"Very well, then, madame," he said, "I will leave this evening."
"Without seeing--you know whom?" said Lise's mother.
"No; I won't promise that! If I did not pay my respects to all whom they
are due to before I quit the chateau, in the first place I should be set
down as a boor, and besides, your end would not be granted, for
everybody would try to find out the cause of such singular conduct."
"You pretend not to understand me. I will speak more plainly, much as it
costs me to do so. You shall not see the princess again in private."
"I can promise you one thing alone, that I will not provoke an
explanation between Madame la Princess and myself. You must admit that
if she honors me by demanding one I could not refuse her it."
"She will not try to see you."
"She may do so."
"I hope otherwise."
"In that case, madame, we are agreed. All shall be done as you wish. I
will write now to the prince explaining my departure."
Content with having got this promise, she left him and went at once to
her daughter's room.
The princess was at her toilet when her mother came into the room.
"Send away the maid," she said; "I have something to say to you."
Rather surprised, Lise Olsdorf obeyed. Then turning to her mother, she
asked, with a smile:
"What have you to tell me that is so mysterious?"
"I have just requested Monsieur Paul Meyrin to leave Pampeln to-day,"
replied the ex-Countess Barineff.
The princess understood all, and anger flushed her face with blood; but
not losing self-command, she replied calmly:
"Why do you tell _me_ this? I presume you have the prince's authority
for taking such a step in respect to one of his guests."
"I have consulted nobody. Monsieur Meyrin's longer stay here might at
any hour be the occasion for a scandalous scene. My duty was to do what
I have done."
"Has this young man bowed to your orders without protesting or defending
himself?"
"He is going away this evening."
"Very good. I will see him directly."
"It would be far better to rather avoid any interview with him."
"Why, pray? I wish to know what means you have employed to obtain from
Monsieur Paul Meyrin so ready and blind a submission."
"What does that matter to you?"
"It matters this, that if Monsieur Meyrin is the man I take him for, he
will not leave before having heard me."
"You must be responsible then for what may happen."
"Why, what will happen?"
"You will see."
"Come, mother, don't let us talk in enigmas. What are you imagining? By
what right do you interfere in what concerns me alone?"
"What I imagine, or rather what I am certain of, I will not say, out of
respect to you. My interference is a fulfillment of my duty. After
rearing you with a view to create for you a future according to my
ambition, after having made a princess of you, I will not suffer you to
ruin everything on account of a ridiculous caprice."
Lise Olsdorf could not master a thrill of anger and pain. The glitter in
her great eyes told her mother that she had overshot the mark. A
ridiculous caprice, this ungovernable passion that had thrown her into
Paul Meyrin's arms!
She recovered herself somewhat, however, and replied bitterly:
"Yes, that is true. You have made a princess of me, and, as you say--to
satisfy your ambition. You would have acted more wisely if you had made
me a happy woman. You forced me to marry a man who did not love me, and
whom I did not and could not love. Is it my fault if the blood of an
artiste runs in my veins?"
"Well--of an artiste?" said Mme. Podoi, haughtily.
"Bah! As if these tastes and these aspirations were not derived from
yourself!"
The ex-comedienne at these words started indignantly.
The past that she had long since forgotten and wished never to recall,
her daughter reminded her of. How came she to know so much? Did she not
know still more?
Possessed by this thought, she said, more gently:
"It is no question of tastes or aspirations but of your honor and that
of the prince, and you repay poorly my care for your peace of mind in
trying to offend me. It would be better, I think, for both of us not to
prolong the interview. I have spoken to you and to Monsieur Paul Meyrin,
as it was my duty to speak. His going will seem quite natural when he
has excused it as I have advised him to do. He will write to the prince,
as I have suggested, and at least any scandal will be avoided. The day
will come when you will thank me."
Lise's only reply to these last words was an ironical smile. As soon as
her mother was gone, she quickly finished her toilet and went down to
the dining-room, where most of the guests were already gathered.
Paul Meyrin entered the room a few moments later. He was so pale and so
evidently preoccupied that several persons asked him if he were not
unwell.
"No," he replied, "but I have had bad news from Paris, and must leave
Pampeln to-day."
At that moment the princess signed to him to come to her, and when he
had done so she said, in a low, rapid voice:
"I know what has passed between my mother and you. I will wait for you
in my room after luncheon."
Mme. Podoi, who had only come into the room leaning on the general's arm
at that moment, did not notice what was going on. Besides, she had made
up her mind not to interfere between her daughter and the painter, to
avoid an outburst. M. Paul Meyrin was going away; that was the main
thing in her eyes.
They sat down to table, but Lise Olsdorf soon excused herself from
keeping her guests company any longer. An hour later, while the visitors
to Pampeln were making for their rooms or strolling over the park, Paul,
going by a roundabout way familiar to him through the principal rooms of
the chateau, stole into the princess's private apartments.
She was there impatiently and feverishly awaiting him.
"You don't love me any longer, then," she cried, springing to him, "as
you have submitted so easily to my mother's orders."
"Your mother has not told you, has she, what she threatened me with if I
did not go?" he asked, reassuring his mistress with a thousand kisses.
"No, but I believe she would do anything to gain her end."
"She told me simply that if I did not leave Pampeln to-day, her husband
would challenge me to a duel."
"Impossible."
"That is the fact, and the thing has been cunningly thought out, for it
is certain that if I were to fight the general I could not remain here
afterward."
"But she would have to supply my step-father with some reason for a
challenge."
"Oh, your mother is clever enough to find a reason."
"And he would obey her blindly, at the risk of being run through the
body. He is simpleton enough for that. I know the influence his wife has
over him."
"You see, I must needs go--not for my own sake, but for yours."
The princess grew somber and fierce. Reclining on a couch, she fixed her
flashing eyes on her lover kneeling before her.
"So be it then," she said, after a moment of silence, winding her arms
about Paul's neck. "So be it--go; but soon to meet again. It is my
mother herself who will be to blame for it."
"Why, what do you mean?" asked the painter, pressing Lise to his heart.
"I mean that before winter is upon us I shall be in Paris. She sends you
away, does she--she separates us? Well, I will go to you."
The artist gave a cry of joy; and mad, intoxicated, careless of danger,
they forgot all else but their love and their dreams of the future.
That evening Paul Meyrin left Pampeln, after writing to the prince in
the sense agreed on with Mme. Podoi. At the same time he made his
excuses for being unable to await the prince's return, thank him in
person for his hospitality, and take formal leave of him.
It was the middle of September, and the stay in Courland, according to
the ordinary custom, would last until the early part of October. Lise
had mapped out her course, and was so completely master of herself that
her mother soon came to think that she had exaggerated the danger, and
that her daughter had almost forgotten Paul Meyrin.
Two months later she saw her mistake, when the prince himself told her
in St. Petersburg that his wife was going to Paris for medical advice as
to the state of her health, about which she was uneasy.
At this quite unlooked-for news the general's wife had almost betrayed
the anger and indignation she felt. Happily she restrained herself, and
hurried to her daughter.
She found her preparing for the departure. At the first glance to the
trunks that the maids were packing, she could see the absence was meant
to be a long one.
"So," she said, after leading her daughter to another room, "you are
going to Paris? Why did you say nothing to me of this journey?"
"I do not start until to-morrow. I was coming to say good-bye this
evening."
"And this journey is taken on account of your health?"
"Undoubtedly."
"You can imagine that I don't believe that?"
"Then it would be useless to question me, as, if what you suppose be
true, I can not, and ought not, to confess it to you."
What the princess could not and would not tell her mother was that she
was _enceinte_ by Paul Meyrin, and that this, more even than her love
for him, compelled her to leave her husband at once.
"Do you imagine that your husband will always be ignorant of what is
going on?" said Mme. Podoi, after a moment's silence.
"I don't know what you mean," said Lise, shrugging her shoulders.
"Suppose I were to warn the prince?"
"Warn him? About what? It is either too late or too soon. If it is too
late, nothing shall hinder me pursuing my aims; and, thanks to you,
there will be a scandalous rupture between Pierre and me. If, on the
contrary, it is too soon, you will do a bad action for the sake of doing
it, for the prince has perfect confidence in me. He would not believe
you, and I should start on my journey all the same. Come, mother, I
advise you not to mix yourself up with my affair. I am married--that is,
I have to render account of my conduct to my husband alone. When the day
to do so shall come--if unhappily it should come ever--I shall know how
to defend myself; I won't ask for your help. If you are willing you need
say and stick to but one thing--that I am very far from well, and that
as Doctor Psaroff, clever as he is, can do nothing for me, I am going to
Paris to take the advice of more eminent men."
"Does the doctor believe you are unwell?"
"Can not women always be as ill as they wish to be, in spite of the
keenest-sighted doctors?"
"Lise, there will be a bad ending to all this!"
"Fools alone make bad endings. Besides, I trust in Providence."
The dry, cutting, cynical tone of the princess in meeting each of her
mother's objections left no room for insistence. Lise Olsdorf could be
wounded on one point alone--her maternal love; but Mme. Podoi had
omitted to speak of her son, whom she must leave in Russia. What she
dreaded was that her daughter would lose the high position she had won
for her. Her pride being touched, to begin with, she had not given a
thought to the only weapon which she could have used with effect.
"Then, adieu," said she, rising; and without so much as kissing her
daughter, she left the room.
The princess did not try to keep her, but went back to her packing.
She had made up her mind to take no servant with her, not even a
lady's-maid, because to do so would be to risk exposure some day or
other as to her condition.
To the affectionate concern of the prince as to her loneliness she
replied that it seemed to her far better to engage a maid and a footman
when once she was at her journey's end, for the few weeks she meant to
remain in France, than to be troubled by servants that were strange to
Paris and its manners and could therefore be only useless.
The prince gave way, and next morning his wife set out for Paris.
Forty-eight hours after, Paul Meyrin had a telegram from Konigsberg,
which he had been eagerly awaiting, to announce the coming of his
mistress to Paris.