PRIMA-SERA
Before starting for the Hôtel de Pënâfiel, I compared my present
state of anxiety and distrust with the careless abandonment of my former
life, and the days I spent with Hélène, when, no matter at what time I
entered the old salon at Serval, I was sure of being received with
pleasant smiles from every one.
Without dreading this interview with Madame de Pënâfiel, I knew that,
although by common consent she was abused and calumniated, her salon was
held in high consideration. It had great importance in the fact that its
judgment was not to be impeached; right or wrong, its stamp was the
valuation that would henceforth be accepted by the world.
The number of such salons, whose influence is so great that it
irrevocably decides the rank of each individual in good society, is
already restricted, and grows less every year. The reason is this, there
are no longer any men who are willing to submit to its restrictions. The
life of the club and the representative chamber, that other great
political club, has swept away the life of the salon. Between to-day's
speech and that of yesterday, between a game of whist or a revenge of
two or three thousand louis, the anxious and absorbing interest in a
race in which a favourite horse is entered for an enormous sum, there
remains very little time for that intimate, flowery, and elegant
conversation, which has no "echo in the country," as the monomaniacs of
the tribune say, and helps you neither to win nor lose at whist or on
the turf. And then the life of the salon is a constraint. You must
appear in evening dress to go and smother in a heated reception, and
then be frozen while waiting for your carriage; whereas it is so much
easier and pleasanter to stretch out in a soft armchair at the club,
where you take a comfortable nap after dinner, from which you awake
refreshed, and ready for an exciting game of whist, with no interruption
but that of your cigar.
However, at the period of which I write, there were still a few houses
where people conversed, and the Hôtel de Pënâfiel was one of these
eccentricities.
Madame de Pënâfiel, among all her defects, was not what was called a
bluestocking, but she was something worse, for she was a woman of real
erudition, and a linguist, speaking three or four languages well, and
having high scientific attainments, they said. If I had no better ground
for believing all this than the word of a savant such as De Cernay, I
should have had my doubts as to its truth, but I recalled a strange
circumstance which was a proof of Madame de Pënâfiel's learning.
Having been fortunate enough when in London to meet the celebrated
Arthur Young, he had spoken to me with great admiration of a young
compatriot of mine who was remarkably well read, although very pretty
and in the best society. He said she had complimented him in the most
intelligent and scientific manner on his famous theory of Interferences,
but had attacked him on the subject of the syllabic or dissyllabic value
he applied to hieroglyphics, in which his system was entirely at
variance with that of Champollion.
This had struck me as very singular, especially when told me by such a
great savant, and I had even made a note of it in my diary.
It was only on my return to Paris, and some time after having seen and
heard of Madame de Pënâfiel, that I confusedly recalled the
conversation of Arthur Young. I then got out my note-book, and found
these details, as well as the name of the marquise.
All that I had heard of Madame de Pënâfiel was far from creating a
pleasant impression. Her strange caprices, her artistic and perpetual
desire to attract attention, her poses, which they said were constantly
studied to the end of making a beautiful portrait of herself, her
fantastic disposition, her scientific studies, were all unbecoming in a
woman of her standing, and were all thoroughly distasteful to me.
Women who are constantly talked about and discussed from various points
of view are rarely influential; all they really care for is to exhibit
their various qualities. A woman who is serious, dignified, and calm, of
whom nobody says or knows anything, can have much more influence and be
more imposing.
And then a man who is naturally cold and reserved, even though he may
not be a social success, will always be well received and perfectly on a
level with the best company that he meets, for it is only the extremely
agreeable or the very ridiculous who attract much attention.
I repeat, then, that it was without any embarrassment, but with a great
deal of rather ill-natured curiosity, that I presented myself at the
Hôtel de Pënâfiel one Wednesday, after the opera.
The house was kept up in a really princely way. In the vestibule, which
was lofty and decorated with statues and immense marble vases filled
with flowers, were several footmen, who wore powder and liveries of blue
and orange, braided with silver.
In a vast antechamber, where there were some fine paintings and
magnificent Faïence vases also filled with flowers, was another
footman, whose livery was orange colour with a blue collar, and braided
on all the seams with silk passementerie, and embroidered with the crest
of De Pënâfiel. Finally, in a third waiting-room, were two _valets de
chambre_ who, instead of being clothed in funereal black, wore suits of
light blue plush, lined with orange-coloured silk and ornamented with
crested gilt buttons.
When I was announced, there were with Madame de Pënâfiel five or six
ladies and two or three men.
She was dressed in black on account of some court mourning or other, and
had jet ornaments in her soft brown hair. I thought her dazzlingly
beautiful and, though I may be mistaken, that she blushed beneath her
rouge when she received me in her most formal and ceremonious manner.
Perhaps it was the blush that made me think her so beautiful. After I
had spoken a few polite words, the conversation which my arrival had
interrupted was continued.
They were discussing the latest scandal, in which a woman's honour and
two men's lives were at stake; the story was told in the most guarded
language, but with so feeble an attempt at disguise, and such
transparent withholding of details, that to have mentioned proper names
outright would have been less significant.
As it almost always happens by one of those coincidences that luck
brings about, just as every one was having his little word or sharp
little witticism on the subject, the husband and wife who were being
discussed were announced. This conjugal entrance astonished no one. It
was explained by an unexpected return to Paris, which necessitated a
first visit.
Though every one who was in the salon was quite used to such impromptus,
there was for a second an embarrassing silence, but Madame de
Pënâfiel, with the most natural and perfect ease, addressed me as
though we were continuing an interrupted conversation:
"You think then, monsieur, that this new maëstro's opera shows great
promise?"
"It shows that he possesses a talent of unquestionable charm and
melancholy, madame," I replied, quite naturally. "Perhaps the music is
wanting in vigour, but it is full of sweetness and inexpressible grace."
"And pray who is the new musical luminary?" said, in an impertinent way,
the young woman who had just entered the room, and who had been the
subject of the previous discussion.
"M. Bellini, madame," said I, with a bow, wishing to save Madame de
Pënâfiel the trouble of answering.
"And the title of the new opera, madame la marquise?" asked the husband,
with an air of great interest, and unwilling to drop such a subject for
conversation.
"I forgot to tell you, madame, that the name of the new opera is 'La
Norma,'" I hastened to say, addressing Madame de Pënâfiel. "The
subject is the love of a priestess of the Gauls." Madame de Pënâfiel
immediately took up this theme, and enlarged on it in a very
entertaining way, showing what a good subject it was for a drama.
She then seized the opportunity of showing her erudition on the religion
of the Druids; she talked about the Celtic stones, and I felt sure that,
by an easy transition, she would soon arrive quite naturally at the
syllabic value of hieroglyphics, and the discussion of which Arthur
Young had spoken. It so happened that I chanced to be very much
interested in this study, for my father, who was an intimate friend of
M. de Guignes, had in his last years been a student of those
alphabetical problems. I could have continued the conversation by
drawing Madame de Pënâfiel into a discussion, in which she probably
would have shone at my expense; but her pretension to being learned
shocked me, and I warded off a hieroglyphic attack, which I thought
imminent, by declaring my perfect ignorance of the subject, whose
aridity I said frightened me.
My avowal of ignorance seemed to lift a weight off the minds of the
other men present, because they would have been mortified at being left
out of such a conversation, which would show an unusual fondness for
studies that were quite beyond an ordinary education. I do not know
whether Madame de Pënâfiel was provoked at my speech, which had lost
her the opportunity of showing her learning, or if she believed my
ignorance was affected. She did not pretend to hide a slight movement of
annoyance, but, with great tact and infinite skill, she resumed her
conversation about the Druids, passing from the Celtic inscriptions to
the picturesque costume of the priestesses of the Gauls, their long,
clinging robes, and the charming effect of the holly leaves in either
blonde or brown hair. She brought down the conversation naturally from
the scientific heights on which she at first had started to the vulgar
plains of every day costume, and then it became general. I admit that
these transitions were skilfully managed by Madame de Pënâfiel, and
that any one but a person who was well-read, clever, quick, and used to
society, would have failed entirely.
I was far from being astonished, for I had not expected to find candour
and inexperience, so as I was tired of so much senseless babble, and saw
that this was not the opportunity I desired of studying and observing at
my ease this person, who was said to be so singular, I rose to go out
unperceived, as a new arrival was being announced; but Madame de
Pënâfiel, near whom I was seated, said to me as she saw that they were
bringing the urn and the waiters into the other little salon:
"Monsieur, will you not have a cup of tea?"
I bowed and remained.
That night there was a grand ball at the house of one of those
easy-going foreigners, who, on the express condition that they may be
permitted to remain in their own salons, and look on at the fête which
is given at their expense, are willing to lend their houses, their
servants, and their supper to the fashionable circle, who take it all as
a matter of course.
Almost all of Madame de Pënâfiel's visitors were going there. I was
hesitating about going also, when, as good luck would have it, Lord
Falmouth was announced.
I had not seen him since his sudden departure for the House of Lords,
where he went to speak on the India question which interested him. There
was such a difference between his original mind and most of the people
I met habitually, that I decided to remain longer than I had at first
intended at the Hôtel de Pënâfiel.
After tea, Lord Falmouth and I were left alone with madame la marquise.
I have forgotten to mention that, in a far-off corner of the salon,
behind the marquise's armchair, unobserved and forgotten, there was a
distinguished young stranger, Baron Stroll, who seemed very timid, and
who, to hide his embarrassment, had been for the last half-hour turning
over the pages of the same album. The young baron was quite red, and his
eyes were staring fixedly, while he held his hat tightly between his
knees. Lord Falmouth called my attention to him, and said, in a low
voice, with his mocking air, the well-known words of the Vizier Maréco
to the Sultan Chaabaam, who was looking at the goldfish: "Let him alone,
he has got occupation enough for another hour yet."
Madame de Pënâfiel had not noticed this stranger, for, as I say, he
was seated behind the very high back of her armchair, beside a table
that was covered with albums; for she did the honours of her salon too
well to have neglected a guest. She began the conversation by graciously
reproaching Lord Falmouth for not coming to see her oftener. To which he
replied that he was unfortunately so stupid, and so terribly
communicative, that out of a hundred persons that he wanted to converse
with, only one or two were strong-minded enough to resist the contagion
of his stupidity, and not to become as dull as himself after a quarter
of an hour's conversation. It was a dreadful effect he had on most
persons, and he deplored it with the most comical humility, and
reproached himself for having made an infinite number of victims, whose
names he cited as living witnesses of his fatal influence.
"Ah, madame la marquise," he said, shaking his head in a disconsolate
way, "I have done a great deal of mischief by my stupidity, as you can
plainly see."
"There is no doubt of it, but you are very much to be blamed for having
only half killed your victims, for they come to life again, and annoy
people in every sort of way," said Madame de Pënâfiel, "and
unfortunately the species is as varied as it is abundant and tiresome.
Really there is nothing I know of that is more positively distressing
than the presence of a bore; there is something in his dreadful
influence that is painful to you, that saddens you in a twofold manner,
as you might feel remorse for a wicked deed you had not committed."
"For my part," said Lord Falmouth, "I ask your forgiveness for the
stupidity of such a trivial comparison; but we are not able to control
our impressions. Well, when it happens that I have to submit to a bore,
I feel exactly the same sensation as when I hear any one sawing a cork;
yes, it is a sort of dull, grinding, squeaking, monotonous sound, which
makes me quite understand the ferocity of Tiberius and Nero. Those
tyrants must have been uncommonly bored by their courtiers."
"As far as I am concerned," said I, "one of my weak points is that I am
very fond of stupid people. When you talk with a clever person, you are
always filled with regret when you come to the end of the conversation.
Whereas, if you are trying to talk to a fool, oh, there comes a moment,
a precious, single moment which compensates you for more than you have
suffered! It is the moment when a kind Providence takes him off your
hands."
"The fact is," said Lord Falmouth, "that we should look upon such a
trial in the light of discipline or mortification, and then it would be
of benefit to us. But never mind, if, by saying a word, a single word,
they could all be annihilated, would you be sufficiently philanthropic
to speak that word, madame la marquise?"
"Annihilate them?" said Madame de Pënâfiel. "Annihilate them bodily?"
"Certainly, for they are already annihilated spiritually. I mean to
annihilate them altogether, flesh, and bones, and cravat," said Lord
Falmouth.
"In fact, that is all there is to them. But it would be a very violent
remedy. Still, if by pronouncing a single word-- It is very tempting,"
replied the marquise.
"A single word," I said to her,--"by pronouncing, let us say, your name,
as they utter some sacred word to chase away an evil spirit."
"But it would be a dreadful massacre," she said.
"Very well, madame, but have we not just decided that stupidity is
deadly?" said Lord Falmouth. "Then you need have no scruples, and
afterwards you will be able to breathe more freely. You will find how
much purer the atmosphere will be, cleansed of all its malarial germs,
that bring on attacks of dismal gaping. You will be able to go freely
and fearlessly everywhere."
"Come, I think I will be tempted to say 'Let there be no more bores,'"
replied the marquise; "for, truly, it is a perpetual source of anxiety.
One has to be always on guard as to what one is saying, and it is an
intolerable annoyance. But, with all this folly, you have reminded me of
a very strange story that I lately read in an old German book, which
might be taken for a touchstone, or thermometer, to measure human
selfishness by, if every one would but truly answer the question asked
in the story.
"The story tells of a poor student in Leipsic, who, in a fit of despair,
invoked the wicked spirit, who appeared, and proposed to make this
strange compact with him.
"'Every wish of yours shall be granted, but on this condition, that you
pronounce aloud this word, _Sathaniel_; and that every time you utter
the word one of your fellow creatures shall die; a man in some distant
country shall die. You will not see him suffer, and no one in the world
but yourself will know that the realisation of your desires has cost the
life of one of your fellow men.' 'And may I choose the country, the
nation of my victim?' said the student. 'Certainly.' 'Shake hands,
master, it is a bargain,' said he to the demon. Now the Turks were
besieging Belgrade at that period, and it was at their expense that the
student satisfied all his wishes, which amounted to fifty or sixty
thousand Turks. It is a very vulgar story," said the marquise, "but I
should like to know if there are many human beings who, if they were
assured of secrecy, could resist the temptation of pronouncing the fatal
word, if they were sure of realising an ardently desired wish."
"It is simply what might be called a venial homicide," said Lord
Falmouth; "and, as for me, if the wish was worth the trouble, if it were
some impossible thing, as if, for example, it were a question of being
honoured by your friendship, madame la marquise, I certainly would not
hesitate at such a trifle as the life of some obscure inhabitant of
Greenland, for example, or a Laplander, because, as he is the smallest
sort of a man, the sin would no doubt be less."
The marquise smiled and shrugged her shoulders, saying to me, "And you,
monsieur, do you think that most men would hesitate very long between
their wish and the fatal word?"
"I believe there would be so little hesitation, madame, even among the
most honourable of men, that if in our golden age the wicked spirit
should make such a proposition, the world would become a wilderness in
eight days; and, perhaps, you, madame, you and Lord Falmouth and I,
would be immolated by the caprice of one of our intimate friends, who,
instead of taking the trouble of going all the way to Greenland for a
victim, would treat us in a neighbourly way."
"But I have an idea," said Lord Falmouth; "suppose that the caprices and
desires of humanity, by dint of satisfying themselves on the human race,
had reduced the inhabitants of the world to two people in some far
corner of this earth, a man who passionately loved a woman who detested
him in return, and that Satan, according to his system, said to him: 'My
terms are still the same; pronounce the redoubtable name, she will love
you, but she will die, and you will have caused her death.' Should the
man say the word?"
"To pronounce the word would be to prove that he loved desperately,"
said I to Lord Falmouth.
"Yes, if he were a good Catholic," said Madame de Pënâfiel; "because
then he would have purchased love at the price of eternal punishment,
without which it is only ferocious selfishness."
"But, madame, permit me to observe that, since there is a question of
Satan, it is evident that they would both be good Catholics."
"You are quite right," replied Lord Falmouth, "and your observation
reminds me of the joyful and hopeful exclamation of a poor man who was
saved from shipwreck. On getting to land, the first thing he saw was a
gallows. 'God be praised,' said he, 'I have landed in a civilised
country.'
"But," said Lord Falmouth, "is it not enough to bring one to the verge
of despair, to think that even now there are some people so happily, so
wonderfully endowed, that they spend three or four hours every morning
trying to see the devil,--evoking and invoking the evil one? I lately
came across one of those credulous individuals in the Rue de la
Barillerie. I assure you he is perfectly convinced that one of these
days he will succeed, and I must admit that I greatly envy him his
credulity, for he has an occupation that he will never become tired of;
for a constant desire sustained by unfailing hope seems to me to come
very near to perfect happiness."
"But," said I to Lord Falmouth, "did not your great poet Byron amuse
himself with such follies at one time?"
"Byron! Ah, do not speak to me of that man!" exclaimed the marquise,
with a look of dislike that almost amounted to hatred.
"Ah, take care, monsieur," said Lord Falmouth, smiling. "With no ill
intention, you have called up a diabolical spirit, that madame la
marquise will have to exorcise, for she detests him."
I was quite astonished, for I was far from expecting to find Madame de
Pënâfiel an anti-Byronian. On the contrary, everything that I had
heard of her fantastic and bold character was quite in harmony with that
disdainful and paradoxical genius. I therefore listened very attentively
to the rest of her conversation. She continued, with a scornful smile:
"Byron! Byron! so cruel and so desperate! What a hard and wicked heart!
When we think how, by some inexplicable fatality, every youthful mind,
with its wealth of imagination, wastes itself in admiration of this
scornful and insatiable demon, it is enough to convince us of the law of
contraries."
"There is nothing truer than the attraction of contraries," said Lord
Falmouth. "Does the charming little butterfly, for example, intelligent
little aerial creature that he is, does he ever fail, so soon as he
perceives a beautiful, bright, hot flame, to hasten with all the speed
of a son of Zephyr and Aurora, and roast himself in an ecstasy of
delight?"
"I cannot bear to think," said Madame de Pënâfiel, in a state of
exaltation, that made her more beautiful than ever, "I cannot bear to
think of so many noble and trusting souls being made for ever desperate
by the malevolent genius of Byron! Oh, how well he has depicted himself
in Manfred! Manfred's Castle, so dark and desolate, well represents
Byron's poetry. It is his terrible spirit. You enter this castle full of
confidence, its wildness and grandeur captivate your imagination, but
when you are once within its walls, under the spell of its pitiless
host, all regret is in vain; he despoils you mercilessly of your purest
and fondest beliefs. And then, when the last spark of faith is extinct,
and your last hope is torn from you, the great lord chases you away with
an insulting smile; and should you ask him what he is to give you in
return for all these riches of your soul, that he has thus profaned and
destroyed--"
"Madame," said I, allowing myself to interrupt her, "Lord Manfred
answers, 'I have given you _doubt,--doubt,_--the wisdom of the wisest.'
But," I added, being curious to see if Madame de Pënâfiel shared in my
admirations as well as my antipathies, "if you have such a strong
dislike to Byron, does not his noble country offer you an antidote to
his dangerous poison, in Walter Scott?"
"Oh," said she, as she clasped her hands with almost infantile grace,
"how charming it is, monsieur, to hear you speak thus! Is it not true
that the great, the good, the adorable Scott is the counterpoise of
Byron? Ah, when wounded to the heart you fly in despair from the
terrible Castle of Manfred, with what grateful relief do you find
yourself in the smiling and peaceful abode of Scott, that kind old man,
so grave and so serene! How tenderly he receives you, how touching is
his pity for you, how he comforts and consoles you! In what a pure and
radiant light he shows you the world, exalting all that is noble, good,
and generous in the human heart! He raises your self-respect as much as
Byron has degraded it. If he can never restore your lost illusions,
which, alas! is an impossibility, he can, at least, tranquillise and
soothe your incurable grief by his beneficent stories. Is it not,
monsieur, true glory to be as great as Walter Scott? Which man is more
truly grand and powerful, he who afflicts or he who consoles? For, alas!
monsieur, it is so easy to get people to believe in evil," added the
marquise, with a grieved expression.
Though all this was very true and very well stated, it would have seemed
too prearranged for a conversation, had there not been something else
that surprised me more.
No doubt every one has felt the same inexplicable sensation. It is this:
you feel, for the space of one or two seconds, that you have positively
seen or heard already the things you are seeing or hearing, although you
have the absolute certainty that the place you see or the person who
speaks has never been seen or heard by you before.
The opinion that Madame de Pënâfiel had just expressed on Byron and
Scott gave me this strange sensation. It was so like my own that it
seemed the echo of my own thoughts. At first I was almost stupefied, but
reflecting that, after all, it was but a simple and natural comparison
between two minds that were diametrically opposed to one another, I
continued calmly, for I was determined not to be influenced by my
feelings, although Madame de Pënâfiel had been very eloquent, and
really seemed to feel what she said.
"No doubt, madame, the genius of Byron is very saddening, and that of
Scott very consoling, and one seems very superior to the other; but
these despairs and consolations are quite superfluous nowadays, for at
the present epoch nobody is distressed or pleased by such trifles."
"How is that?" asked she.
"It appears, madame, that we no longer live in the age of imaginary joys
and misfortune; we have come to the wise conclusion of substituting
reality and material comfort for dreamy, foolish ideality and passion;
so in all probability we are much nearer happiness than we ever have
been before, for there is nothing more difficult, more impossible to
realise, than the ideal, while, with a little common sense, every one
can arrange for himself a comfortable existence according to his own
taste."
"Then, monsieur," said Madame de Pënâfiel, with some show of
impatience, "you deny the existence of passion? You say that in our day
it does not exist?"
"I was mistaken, madame, if I said that, for there is still one passion
remaining, and only one, and in this one passion all others are
concentrated. Its influence is tremendous; it is the only one which,
being well managed, carries any weight in society nowadays; it controls
our customs so completely that, though we are still a thousand leagues
away from the gracious ways of the great period of gallantry and
pleasure, the passion that I speak of, madame, is able to change every
salon of Paris into a Quaker meeting or an assemblage of American
citizens."
"How could that be?" said she.
"To be brief, madame, would you wish to see the strictest prudery reign
in all conversation? Would you wish to hear endless invocations (by
unmarried men, you understand) on the sanctity of marriage and the duty
of married women? Would you wish to see the Utopia dreamed of by the
sternest moralists realised?"
"For my part, I should like to see it once, just for a minute or two,"
said Lord Falmouth, pretending to be alarmed at the idea, "but that
would be sufficient; I should utter a protest if it were to last any
longer."
"Tell us what this passion is, monsieur," said Madame de Pënâfiel,
"this passion that can perform all these miracles,--what is it?"
"It is selfishness, or the passion for material comfort, madame; a
passion that can be translated by a trivial and very significant
word,--money."
"And how will you utilise the excessive love of money in the development
of this excessive and threatening virtue, of which you have drawn such
an exaggerated picture that I am still quite overcome?" said Lord
Falmouth.
"Just as they do in your country, monsieur, by punishing every
infraction of duty by an enormous fine. How else can it be done? In our
epoch of materialism we no longer fear anything except that which
touches our daily life, our pocket; this being the case, the system of
fines applied to the maintenance of good morals will certainly be the
most powerful social lever of the period. For instance, imagine that a
confirmed, inexorable moralist was determined to put a stop, suddenly
and brutally, to those weaknesses that society pardons,--a man entirely
devoted to his sense of duty, or, if you like it better, take a man who
is very ugly, very tiresome, and consequently very envious of certain
charming sins that he has never been lucky enough to commit, but that he
is determined to exterminate,--suppose that this blood-thirsty moralist
is a legislator, and that one day in the halls of state he discloses a
most deplorable state of affairs, and then demands and obtains, after
some discussion, from the majority, whom you can, without any great
stretch of imagination, suppose to consist of men who are also very
ugly, old, and tiresome, the passage of a bill organising a secret
police, destined to ferret out and unmask every act that threatens
private life: imagine that finally a law is promulgated, which punishes
by a fine of fifty thousand francs the tender crime whose victims fill
our tribunals, and that the fine shall be doubled in case of a second
arrest. This fine is not to be offered in the shameful form of damages
to the injured party, but employed, let us suppose, in the education of
abandoned children,--so that the superfluous would help the
necessitous."
"And do you believe, monsieur," cried the marquise, "that the ignoble
fear of paying a given sum would render the majority of men less
attentive, less devoted to women?"
"I believe it so firmly, madame, that I can give you an excellent sketch
of the two very different aspects of a salon, filled with the same
persons, on the day before and the day after the promulgation of such a
law.
"The day before you would see all the men smiling, expansive, charming,
using their softest tones and tenderest looks to prove by every grace of
look and accent the amorous principles of such logic as this: 'Whatever
is pleasant is right.' 'Discretion is the only virtue.' 'Your heart was
not consulted when they gave you your tyrant.' 'There are certain
feelings that are inevitably sympathetic.''Your soul longs for its twin
sister, take my soul.' (This piece of a soul, by the way, has enormous
moustaches, or side-whiskers.) 'When it has reached a certain stage,
guilty love becomes a sacred duty,' etc. I will excuse you, madame, from
hearing a variety of other excellent reasonings, which generally do not
deceive those that hear them, any more than those that give utterance to
them.
"But on the evening after the promulgation of this terrible law, when
there would be danger of the fine, what a difference! As all those
pretty paradoxes of night before last might end, after all, in the
payment of a heavy sum, and as that sum would reduce by just so much the
luxury and comfort which are the necessities of an essentially material
life, while love is only a delightful superfluity, you would see all the
men suddenly become serious, pompous, dignified, frightened at the
slightest attempt at conversation from a woman, if she was at all
removed from the rest of the company; prudish and scared as schoolgirls
before their head teacher, you would hear them cry out aloud so that
every one could hear them, and in their most solemn voice, the voice
that they use when they make political speeches, refuse requests, and
later scold their wives and children with: 'After all, good morals are
the foundation of society.' 'We must draw the line somewhere!' 'There
are some duties that a gallant man ought to respect.' 'I had a mother
once.' 'I shall be a father some day.' 'There is no real pleasure except
in the satisfaction of conscience,' etc. For I will spare you, madame, a
quantity of other formulas more or less moral, which, as soon as the
question of a fine came up, might be translated thus: 'Ladies, I know
that you are all as charming as possible; but I love my opera box, my
house, my table, my stable, my gaming, my journey to the summer resorts
or to Italy, my pictures, my bric-à-brac; shall I risk all of these for
a few moments of felicity, as rare as it is intoxicating? No!'"
"It is infamous," said the marquise; "out of a hundred men, not one
would answer in this way."
"Permit me, madame, to be of an absolutely opposite opinion. I believe
the men of our day are pitilessly attached to material comfort, and
willing to sacrifice everything else to it, and, more than all the rest,
that which is called love."
"You believe that?" said Madame de Pënâfiel with profound
astonishment. "You believe that? And how old might you be, monsieur?"
The question was so strange and so impolite, besides being so difficult
to answer without being extremely ridiculous, that I bowed respectfully
and said at haphazard:
"My star was so favourable, madame la marquise, that I was born the day
before your birthday."
Madame de Pënâfiel drew herself up with a haughty expression of
impatience, and said, in a lofty way, "I was speaking in earnest,
monsieur."
"And it is in all seriousness, madame, that I have the honour of
answering; the question that you were so kind as to ask is too
flattering a proof of your interest to allow me to answer it in any
other way."
"But how do you know my age?" she asked me, with surprise and curiosity.
"It will be many long years from now, madame, before this secret need
give you any uneasiness, and, by that time, I hope that I shall have
been so long in your good graces that I shall have forgotten all about
it."
At this very instant a terrible sneeze, all the more sonorous from
having been restrained, was heard in the direction of the young
stranger, who, as Lord Falmouth had predicted, had been turning over the
pages of the same album for the last hour, in profound silence. The
noise caused Madame de Pënâfiel to start with surprise, and she turned
her head quickly, when, to her great consternation, she saw M. de
Stroll. But she made such profound and gracious excuses to the young
baron for her apparent neglect of him, that he found her conduct quite
natural, and seemed rather pleased to have sneezed so loud.
It was now late, and I left.
I was waiting for my carriage in one of the entrance salons, when Lord
Falmouth and M. de Stroll came to find their servants.
"Well," said Lord Falmouth to me, "what do you think of Madame de
Pënâfiel?"
Whether from false shame at having to acknowledge myself already under
the spell, or from pure dissimulation, I answered, pleasantly: "Madame
de Pënâfiel appears to be extremely unassuming in manners, she
possesses a candid mind devoid of all pretentiousness, an enchanting
personality, and has an innocent way of saying just what she thinks."
"Upon my word," replied Lord Falmouth, with his grave irony, "your
judgment is a true one, as true as that we are now standing at noonday
in the middle of a thick forest listening to the songs of the birds."
Then he added, seriously: "The most infernal thing about her is her
falseness. I am quite sure that she does not believe a word of all she
said to us about Scott and Byron, for she has about as much heart as
that," said he, striking with his cane the base of a colossal Japanese
vase filled with flowers that he was standing near; "or rather," he
said, taking from the vase a beautiful crimson camellia, and holding it
up to me; "she resembles this flower,--colour and brilliance, nothing
more; no more soul than this flower has perfume. After all, though, when
she wants to, she can talk very charmingly. But people say you should
hear her when one of her guests has just left,--how she can take them to
pieces! One of these days we will play at that game; you shall go out
and I will stay behind, then I will tell you all that she has said about
you, and you shall do as much sometime for me."
Just then our carriages came up. Lord Falmouth went off to the club to
make a night of it; after a moment's hesitation as to accompanying him,
I decided to go home.
In spite of Lord Falmouth's opinion and what I myself had said about
Madame de Pënâfiel, I had quite agreed with her, and what she said
about Byron had made a deep impression on me; for I thought that I
detected hidden under this discussion, the signs of mental anguish and
heartfelt loneliness, and this gave me much to reflect upon, because I
believed I had perceived something of her true character, which was
absolutely in opposition to all that they said about Madame de
Pënâfiel.