“You must go. It is broad daylight, eleven o’clock, and the chateau is
already awake.”
All had vanished like a dream! I found myself wandering through the
corridors before I had recovered my senses. How could I regain my
apartment, not knowing where it was? Any mistake might bring about an
exposure. I resolved on a morning walk. The coolness of the fresh air
gradually tranquilized my imagination and brought me back to the world
of reality; and now instead of a world of enchantment I saw myself in my
soul, and my thoughts were no longer disturbed but followed each other
in connected order; in fact, I breathed once more. I was, above all
things, anxious to learn what I was to her so lately left--I who knew
that she had been desperately in love with the Marquis de V-----. Could
she have broken with him? Had she taken me to be his successor, or
only to punish him? What a night! What an adventure! Yes, and what a
delightful woman! While I floated on the waves of these thoughts, I
heard a sound near at hand. I raised my eyes, I rubbed them, I could not
believe my senses. Can you guess who it was? The Marquis de V-----!
“You did not expect to see me so early, did you?” he said. “How has it
all gone off?”
“Did you know that I was here?” I asked in utter amazement.
“Oh, yes, I received word just as you left Paris. Have you played your
part well? Did not the husband think your visit ridiculous? Was he put
out? When are you going to take leave? You had better go, I have made
every provision for you. I have brought you a good carriage. It is at
your service. This is the way I requite you, my dear friend. You may
rely on me in the future, for a man is grateful for such services as
yours.”
These last words gave me the key to the whole mystery, and I saw how I
stood.
“But why should you have come so soon?” I asked him; “it would have been
more prudent to have waited a few days.”
“I foresaw that; and it is only chance that has brought me here. I am
supposed to be on my way back from a neighboring country house. But has
not Madame de T----- taken you into her secret? I am surprised at her
want of confidence, after all you have done for us.”
“My dear friend,” I replied, “she doubtless had her reasons. Perhaps I
did not play my part very well.”
“Has everything been very pleasant? Tell me the particulars; come, tell
me.”
“Now wait a moment. I did not know that this was to be a comedy; and
although Madame de T----- gave me a part in the play--”
“It wasn’t a very nice one.”
“Do not worry yourself; there are no bad parts for good actors.”
“I understand, you acquitted yourself well.”
“Admirably.”
“And Madame de T-----?”
“Is adorable.”
“To think of being able to win such a woman!” said he, stopping short in
our walk, and looking triumphantly at me. “Oh, what pains I have taken
with her! And I have at last brought her to a point where she is perhaps
the only woman in Paris on whose fidelity a man may infallibly count!”
“You have succeeded--?”
“Yes; in that lies my special talent. Her inconstancy was mere
frivolity, unrestrained imagination. It was necessary to change that
disposition of hers, but you have no idea of her attachment to me. But
really, is she not charming?”
“I quite agree with you.”
“And yet _entre nous_ I recognize one fault in her. Nature in giving her
everything, has denied her that flame divine which puts the crown on all
other endowments; while she rouses in others the ardor of passion, she
feels none herself, she is a thing of marble.”
“I am compelled to believe you, for I have had no opportunity of
judging, but do you think that you know that woman as well as if you
were her husband? It is possible to be deceived. If I had not dined
yesterday with the veritable--I should take you--”
“By the way, has he been good?”
“Oh, I was received like a dog!”
“I understand. Let us go in, let us look for Madame de T-----. She must
be up by this time.”
“But should we not out of decency begin with the husband?” I said to
him.
“You are right. Let us go to your room, I wish to put on a little
powder. But tell me, did he really take you for her lover?”
“You may judge by the way he receives me; but let us go at once to his
apartment.”
I wished to avoid having to lead him to an apartment whose whereabouts
I did not know; but by chance we found it. The door was open and there I
saw my _valet de chambre_ asleep on an armchair. A candle was going out
on a table beside him. He drowsily offered a night robe to the marquis.
I was on pins and needles; but the marquis was in a mood to be easily
deceived, took the man for a mere sleepy-head, and made a joke of the
matter. We passed on to the apartment of Monsieur de T-----. There was
no misunderstanding the reception which he accorded me, and the welcome,
the compliments which he addressed to the marquis, whom he almost forced
to stay. He wished to take him to madame in order that she might insist
on his staying. As for me, I received no such invitation. I was reminded
that my health was delicate, the country was damp, fever was in the air,
and I seemed so depressed that the chateau would prove too gloomy for
me. The marquis offered me his chaise and I accepted it. The husband
seemed delighted and we were all satisfied. But I could not refuse
myself the pleasure of seeing Madame de T----- once more. My impatience
was wonderful. My friend conceived no suspicions from the late sleep of
his mistress.
“Isn’t this fine?” he said to me as we followed Monsieur de T-----. “He
couldn’t have spoken more kindly if she had dictated his words. He is a
fine fellow. I am not in the least annoyed by this reconciliation; they
will make a good home together, and you will agree with me, that he
could not have chosen a wife better able to do the honors.”
“Certainly,” I replied.
“However pleasant the adventure has been,” he went on with an air of
mystery, “you must be off! I will let Madame de T----- understand that
her secret will be well kept.”
“On that point, my friend, she perhaps counts more on me than on you;
for you see her sleep is not disturbed by the matter.”
“Oh! I quite agree that there is no one like you for putting a woman to
sleep.”
“Yes, and a husband too, and if necessary a lover, my dear friend.”
At last Monsieur de T----- was admitted to his wife’s apartment, and
there we were all summoned.
“I trembled,” said Madame de T----- to me, “for fear you would go before
I awoke, and I thank you for saving me the annoyance which that would
have caused me.”
“Madame,” I said, and she must have perceived the feeling that was in my
tones--“I come to say good-bye.”
She looked at me and at the marquis with an air of disquietude; but the
self-satisfied, knowing look of her lover reassured her. She laughed
in her sleeve with me as if she would console me as well as she could,
without lowering herself in my eyes.
“He has played his part well,” the marquis said to her in a low voice,
pointing to me, “and my gratitude--”
“Let us drop the subject,” interrupted Madame de T-----; “you may be
sure that I am well aware of all I owe him.”
At last Monsieur de T-----, with a sarcastic remark, dismissed me; my
friend threw the dust in his eyes by making fun of me; and I paid back
both of them by expressing my admiration for Madame de T-----, who made
fools of us all without forfeiting her dignity. I took myself off; but
Madame de T----- followed me, pretending to have a commission to give
me.
“Adieu, monsieur!” she said, “I am indebted to you for the very great
pleasure you have given me; but I have paid you back with a beautiful
dream,” and she looked at me with an expression of subtle meaning. “But
adieu, and forever! You have plucked a solitary flower, blossoming in
its loveliness, which no man--”
She stopped and her thought evaporated in a sigh; but she checked the
rising flood of sensibility and smiled significantly.
“The countess loves you,” she said. “If I have robbed her of some
transports, I give you back to her less ignorant than before. Adieu! Do
not make mischief between my friend and me.”
She wrung my hand and left me.
More than once the ladies who had mislaid their fans blushed as they
listened to the old gentleman, whose brilliant elocution won their
indulgence for certain details which we have suppressed, as too erotic
for the present age; nevertheless, we may believe that each lady
complimented him in private; for some time afterwards he gave to each
of them, as also to the masculine guests, a copy of this charming story,
twenty-five copies of which were printed by Pierre Didot. It is
from copy No. 24 that the author has transcribed this tale, hitherto
unpublished, and, strange to say, attributed to Dorat. It has the merit
of yielding important lessons for husbands, while at the same time it
gives the celibates a delightful picture of morals in the last century.