“Why is not Henriette here?”
“Because she is playing in my room, I presume. Do you suppose, monsieur,
that I can always attend to her? A girl who will soon be four years old
can play alone.”
I sat down to listen to the music, but in five minutes my wife said that
she was tired and left the piano. Monsieur Dulac talked a few minutes,
then took his leave. My wife returned to her room, and I to my study,
saying to myself that I must have seemed like a donkey to that man.
When I was alone I blushed at the suspicions that had passed through my
head. In spite of that I became more constant in my attendance on my
wife. I did not leave to others the duty of escorting her to parties; I
went with her myself. But, as the time of her delivery drew near,
Eugénie went about less. Balls were abandoned, receptions less
frequented, and even music was somewhat neglected. At last the moment
arrived, and I became the father of a boy.
Nothing can describe my joy, my intoxication; I had a boy! I myself ran
about to announce it everywhere; and among my visits I did not forget
Ernest and his wife, for I knew that they would share my delight. They
embraced me and congratulated me; they adored their children, so that
they understood my feeling.
My mother was my son’s godmother, with a distant kinsman of my wife. I
gave him the name of Eugène and we put him out to nurse at Livry with
the same peasant woman who had taken our daughter, and whose trade it
was always to have a supply of milk.
Eugénie seemed pleased to have a son, although her joy was less
expansive than mine. Our acquaintances came to see us; Monsieur Dulac
was not one of the last. That young man seemed to share my pleasure so
heartily that I was touched. I had totally forgotten the ideas that had
passed through my mind a few months before; I could not understand how I
had been able to doubt my Eugénie’s fidelity for an instant.
Bélan also came to see me. He was satisfied now concerning his Armide’s
virtue. She had demonstrated to him that she had arranged to meet the
marquis on the new boulevards to go begging for the benefit of the poor;
and her reason for doing it secretly was that her modesty would have
suffered too much if people had known of all that she did for the relief
of her fellow-creatures. Bélan had humbled himself before his charitable
better half; he went about everywhere extolling his wife’s noble deeds;
he was no longer afraid of being betrayed. So much the better for him. I
congratulated him and bowed him out just when he seemed to be on the
point of mentioning Monsieur Dulac again. I gave him to understand that
I did not like evil tongues and that I should take it very ill of
anybody who tried to disturb the peace of my household.
No, I certainly would not be jealous again. I blushed to think that I
had been for a single instant. If Eugénie was no longer the same with me
as in the first months of our wedded life, it was doubtless because we
are not permitted to enjoy such happiness forever. Enjoyment, if it does
not entirely extinguish love, certainly diminishes its piquancy; when
one can gratify one’s desires as soon as they are formed, one does not
form so many. And yet Ernest and Marguerite were still like lovers! To
be sure, they were not married. Could it be that the idea that they
could leave each other at any minute was the consideration that kept
their love from growing old?
When she had entirely recovered her health, Eugénie’s taste for society
revived; she paid little attention to her daughter, and that distressed
me. For our Henriette was fascinating. I passed hours talking with her,
and those hours passed much more rapidly than those which I was obliged
to spend at evening parties.
I suggested going to see my son at Livry. My wife declared that he was
too small, that we must wait until his features had become more formed.
But I did not choose to wait any longer; I longed to embrace my little
Eugène, so I hired a horse one morning, and went to the nurse’s house.
My son seemed to me a fascinating little fellow; I recognized his
mother’s features in his. I embraced him, but I sighed; something was
lacking to my happiness. I felt that it was wrong of Eugénie not to have
desired to embrace her son.
The nurse asked me if my wife was sick. The good people thought that she
must be sick because she had failed to accompany me.
“Yes, she is not feeling very well,” I said to the nurse.
“Oh well! as soon as she’s all right again, I’m sure that madame will
want to come too.”
“Yes, we will come together the next time.”
I passed several hours beside my son’s cradle. As I drove back to Paris,
I indulged in reflections which were not cheerful. In vain did I try to
excuse Eugénie, I felt that her conduct was not what it should be, and
it distressed me to feel that she was in the wrong.
I reached home at six o’clock. Madame was not there; she had gone to
dine with Madame Dorcelles. She was one of her school friends whom she
had met again in society; one of those dissipated, coquettish women, who
consider it perfectly natural to see their husbands only by chance, when
they dine with him. I did not like that woman, and I had told Eugénie so
and had requested her not to see too much of her; and she went to dine
at her house!
She had not taken her daughter. My little Henriette ran out to embrace
me, with outstretched arms! How could Eugénie take any pleasure, away
from her daughter? I could not understand it.
“Didn’t your mamma take you?” I asked the child, taking her on my knee.
“No, papa.”
“Did you cry when she went away?”
“Yes, papa, I cried.”
“Poor child! you cried, and your mother left you behind!”
“But mamma told me that if I was very good she would bring me a cake; so
then I stopped crying.”
“Did anybody come to see your mamma to-day?”
“Yes, you know, that gentleman who plays music with mamma, and who gives
me sweeties.”
“Monsieur Dulac?”
“Yes.”
“And did you stay with your mamma while she was playing music?”
“No, because mamma said that I was making too much noise; she sent me to
play in the hall with my doll.”
I felt a weight at my heart; and for a long time I was silent. Evidently
my little Henriette divined that I was unhappy, for she looked timidly
at me and said nothing. I kissed her lovingly, and then she smiled
again.
Where could Eugénie be? That Madame Dorcelles did not receive that
evening; at least, I thought that it was not her day. At all events, I
did not choose to go to her house; I suspected that woman of giving
Eugénie very bad advice, and I might let my ill humor appear. It was
much better not to go there.
But why should I always hold myself in check? Why should I not tell my
wife frankly what my feelings were? In order to have peace, to avoid
quarrels. But in order to have peace, should a man let his wife make a
fool of herself and do rash things, if nothing worse? No, I determined
to tell Eugénie all that I had on my mind.
Perhaps those ladies had gone to the play. I went out, after kissing
Henriette again and handing her over to her nurse. Where should I go? At
what theatre should I look for them? I went into the Variétés, the
Gymnase, and the Porte-Saint-Martin. And I remembered that I had met
Eugénie there on the day following Giraud’s ball, at which I saw her for
the first time. My eyes turned toward the box in which she sat that
evening. Ah! how glad I would have been to go back to that time! How
madly in love I was! I still loved her as dearly! but she----
The time passes quickly when one is engrossed by souvenirs of the past.
The play came to an end unnoticed by me. I was aroused from my
reflections by seeing that everybody had gone; whereupon I understood
that I must do likewise. I returned home. As I approached the house, I
saw a gentleman and lady standing at the door, and I thought that I
recognized my wife. I stepped behind one of the trees on the boulevard,
where I could see them better. Yes, it was my wife and Monsieur Dulac.
He had brought her home. But they talked together a very long time! He
took her hand and did not release it. Why did he hold her hand like
that? When a man holds a woman’s hand so long, it means that he is
making love to her. I remembered very clearly that that was what I used
to do; and that I used to bestow a loving pressure upon the hand that I
held in mine. He was pressing my wife’s hand, no doubt, and she did not
withdraw it! That idea maddened me, I could no longer restrain myself,
and I walked rapidly toward them. They dropped each other’s hands; Dulac
bowed ceremoniously, then exclaimed:
“Ah! here is Monsieur Blémont! I have brought madame home; she deigned
to accept my arm. Good-night, madame; pray receive my respects.”
He bowed and walked away; I do not know whether I made any answer to
him. I pushed my wife into the house and we went upstairs without
exchanging a word. When we reached our apartment, madame entered her
bedroom, and I followed her. I paced the floor a long while without
speaking. I wanted to see whether she would ask me about my son, for she
must have guessed that I had been to Livry. But she did not say a word;
she simply began to arrange her hair in curl papers.