"But I get the sunshine," he said, blushing.
I am quite sure that he often stands at his window and builds the most
superb palaces from the red-gold of the sunset sky, and marble bridges
from the purple clouds at evening.
Big child that you are, how I love you!
But I will never, never start a home with you!
Well, surely one gardener can hardly suffice to poison the air of the
place. If he is a nuisance I shall send him packing.
The man comes from a big estate. If he is content to cultivate my
cabbage patch, it must be because, besides being very ugly, he has some
undiscovered faults. But I really cannot undertake to make minute
inquiries into the psychical qualities of Mr. Under-gardener Jensen.
His photograph was sent by a registry office, among many others. We
examined them, Jeanne, Torp, and myself, with as deep an interest as
though they had been fashion plates from Paris. To my silent amusement,
I watched Torp unconsciously sniffing at each photograph as though she
thought smells could be photographed, too.
Prudence prompted me to select this man; he is too ugly to disturb our
peace of mind. On the other hand, as I had the wisdom not to pull down
the hut in which the former proprietor lived, the two rooms there will
have to do for Mr. Jensen, so that we can keep him at a little distance.
Torp asked if he was to take meals in the kitchen.
Certainly! I have no intention of having him for my opposite neighbour
at table. But, on the whole, he had better have his meals in his hut,
then we shall not be always smelling him.
* * * * *
Perhaps we are really descended from dogs, for the sense of smell can so
powerfully influence our senses.
I would undertake in pitch darkness to recognise every man I know by the
help of my nose alone; that is, if I passed near enough to him to sniff
his atmosphere. I am almost ashamed to confess that men are the same to
me as flowers; I judge them by their smell. I remember once a young
English waiter in a restaurant who stirred all my sensibilities each
time he passed the back of my chair. Luckily Richard was there! For the
same reason I could not endure Herr von Brincken to come near me--and
equally for the same reason Richard had power over my senses.
Every time I bite the stalk of a pansy I recall the neighbourhood of
the young Englishman.
Men ought never to use perfumes. The Creator has provided them. But with
women it is different....
* * * * *
To-day is my birthday. No one here knows it. Besides, what woman would
enjoy celebrating her forty-third birthday? Only Lillie Rothe, I am
sure!...
One day I was talking to a specialist about the thousands of women who
are saved by medical science to linger on and lead a wretched
semi-existence. These women who suffer for years physically and are
oppressed by a melancholy for which there seems to be no special cause.
At last they consult a doctor; enter a nursing home and undergo some
severe operation. Then they resume life as though nothing had happened.
Their surroundings are unchanged; they have to fulfil all the duties of
everyday life--even the conjugal life is taken up once more. And these
poor creatures, who are often ignorant of the nature of their illness,
are plunged into despair because life seems to have lost its joy and
interest.
I ventured to observe to the doctor with whom I was conversing that it
would be better for them if they died under the anæsthetic. The surgeon
reproved me, and inquired whether I was one of those people who thought
that all born cripples ought to be put out of their misery at once.
I did not quite see the connection of ideas; but I suppressed my desire
to close his argument by telling him of an example which is branded upon
my memory.
Poor Mathilde Bremer! I remember her so well before and after the
operation. She was not afraid to die, because she knew her husband was
devoted to her. But she kept saying to the surgeon:
"You must either cure me or kill me. For my own sake and for his, I will
not go on living this half-invalidish life."
She was pronounced "cured." Two years later she left her husband, very
much against his will, but feeling she was doing the best for both of
them.
She once said to me: "There is no torture to equal that which a woman
suffers when she loves her husband and is loved by him; a woman for whom
her husband is all in all, who longs to keep his devotion, but knows she
must fail, because physically she is no longer herself."
The life Mathilde Bremer is now leading--that of a solitary woman
divorced from her husband--is certainly not enviable. Yet she admits
that she feels far better than she used to do.
* * * * *
Any one might suppose I was on the way to become a rampant champion of
the Woman's Cause. May I be provided with some other occupation! I have
quite enough to do to manage my own affairs.
Heaven be eternally praised that I have no children, and have been
spared all the ailments which can be "cured" by women's specialists!
* * * * *
Ye powers! How interminable a day can be! Surely every day contains
forty-eight hours!
I can actually watch the seconds oozing away, drop by drop.... Or
rather, they fall slowly on my head, like dust upon a polished table. My
hair is getting steadily greyer.
It is not surprising, because I neglect it.
But what is the use of keeping it artificially brown with lotions and
pomades? Let it go grey!
Torp has observed that I take far more pleasure in good cooking than I
did at first.
My dresses are getting too tight. I miss my masseuse.
* * * * *
To-day I inspected my linen cupboard with all the care of the lady
superior of an aristocratic convent. I delighted in the spectacle of the
snowy-white piles, and counted it all. I am careful with my money, and
yet I like to have great supplies in the house. The more bottles, cases,
and bags I see in the larder, the better pleased I am. In that respect
Torp and I are agreed. If we were cut off from the outer world by flood,
or an earthquake, we could hold out for a considerable time.
* * * * *
If I had more sensibility, and a little imagination--even as much as
Torp, who makes verses with the help of her hymn-book--I think I should
turn my attention to literature. Women like to wade in their memories as
one wades through dry leaves in autumn. I believe I should be very
clever in opening a series of whited sepulchres, and, without betraying
any personalities, I should collect my exhumed mummies under the general
title of, "Woman at the Dangerous Age." But besides imagination, I lack
the necessary perseverance to occupy myself for long together with other
people's affairs.
* * * * *
We most of us sail under a false flag; but it is necessary. If we were
intended to be as transparent as glass, why were we born with our
thoughts concealed?
If we ventured to show ourselves as we really are, we should be either
hermits, each dwelling on his own mountain-top, or criminals down in the
valleys.
* * * * *
Torp has gone to evening service. Angelic creature! She has taken a
lantern with her, therefore we shall probably not see her again before
midnight. In consequence of her religious enthusiasm, we dined at
breakfast-time. Yes, Torp knows how to grease the wheels of her
existence!
Naturally she is about as likely to attend church as I am. Her vespers
will be read by one of the sailors whose ship has been laid up near here
for the winter. Peace be with her--but I am dreadfully bored.
I have a bitter feeling as though Jeanne and I were doing penance, each
in a dark corner of our respective quarters. The Sundays of my childhood
were not worse than this.
In the distance a cracked, tinkling bell "tolls the knell of parting
day." Jeanne and I are depressed by it. I have taken up a dozen
different occupations and dropped them all.
If it were only summer! I am oppressed as though I were sitting in a
close bower of jasmine; but we are in mid-winter, and I have not used a
drop of scent for months.
But, after all, Sundays were no better in the Old Market Place. There I
had Richard from morning till night. To be bored alone is bad; to be
bored in the society of one other person is much worse. And to think
that Richard never even noticed it! His incessant talk reminded me of a
mill-wheel, and I felt as though all the flour was blowing into my eyes.
* * * * *