“What is the matter? You are trembling?”
“I tremble at the thought of how easily I might lose you,” I replied.
“Are you made less happy now, because of this?” she replied. “Does it
rob you of any of your joys, that I have belonged to another before I
did to you, that others after you will possess me, and would you enjoy
less if another were made happy simultaneously with you?”
“Wanda!”
“You see,” she continued, “that would be a way out. You won’t ever lose
me then. I care deeply for you and intellectually we are harmonious,
and I should like to live with you always, if in addition to you I
might have—”
“What an idea,” I cried. “You fill me with a sort of horror.”
“Do you love me any the less?”
“On the contrary.”
Wanda had raised herself on her left arm. “I believe,” she said, “that
to hold a man permanently, it is vitally important not to be faithful
to him. What honest woman has ever been as devotedly loved as a
hetaira?”
“There is a painful stimulus in the unfaithfulness of a beloved woman.
It is the highest kind of ecstacy.”
“For you, too?” Wanda asked quickly.
“For me, too.”
“And if I should give you that pleasure,” Wanda exclaimed mockingly.
“I shall suffer terrible agonies, but I shall adore you the more,” I
replied. “But you would never deceive me, you would have the daemonic
greatness of saying to me: I shall love no one but you, but I shall
make happy whoever pleases me.”
Wanda shook her head. “I don’t like deception, I am honest, but what
man exists who can support the burden of truth. Were I say to you: this
serene, sensual life, this paganism is my ideal, would you be strong
enough to bear it?”
“Certainly. I could endure anything so as not to lose you. I feel how
little I really mean to you.”
“But Severin—”
“But it is so,” said I, “and just for that reason—”
“For that reason you would—” she smiled roguishly—“have I guessed it?”
“Be your slave!” I exclaimed. “Be your unrestricted property, without a
will of my own, of which you could dispose as you wished, and which
would therefore never be a burden to you. While you drink life at its
fullness, while surrounded by luxury, you enjoy the serene happiness
and Olympian love, I want to be your servant, put on and take off your
shoes.”
“You really aren’t so far from wrong,” replied Wanda, “for only as my
slave could you endure my loving others. Furthermore the freedom of
enjoyment of the ancient world is unthinkable without slavery. It must
give one a feeling of like unto a god to see a man kneel before one and
tremble. I want a slave, do you hear, Severin?”
“Am I not your slave?”
“Then listen to me,” said Wanda excitedly, seizing my hand. “I want to
be yours, as long as I love you.”
“A month?”
“Perhaps, even two.”
“And then?”
“Then you become my slave.”
“And you?”
“I? Why do you ask? I am a goddess and sometimes I descend from my
Olympian heights to you, softly, very softly, and secretly.
“But what does all this mean,” said Wanda, resting her head in both
hands with her gaze lost in the distance, “a golden fancy which never
can become true.” An uncanny brooding melancholy seemed shed over her
entire being; I have never seen her like that.
“Why unachievable?” I began.
“Because slavery doesn’t exist any longer.”
“Then we will go to a country where it still exists, to the Orient, to
Turkey,” I said eagerly.
“You would—Severin—in all seriousness,” Wanda replied. Her eyes burned.
“Yes, in all seriousness, I want to be your slave,” I continued. “I
want your power over me to be sanctified by law; I want my life to be
in your hands, I want nothing that could protect or save me from you.
Oh, what a voluptuous joy when once I feel myself entirely dependent
upon your absolute will, your whim, at your beck and call. And then
what happiness, when at some time you deign to be gracious, and the
slave may kiss the lips which mean life and death to him.” I knelt
down, and leaned my burning forehead against her knee.
“You are talking as in a fever,” said Wanda agitatedly, “and you really
love me so endlessly.” She held me to her breast, and covered me with
kisses.
“You really want it?”
“I swear to you now by God and my honor, that I shall be your slave,
wherever and whenever you wish it, as soon as you command,” I
exclaimed, hardly master of myself.
“And if I take you at your word?” said Wanda.
“Please do!”
“All this appeals to me,” she said then. “It is different from anything
else—to know that a man who worships me, and whom I love with all my
heart, is so wholly mine, dependent on my will and caprice, my
possession and slave, while I—”
She looked strangely at me.
“If I should become frightfully frivolous you are to blame,” she
continued. “It almost seems as if you were afraid of me already, but
you have sworn.”
“And I shall keep my oath.”
“I shall see to that,” she replied. “I am beginning to enjoy it, and,
heaven help me, we won’t stick to fancies now. You shall become my
slave, and I—I shall try to be _Venus in Furs_.”
* * * * *
I thought that at last I knew this woman, understood her, and now I see
I have to begin at the very beginning again. Only a little while ago
her reaction to my dreams was violently hostile, and now she tries to
carry them into execution with the soberest seriousness.
She has drawn up a contract according to which I give my word of honor
and agree under oath to be her slave, as long as she wishes.
With her arm around my neck she reads this, unprecedented, incredible
document to me. The end of each sentence she punctuates with a kiss.
“But all the obligations in the contract are on my side,” I said,
teasing her.
“Of course,” she replied with great seriousness, “you cease to be my
lover, and consequently I am released from all duties and obligations
towards you. You will have to look upon my favors as pure benevolence.
You no longer have any rights, and no longer can lay claim to any.
There can be no limit to my power over you. Remember, that you won’t be
much better than a dog, or some inanimate object. You will be mine, my
plaything, which I can break to pieces, whenever I want an hour’s
amusement. You are nothing, I am everything. Do you understand?” She
laughed and kissed me again, and yet a sort of cold shiver ran through
me.
“Won’t you allow me a few conditions—” I began.
“Conditions?” She contracted her forehead. “Ah! You are afraid already,
or perhaps you regret, but it is too late now. You have sworn, I have
your word of honor. But let me hear them.”
“First of all I should like to have it included in our contract, that
you will never completely leave me, and then that you will never give
me over to the mercies of any of your admirers—”
“But Severin,” exclaimed Wanda with her voice full of emotion and with
tears in her eyes, “how can you imagine that I—and you, a man who loves
me so absolutely, who puts himself so entirely in my power—” She
halted.
“No, no!” I said, covering her hands with kisses. “I don’t fear
anything from you that might dishonor me. Forgive me the ugly thought.”
Wanda smiled happily, leaned her cheek against mine, and seemed to
reflect.
“You have forgotten something,” she whispered coquettishly, “the most
important thing!”
“A condition?”
“Yes, that I must always wear my furs,” exclaimed Wanda. “But I promise
you I’ll do that anyhow because they give me a despotic feeling. And I
shall be very cruel to you, do you understand?”
“Shall I sign the contract?” I asked.
“Not yet,” said Wanda. “I shall first add your conditions, and the
actual signing won’t occur until the proper time and place.”
“In Constantinople?”
“No. I have thought things over. What special value would there be in
owning a slave where everyone owns slaves. What I want is to _have a
slave, I alone,_ here in our civilized sober, Philistine world, and a
slave who submits helplessly to my power solely on account of my beauty
and personality, not because of law, of property rights, or
compulsions. This attracts me. But at any rate we will go to a country
where we are not known and where you can appear before the world as my
servant without embarrassment. Perhaps to Italy, to Rome or Naples.”
* * * * *
We were sitting on Wanda’s ottoman. She wore her ermine jacket, her
hair was loose and fell like a lion’s mane down her back. She clung to
my lips, drawing my soul from my body. My head whirled, my blood began
to seethe, my heart beat violently against hers.
“I want to be absolutely in your power, Wanda,” I exclaimed suddenly,
seized by that frenzy of passion when I can scarcely think clearly or
decide freely. “I want to put myself absolutely at your mercy for good
or evil without any condition, without any limit to your power.”
While saying this I had slipped from the ottoman, and lay at her feet
looking up at her with drunken eyes.
“How beautiful you now are,” she exclaimed, “your eyes half-broken in
ecstacy fill me with joy, carry me away. How wonderful your look would
be if you were being beaten to death, in the extreme agony. You have
the eye of a martyr.”
* * * * *
Sometimes, nevertheless, I have an uneasy feeling about placing myself
so absolutely, so unconditionally into a woman’s hands. Suppose she did
abuse my passion, her power?
Well, then I would experience what has occupied my imagination since my
childhood, what has always given me the feeling of seductive terror. A
foolish apprehension! It will be a wanton game she will play with me,
nothing more. She loves me, and she is good, a noble personality,
incapable of a breach of faith. But it lies in her hands —_if she wants
to she can._ What a temptation in this doubt, this fear!
Now I understand Manon l’Escault and the poor chevalier, who, even in
the pillory, while she was another man’s mistress, still adored her.
Love knows no virtue, no profit; it loves and forgives and suffers
everything, because it must. It is not our judgment that leads us; it
is neither the advantages nor the faults which we discover, that make
us abandon ourselves, or that repel us.
It is a sweet, soft, enigmatic power that drives us on. We cease to
think, to feel, to will; we let ourselves be carried away by it, and
ask not whither?
* * * * *
A Russian prince made his first appearance today on the promenade. He
aroused general interest on account of his athletic figure, magnificent
face, and splendid bearing. The women particularly gaped at him as
though he were a wild animal, but he went his way gloomily without
paying attention to any one. He was accompanied by two servants, one a
negro, completely dressed in red satin, and the other a Circassian in
his full gleaming uniform. Suddenly he saw Wanda, and fixed his cold
piercing look upon her; he even turned his head after her, and when she
had passed, he stood still and followed her with his eyes.
And she—she veritably devoured him with her radiant green eyes—and did
everything possible to meet him again.
The cunning coquetry with which she walked, moved, and looked at him,
almost stifled me. On the way home I remarked about it. She knit her
brows.
“What do you want,” she said, “the prince is a man whom I might like,
who even dazzles me, and I am free. I can do what I please—”
“Don’t you love me any longer—” I stammered, frightened.
“I love only you,” she replied, “but I shall have the prince pay court
to me.”
“Wanda!”
“Aren’t you my slave?” she said calmly. “Am I not Venus, the cruel
northern Venus in Furs?”
I was silent. I felt literally crushed by her words; her cold look
entered my heart like a dagger.
“You will find out immediately the prince’s name, residence, and
circumstances,” she continued. “Do you understand?”
“But—”
“No argument, obey!” exclaimed Wanda, more sternly than I would have
thought possible for her, “and don’t dare to enter my sight until you
can answer my questions.”
It was not till afternoon that I could obtain the desired information
for Wanda. She let me stand before her like a servant, while she leaned
back in her arm-chair and listened to me, smiling. Then she nodded; she
seemed to be satisfied.
“Bring me my footstool,” she commanded shortly.
I obeyed, and after having put it before her and having put her feet on
it, I remained kneeling.
“How will this end?” I asked sadly after a short pause.
She broke into playful laughter. “Why things haven’t even begun yet.”
“You are more heartless than I imagined,” I replied, hurt.
“Severin,” Wanda began earnestly. “I haven’t done anything yet, not the
slightest thing, and you are already calling me heartless. What will
happen when I begin to carry your dreams to their realization, when I
shall lead a gay, free life and have a circle of admirers about me,
when I shall actually fulfil your ideal, tread you underfoot and apply
the lash?”
“You take my dreams too seriously.”
“Too seriously? I can’t stop at make-believe, when once I begin,” she
replied. “You know I hate all play-acting and comedy. You have wished
it. Was it my idea or yours? Did I persuade you or did you inflame my
imagination? I am taking things seriously now.”
“Wanda,” I replied, caressingly, “listen quietly to me. We love each
other infinitely, we are very happy, will you sacrifice our entire
future to a whim?”
“It is no longer a whim,” she exclaimed.
“What is it?” I asked frightened.
“Something that was probably latent in me,” she said quietly and
thoughtfully. “Perhaps it would never have come to light, if you had
not called it to life, and made it grow. Now that it has become a
powerful impulse, fills my whole being, now that I enjoy it, now that I
cannot and do not want to do otherwise, now you want to back out—
you—are you a man?”
“Dear, sweet Wanda!” I began to caress her, kiss her.
“Don’t—you are not a man—”
“And you,” I flared up.
“I am stubborn,” she said, “you know that. I haven’t a strong
imagination, and like you I am weak in execution. But when I make up my
mind to do something, I carry it through, and the more certainly, the
more opposition I meet. Leave me alone!”
She pushed me away, and got up.
“Wanda!” I likewise rose, and stood facing her.
“Now you know what I am,” she continued. “Once more I warn you. You
still have the choice. I am not compelling you to be my slave.”
“Wanda,” I replied with emotion and tears filling my eyes, “don’t you
know how I love you?”
Her lips quivered contemptuously.
“You are mistaken, you make yourself out worse than you are; you are
good and noble by nature—”
“What do you know about my nature,” she interrupted vehemently, “you
will get to know me as I am.”
“Wanda!”
“Decide, will you submit, unconditionally?”
“And if I say no.”
“Then—”
She stepped close up to me, cold and contemptuous. As she stood before
me now, the arms folded across her breast, with an evil smile about her
lips, she was in fact the despotic woman of my dreams. Her expression
seemed hard, and nothing lay in her eyes that promised kindness or
mercy.
“Well—” she said at last.
“You are angry,” I cried, “you will punish me.”
“Oh no!” she replied, “I shall let you go. You are free. I am not
holding you.”
“Wanda—I, who love you so—”
“Yes, you, my dear sir, you who adore me,” she exclaimed
contemptuously, “but who are a coward, a liar, and a breaker of
promises. Leave me instantly—”
“Wanda I—”
“Wretch!”
My blood rose in my heart. I threw myself down at her feet and began to
cry.
“Tears, too!” She began to laugh. Oh, this laughter was frightful.
“Leave me—I don’t want to see you again.”
“Oh my God!” I cried, beside myself. “I will do whatever you command,
be your slave, a mere object with which you can do what you will—only
don’t send me away—I can’t bear it—I cannot live without you.” I
embraced her knees, and covered her hand with kisses.
“Yes, you must be a slave, and feel the lash, for you are not a man,”
she said calmly. She said this to me with perfect composure, not
angrily, not even excitedly, and it was what hurt most. “Now I know
you, your dog-like nature, that adores where it is kicked, and the
more, the more it is maltreated. Now I know you, and now you shall come
to know me.”
She walked up and down with long strides, while I remained crushed on
my knees; my head was hanging supine, tears flowed from my eyes.
“Come here,” Wanda commanded harshly, sitting down on the ottoman. I
obeyed her command, and sat down beside her. She looked at me sombrely,
and then a light suddenly seemed to illuminate the interior of her eye.
Smiling, she drew me toward her breast, and began to kiss the tears out
of my eyes.
* * * * *
The odd part of my situation is that I am like the bear in Lily’s park.
I can escape and don’t want to; I am ready to endure everything as soon
as she threatens to set me free.
* * * * *
If only she would use the whip again. There is something uncanny in the
kindness with which she treats me. I seem like a little captive mouse
with which a beautiful cat prettily plays. She is ready at any moment
to tear it to pieces, and my heart of a mouse threatens to burst.
What are her intentions? What does she purpose to do with me?
* * * * *
It seems she has completely forgotten the contract, my slavehood. Or
was it actually only stubbornness? And she gave up her whole plan as
soon as I no longer opposed her and submitted to her imperial whim?
How kind she is to me, how tender, how loving! We are spending
marvellously happy days.
To-day she had me read to her the scene between Faust and
Mephistopheles, in which the latter appears as a wandering scholar. Her
glance hung on me with strange pleasure.
“I don’t understand,” she said when I had finished, “how a man who can
read such great and beautiful thoughts with such expression, and
interpret them so clearly, concisely, and intelligently, can at the
same time be such a visionary and supersensual ninny as you are.”
“Were you pleased,” said I, and kissed her forehead.
She gently stroked my brow. “I love you, Severin,” she whispered. “I
don’t believe I could ever love any one more than you. Let us be
sensible, what do you say?”
Instead of replying I folded her in my arms; a deep inward, yet vaguely
sad happiness filled my breast, my eyes grew moist, and a tear fell
upon her hand.
“How can you cry!” she exclaimed, “you are a child!”
* * * * *
On a pleasure drive we met the Russian prince in his carriage. He
seemed to be unpleasantly surprised to see me by Wanda’s side, and
looked as if he wanted to pierce her through and through with his
electric gray eyes. She, however, did not seem to notice him. I felt at
that moment like kneeling down before her and kissing her feet. She let
her glance glide over him indifferently as though he were an inanimate
object, a tree, for instance, and turned to me with her gracious smile.
* * * * *
When I said good-night to her to-day she seemed suddenly unaccountably
distracted and moody. What was occupying her?
“I am sorry you are going,” she said when I was already standing on the
threshold.
“It is entirely in your hands to shorten the hard period of my trial,
to cease tormenting me—” I pleaded.
“Do you imagine that this compulsion isn’t a torment for me, too,”
Wanda interjected.
“Then end it,” I exclaimed, embracing her, “be my wife.”
“_Never, Severin_,” she said gently, but with great firmness.
“What do you mean?”