young; doubtless, if I had seen her grow old slowly, and her features
change imperceptibly, I should have become accustomed to it without a
shock.--In my childhood I was surrounded by none but youthful, laughing
faces, so that I have retained an insurmountable antipathy for old
people. So it was that I shuddered when the lovely widow touched the
dowager's yellow brow with her pure vermilion lips.--It was something
I wouldn't have taken upon myself to do. I know that I shall look like
that when I am sixty; but I can do nothing to prevent it, and I pray
God that I may die young like my mother.
However, the old lady had retained some simple and majestic features of
her former beauty which prevented her from attaining the baked-apple
stage of ugliness that is the lot of women who have been simply pretty
or fresh and healthy: her eyes, although they had crow's feet at the
corners and were covered by great, flabby lids, still retained some
sparks of their former fire, and you could see that, under the reign of
the late king, they might have emitted dazzling flashes of passion.
Her fine and thin nose, slightly hooked like the beak of a bird of
prey, gave to her profile a sort of solemn grandeur, tempered by the
indulgent smile upon her protruding Austrian lip, which was touched
with carmine according to the fashion of the last generation.
Her costume was old-fashioned without being absurd, and was in perfect
harmony with her face; her head-dress was a simple white cap with a
narrow lace border; her long, emaciated hands, which you could see had
once been beautiful, were encased in mittens with no fingers or thumbs;
a dress of the color of dead leaves, with flowered work of a deeper
shade, a black mantle and a paduasoy apron of changing color completed
her toilet.
Old women ought always to dress in that way and respect their
approaching death sufficiently to avoid decking themselves out with
feathers and wreaths of flowers, ribbons of delicate shades and the
countless gewgaws that are suited only to extreme youth. It is of
no use for them to make advances to life; life will have nothing
to do with them; they have their pains for their trouble, like the
superannuated courtesans who plaster themselves with red and white
paint and whom drunken mule-drivers repulse with insults and kicks.
The old lady welcomed us with the ease of manner and exquisite courtesy
characteristic of those people who were of the old court, the secret of
which we seem to be losing from day to day, like so many other valuable
secrets--and in a voice which, though broken and trembling, was still
extremely sweet.
She seemed much pleased with me and looked at me very attentively for
a long while, apparently much moved.--A tear gathered in the corner of
her eye and rolled slowly down one of the deep wrinkles, where it dried
up and disappeared. She begged me to excuse her and said that I greatly
resembled a son who was killed in the army.
All the time that I remained at the chateau, I was treated by the dear
old lady with extraordinary, altogether motherly kindness because
of that resemblance, real or imaginary. I found more charm in that
condition of things than I anticipated at first, for the greatest favor
that elderly people can confer upon me is never to speak to me and to
leave the room when I enter it.
I will not tell you in detail what I did each day at R--. If I have
lingered a little over all this preliminary matter and have drawn with
some care these two or three physiognomies of persons and of places,
it is because I had there some very strange adventures, albeit very
natural and just what I ought to have foreseen when I donned the garb
of a man.
My natural light-headedness led me into an imprudence which I bitterly
repent, for it has brought trouble to a kind and loving heart, trouble
which I cannot allay without disclosing what I am and compromising
myself seriously.
In order to acquire masculine manners perfectly and to divert myself
a little, I could think of nothing better than to pay court to my
friend's sister.--It seemed very amusing to me to fall upon all
fours when she dropped her glove and to return it to her with humble
reverences, to lean over the back of her chair with an adorably
languorous expression, to whisper in her ear a thousand and one
flattering speeches of the most seductive description. Whenever she
passed from one room to another I gracefully offered my hand; if she
rode, I held her stirrup, and in walking I was always at her side; in
the evening I read to her and sang with her;--in short, I performed
with scrupulous accuracy all the functions of a cicisbeo.
I did everything that I had seen young men in love do, which amused me
and made me laugh like the genuine madcap that I am, when I was alone
in my chamber and reflected on all the impertinent remarks I had made
in the most serious tone imaginable.
Alcibiades and the old marchioness seemed to look upon the intimacy
with pleasure and left us together very often. I sometimes regretted
that I was not a man in order to take advantage of the tête-à-tête; if
I had been, it would have depended entirely upon me, for our charming
widow seemed to have forgotten the defunct entirely, or, if she
remembered him, she would readily have been unfaithful to his memory.
Having begun upon that line I could hardly draw back with honor, and
it was very difficult to effect a retreat with arms and stores; I
could not go beyond a certain limit, however, and I could hardly be
affectionate except in words:--I hoped to reach without mishap the end
of the month I was to pass at R--, and to retire with a promise to
return, intending to do nothing of the kind.--I thought that when I had
gone the fair widow would readily be consoled, and would soon forget me
when I was out of her sight.
But, while seeking only my own amusement, I had aroused a serious
passion, and things turned out differently:--which goes to prove a
truth that has long been well known, to wit, that one must never play
with fire or with love.
Before she fell in with me, Rosette had not known what love is.
Married very young to a man many years her senior, she had felt only
a sort of filial affection for him;--courted she had been, I doubt
not, but she had had no lover, incredible as it may appear: either
the gallants who had hitherto shown her attention were but moderately
attractive, or else, which is more probable, her hour had not yet
come.--The petty aristocrats and country squires who talked of nothing
but fertilizers and fumets, young boars and seven-year stags, hunting
cries and antlers, with an admixture of charades out of the almanac and
compliments moss-grown with age, were certainly not made to commend
themselves to her, and her virtue had not had to exert itself overmuch
in order not to yield to them.--Moreover, the natural gaiety and
playfulness of her disposition were a sufficient defence against love,
that sentimental passion that takes such strong hold of dreamers and
melancholy folk; the idea of sensual pleasure that her old Tithonus
had been able to give her was probably not sufficient to arouse any
great temptation to try it again, and she enjoyed in a mild way the
pleasure of being left a widow so early in life and of having so many
years to be pretty.
But on my arrival, there was a great change.--I thought at first
that if I had kept strictly within the limits of cold and scrupulous
courtesy, she would not have taken any notice of me; but really I was
obliged to admit afterward that it would have made no difference at
all, and that that supposition, although very modest, was entirely
without foundation.--Alas! nothing can turn aside the fatal horoscope,
and no one can avoid the influence, whether benignant or malignant, of
his star.
It was Rosette's destiny to love but once in her life, and with an
impossible passion; she must and she will accomplish her destiny.
I have been loved, O Graciosa, and it is a sweet experience, although
I have been loved only by a woman, and in such an unnatural love there
is something painful that there certainly cannot be in the other;--oh!
it is a very sweet experience!--When you wake in the night and rest
upon your elbow, to say to yourself: "Some one is thinking or dreaming
of me; my life is of interest to somebody; a movement of my eyes or my
mouth causes joy or sadness to another creature; a word I have let fall
at random is carefully treasured up, commented upon and dissected for
hours at a time; I am the pole toward which a restless magnet tends;
my eye is a heaven, my mouth a paradise more ardently longed for than
the real; if I should die, a warm shower of tears would keep my ashes
warm, my grave would be brighter with flowers than a wedding-feast; if
I were in danger, some one would throw himself between the point of the
sword and my breast and sacrifice himself for me!"--it is lovely, and I
cannot think what more one can desire in this world.
This thought caused me a feeling of pleasure for which I blamed myself,
for I had nothing to give in exchange for it all, and I was in the
position of a poor person who accepts presents from a rich and generous
friend, with no hope of ever being able to repay them. It delighted
me to be so adored and at times I gave myself up to it with strange
complaisance. By dint of hearing everybody call me _monsieur_ and of
being treated as if I were a man, I gradually forgot that I was a
woman; my disguise seemed to be my natural attire, and I forgot that
I had ever worn any other; I ceased to reflect that I was, after all,
only a little empty-headed creature who had made a sword of her needle
and a pair of breeches out of one of her petticoats.
Many men are more like women than I am.--There is little of the
woman about me except the breast, some more rounded outlines and
more delicate hands; the petticoat is on my hips, not in my mind. It
often happens that the sex of the mind is different from that of the
body, and that is a contradiction that cannot fail to produce much
confusion.--For example, if I myself had not made this resolution,
insane in appearance but very wise in reality, to renounce the costume
of a sex which is mine only materially and by accident, I should have
been very unhappy: I love horses, fencing, all violent exercises,
I like to climb and run about like a young boy; it tires me to sit
with my feet close together, my elbows glued to my sides, to lower my
eyes modestly, to speak in a little soft, sweet voice, and to pass
worsted through the holes in a piece of canvas ten million times;--I
do not like to obey the laws of society, and the words that are most
frequently on my tongue are: "I will."--Behind my smooth brow and
beneath my silky hair, strong and virile thoughts are constantly in
motion; all the precious nonsense that generally is most attractive to
women has never produced any but the slightest effect upon me, and,
like Achilles disguised as a girl, I would gladly lay aside my mirror
for a sword.--The only thing about women that attracts me is their
beauty;--notwithstanding the inconveniences that result from it, I
would not willingly give up my figure, although it is ill-sorted with
the spirit it encloses.
Such an intrigue was something novel and alluring, and I should have
been greatly entertained by it if it had not been taken so seriously
by poor Rosette. She set about loving me with admirable _naïveté_
and earnestness, with all the force of her dear, loving heart--with
a love of the sort that men do not understand, of which they cannot
form even a remote idea, a refined, ardent love; she loved me as I
would like to be loved if I should ever meet the reality of my dream.
What a priceless treasure wasted, what white, transparent pearls, such
as divers will never find in the jewel-chest of the sea! what sweet
breath, what soft sighs scattered through the air, which might have
been gathered by pure, loving lips!
That passion might have made a young man so happy! so many unfortunate
youths, handsome, charming, well endowed, full of heart and spirit,
have pleaded vainly on their knees with insensible, lifeless idols!
so many loving, tender souls have thrown themselves in despair into
the arms of prostitutes, or have burned out silently like a lamp in a
tomb, who might have been saved from debauchery and death by a sincere
passion!
What a strange thing is human destiny! and what an inveterate joker is
chance.
The thing that so many others had ardently desired came to me, who
did not, could not, want it. A whimsical young woman takes a fancy to
travel about the country in a man's clothes in order to find out a
little something as to what she is to expect on the part of her future
lovers; she sleeps at an inn with an excellent brother who leads her
by the end of the finger to his sister, who has nothing better to do
than to fall in love with her like a cat, like a dove, like whatever
is most amorous and languorous on earth.--It is very clear that, if I
had been a young man, and this condition of things could have been of
any service to me, it would have turned out very differently and the
lady would have taken a violent dislike to me.--Fortune loves to give
slippers to those who have wooden legs and gloves to those who have no
hands;--the inheritance that would have enabled you to live at your
ease, ordinarily falls in on the day of your death.
I went sometimes, not as often as she would have liked, to see Rosette
in her bed; although she does not usually receive until she is dressed,
an exception is made in my favor.--An exception would have been made in
my favor in many other respects, if I had wished;--but, as the saying
is, the most beautiful woman can give only what she has, and what I had
would have been of little service to Rosette.
She would give me her little hand to kiss;--I confess that it afforded
me some pleasure to kiss it, for it is very smooth, very white,
exquisitely perfumed, and made softer by a nascent moisture; I felt
it shiver and contract under my lips, whose pressure I maliciously
prolonged.--Thereupon Rosette, deeply moved and with a supplicating
air, would look up at me with her great eyes laden with desire and
flooded with a humid, transparent light, then she would let her
pretty head, which she had raised a little, the better to receive
me, fall back upon the pillow.--I could see her restless bosom
rise and fall under the sheet and her whole body suddenly begin to
tremble.--Certainly any one who was in a condition to dare might have
dared much, and it is equally certain that she would have been grateful
to him for his daring and would have thanked him for skipping a few
chapters of the novel.
I remained an hour or two with her, not releasing her hand which I had
rested on the coverlid; we had interminable, fascinating conversations;
for, although Rosette was much engrossed by her love, she believed
herself to be too sure of success, not to retain almost all her freedom
and playfulness of mind.--From time to time, however, her passion cast
a transparent veil of gentle melancholy over her gaiety, which made her
even more seductive.
Indeed, it might well have seemed an incredible thing that a young
beginner, as I seemed to be, should not be overjoyed at such good
fortune and profit by it to the utmost. Rosette was not so made that
she was likely to meet with very cruel rebuffs, and knowing no more
than she did about me, she relied upon her charms and upon my youth, in
default of my love.
However, as the situation was beginning to be prolonged a little beyond
the natural limits, she became anxious, and I had difficulty in
restoring her former feeling of security by redoubling my flattering
phrases and fine protestations. Two things about me surprised her,
and she noticed contradictions in my conduct which she could not
reconcile:--those two things were the warmth of my words and the
coldness of my actions.
You know better than any one, my dear Graciosa, that my friendship has
all the characteristics of a passion; it is sudden, ardent, intense,
exclusive, it has almost everything of love even to jealousy, and I had
for Rosette a friendship almost equal to my friendship for you.--One
might easily misunderstand it.--Rosette misunderstood it the more
completely because the coat I wore made it impossible for her to have
any other idea.
As I have never loved any man, the overflow of my affection has in
some sort spread through my friendships with girls and young men; I
plunge into them with the same earnestness and exaltation that I put
into everything I do, for it is impossible for me to be moderate in
anything, especially in anything touching the heart. In my eyes there
are only two classes of people, those I adore and those I abhor; all
others are to me as if they did not exist, and I would drive my horse
over them as I drive him over the high road; in my mind they stand on
the same footing with pavements and milestones.
I am naturally expansive and I have a very caressing
manner.--Sometimes, forgetting all that such demonstrations might seem
to mean, when I went to walk with Rosette I would put my arm about her
waist, as I used to do when you and I walked together in the deserted
path at the foot of my uncle's garden; or, as I leaned over the back
of her chair while she embroidered, I would twine around my fingers
the little stray hairs that grew upon her plump, round neck, or stroke
with the back of my hand her lovely hair held in place by the comb, and
increase its lustre--or indulge in some other of the endearments to
which, as you know, I am much addicted with my dear friends.
She was very far from attributing these caresses to simple friendship.
Friendship, as it is usually understood, does not go so far as that;
but, seeing that I went no farther, she was inwardly surprised and
did not know what to think; she decided finally that it was too great
timidity on my part, due to my extreme youth and lack of practice
in amorous intrigue, and that I must be encouraged by all sorts of
advances and proofs of good-will.
Consequently she took pains to arrange a multitude of opportunities for
tête-à-tête interviews in places well adapted to embolden me by their
solitude and seclusion from all noise and all interruption; she took me
to walk several times in the forest, to see if the voluptuous musings
and amorous desires ordinarily aroused in impressionable hearts by the
dense and propitious shade of the woods, could not be turned to her
advantage.
One day, after we had wandered a long while through a very picturesque
park that lay behind the chateau, and of which I knew only the portions
near the buildings, she led me through a narrow path that wound
capriciously among elder-bushes and hazels, to a little rustic cabin,
a sort of charcoal-kiln, built of round timbers laid transversely,
with a thatched roof and a door roughly made of five or six pieces of
wood almost unplaned, the interstices being stuffed with moss and wild
plants; close beside it, between the green roots of tall ash-trees with
silvery bark, marred by black spots here and there, was an abundant
spring, which, a few steps away, flowed down over two marble steps into
a basin filled with water-cresses greener than the emerald.--In the
spots where there were no cresses, you could see at the bottom fine
sand as white as snow; the water was as clear as crystal and as cold
as ice; coming suddenly from the earth and never receiving the faintest
ray of sunlight in that impenetrable shade, it had not time to become
warm or disturbed.--Despite its crudity, I love fresh spring water,
and seeing how clear that was, I could not resist the impulse to drink
some of it; I leaned over and drank several times from the hollow of my
hand, having no other vessel at my disposal.
Rosette expressed a desire to drink some of the water, too, to appease
her thirst, and asked me to bring her a few drops, being afraid, she
said, to lean over far enough to reach it.--I dipped my two hands,
joined as closely as possible, into the clear fountain, then put
them like a cup to Rosette's lips and held them there until she had
exhausted the water they contained, which was not long, for there was
very little of it, and much of that little dropped through my fingers,
although I held them close together; we made a very pretty group, and
it's a pity that a sculptor was not there to make a sketch of it.
When she had almost finished, having my hand so near her lips, she
could not refrain from kissing it, but in such a way that I might think
she was drawing in her breath to exhaust the last pearl of water
collected in my palm; but I was not deceived, and the charming blush
that covered her face betrayed her plainly enough.
She took my arm again and we walked on toward the cabin. The fair
widow walked as close to me as possible, and leaned toward me as she
spoke so that her breast was pressed against my sleeve; an extremely
shrewd position and certain to disturb the equanimity of any other than
myself; I could feel distinctly the pure, firm contour and the gentle
warmth; furthermore I could detect a hurried undulation, which, whether
it was genuine or affected, was none the less flattering and seductive.
We arrived thus at the door of the cabin, which I opened by pushing
with my foot; I certainly did not expect the spectacle that was
presented to my eyes.--I supposed that the hut was carpeted with
rushes, with possibly a mat on the ground and a stool or two to sit on.
Nothing of the sort.
It was a boudoir furnished with all imaginable luxury.--The spaces
above the doors and mirrors represented the most amorous scenes from
Ovid's Metamorphoses: Salmaces and Hermaphrodite, Venus and Adonis,
and Apollo and Daphne, and other mythological loves on plain lilac
cameo; the pier-glasses were covered with pompon roses carved with
great delicacy, and little marguerites, of which, by a refinement
of luxury, only the hearts were gilded, the leaves being silvered.
All the furniture was trimmed with silk cord, which was also used to
relieve hangings of the most delicate blue imaginable, marvellously
well adapted to bring out the whiteness and brilliancy of the skin;
the mantel was crowded with a thousand charming and curious things, as
were the consoles and _étagères_, and there was an abundant supply of
easy-chairs, reclining-chairs and sofas, which proved conclusively that
the retreat was not destined for the most austere avocations, and that
mortification of the flesh was not in vogue there.
A lovely clock in rock-work stood on a richly-incrusted bracket
opposite a large Venetian mirror, in which it was reflected with
strikingly brilliant effect. It had stopped, however, as if it were a
superfluous thing to mark the hours in a place where they were destined
to be forgotten.
I told Rosette that that refinement of luxury pleased me, that I
considered it extremely good taste to conceal the greatest elegance
under an appearance of simplicity, and that I strongly approved of a
woman wearing embroidered petticoats and chemises trimmed with lace,
with an outer garment of simple cloth; it was a delicate attention for
the lover that she had or might have, for which he would be grateful
beyond words, and that it certainly was better to put a diamond in a
walnut than a walnut in a gold box.
Rosette, to prove that she agreed with me, raised her dress slightly
and showed me the edge of a petticoat very richly embroidered with
great flowers and leaves; it rested entirely with me to be admitted
to the secret of greater interior splendors; but I did not ask to see
if the magnificence of the chemise equalled that of the petticoat; it
is probable that it did not fall short of it.--Rosette dropped the
skirt of her dress, sorry not to have shown more.--However, even that
exhibition had served to disclose the beginning of a perfectly-turned
calf, giving a most favorable idea of what was above.--The leg, which
she put forward, the better to show off her petticoat, was in very
truth miraculously graceful and shapely in its neat, tight-fitting
pearl-gray silk stocking, and the little heeled slipper, terminating in
a rosette of ribbon resembled the glass slipper worn by Cinderella.
I complimented her most sincerely upon it and told her that I could
hardly imagine a prettier leg or tinier foot.--To which she replied
with a frankness and ingenuousness altogether charming and very clever,
too:--
"That is true."