A STROLL............................................................................................................................................48

ALEXANDRE.......................................................................................................................................51

THE LOG ...............................................................................................................................................54

JULIE ROMAIN ....................................................................................................................................57

THE RONDOLI SISTERS....................................................................................................................62

The household lived frugally on the meager income derived from the husband's insignificant appointments.

Two children had been born of the marriage, and the earlier condition of the strictest economy had become

one of quiet, concealed, shamefaced misery, the poverty of a noble familywhich in spite of misfortune

Hector de Gribelin had been educated in the provinces, under the paternal roof, by an aged priest. His people

At twenty years of age they tried to find him a position, and he entered the Ministry of Marine as a clerk at

sixty pounds a year. He foundered on the rock of life like all those who have not been early prepared for its

rude struggles, who look at life through a mist, who do not know how to protect themselves, whose special

aptitudes and faculties have not been developed from childhood, whose early training has not developed the

rough energy needed for the battle of life or furnished them with tool or weapon.

He had, however, renewed the acquaintance of a few friends of his family elderly people, far behind the

times, and poor like himself, who lived in aristocratic streets, the gloomy thoroughfares of the Faubourg

Strangers to modern life, humble yet proud, these needy aristocrats lived in the upper stories of sleepy,

oldworld houses. From top to bottom of their dwellings the tenants were titled, but money seemed just as

Their eternal prejudices, absorption in their rank, anxiety lest they should lose caste, filled the minds and

thoughts of these families once so brilliant, now ruined by the idleness of the men of the family. Hector de

Gribelin met in this circle a young girl as well born and as poor as himself and married her.

For four years more the husband and wife, harassed by poverty, knew no other distraction than the Sunday

walk in the ChampsElysees and a few evenings at the theatre (amounting in all to one or two in the course

of the winter) which they owed to free passes presented by some comrade or other.

But in the spring of the following year some overtime work was entrusted to Hector de Gribelin by his chief,

"My dear Henrietta, we must indulge in some sort of festivitysay an outing for the children."

And after a long discussion it was decided that they should go and lunch one day in the country.

"Well," cried Hector, "once will not break us, so we'll hire a wagonette for you, the children and the maid.

Every evening, on his return from the office, Hector caught up his elder son, put him astride his leg, and,

And the youngster amused himself all day long by bestriding chairs, dragging them round the room and

The servant herself gazed at her master with awestruck eyes as she thought of him riding alongside the

carriage, and at mealtimes she listened with all her ears while he spoke of riding and recounted the exploits

of his youth, when he lived at home with his father. Oh, he had learned in a good school, and once he felt his

"If only they would give me a restive animal I should be all the better pleased. You'll see how well I can ride;

and if you like we'll come back by the ChampsElysees just as all the people are returning from the Bois. As

we shall make a good appearance, I shouldn't at all object to meeting some one from the ministry. That is all

On the day appointed the carriage and the riding horse arrived at the same moment before the door. Hector

went down immediately to examine his mount. He had had straps sewn to his trousers and flourished in his

He raised the horse's legs and felt them one after another, passed his hand over the animal's neck, flank and

hocks, opened his mouth, examined his teeth, declared his age; and then, the whole household having

collected round him, he delivered a discourse on the horse in general and the specimen before him in

When the rest of the party had taken their seats in the carriage he examined the saddlegirth; then, putting his

foot in the stirrup, he sprang to the saddle. The animal began to curvet and nearly threw his rider.

Then, when the horse had recovered his equanimity and the rider his nerve, the latter asked:

All looks were centered on him. He trotted in the English style, rising unnecessarily high in the saddle;

looking at times as if he were mounting into space. Sometimes he seemed on the point of falling forward on

His wife, holding one of the children on her knees, and the servant, who was carrying the other, continually

And the two boys, intoxicated by the motion of the carriage, by their delight and by the keen air, uttered shrill

cries. The horse, frightened by the noise they made, started off at a gallop, and while Hector was trying to

control his steed his hat fell off, and the driver had to get down and pick it up. When the equestrian had

They lunched on the grass in the Vesinet woods, having brought provisions with them in the carriage.

Although the driver was looking after the three horses, Hector rose every minute to see if his own lacked

"He's an unequal trotter," he declared. "He certainly shook me up a little at first, but, as you saw, I soon got

That spacious thoroughfare literally swarmed with vehicles of every kind, and on the sidewalks the

pedestrians were so numerous that they looked like two indeterminate black ribbons unfurling their length

from the Arc de Triomphe to the Place de la Concorde. A flood of sunlight played on this gay scene, making

the varnish of the carriages, the steel of the harness and the handles of the carriage doors shine with dazzling

An intoxication of life and motion seemed to have invaded this assemblage of human beings, carriages and

horses. In the distance the outlines of the Obelisk could be discerned in a cloud of golden vapor.

As soon as Hector's horse had passed the Arc de Triomphe he became suddenly imbued with fresh energy,

and, realizing that his stable was not far off, began to trot rapidly through the maze of wheels, despite all his

The carriage was now far behind. When the horse arrived opposite the Palais de l'Industrie he saw a clear

An old woman wearing an apron was crossing the road in leisurely fashion. She happened to be just in

Hector's way as he arrived on the scene riding at full speed. Powerless to control his mount, he shouted at the

She must have been deaf, for she continued peacefully on her way until the awful moment when, struck by

the horse's chest as by a locomotive under full steam, she rolled ten paces off, turning three somersaults on

A terrible jolt hurled him, as if shot from a gun, over his horse's ears and cast him into the arms of a

In the space of a second a furious, gesticulating, vociferating group had gathered round him. An old

gentleman with a white mustache, wearing a large round decoration, seemed particularly exasperated. He

"Confound it! When a man is as awkward as all that he should remain at home and not come killing people in

Four men arrived on the scene, carrying the old woman. She appeared to be dead. Her skin was like

"Take her to a druggist's," ordered the old gentleman, "and let us go to the commissary of police."

Hector started on his way with a policeman on either side of him, a third was leading his horse. A crowd

followed themand suddenly the wagonette appeared in sight. His wife alighted in consternation, the

servant lost her head, the children whimpered. He explained that he would soon be at home, that he had

knocked a woman down and that there was not much the matter. And his family, distracted with anxiety,

When they arrived before the commissary the explanation took place in few words. He gave his

nameHector de Gribelin, employed at the Ministry of Marine; and then they awaited news of the injured

woman. A policeman who had been sent to obtain information returned, saying that she had recovered

consciousness, but was complaining of frightful internal pain. She was a charwoman, sixtyfive years of age,

When he heard that she was not dead Hector regained hope and promised to defray her doctor's bill. Then he

hastened to the druggist's. The door way was thronged; the injured woman, huddled in an armchair, was

groaning. Her arms hung at her sides, her face was drawn. Two doctors were still engaged in examining her.

"This woman ought to be sent to a home. I know one where they would take her at six francs a day. Would

"It's all right. This Madame Simon is better already and will be quite well in two or three days. I have sent her

When he left his office the next day he went to inquire for Madame Simon. He found her eating rich soup

"Oh, sir," she replied, "I'm just the same. I feel sort of crushednot a bit better."

The doctor declared they must wait and see; some complication or other might arise.

Hector waited three days, then he returned. The old woman, freshfaced and cleareyed, began to whine

"I can't move, sir; I can't move a bit. I shall be like this for the rest of my days."

A shudder passed through Hector's frame. He asked for the doctor, who merely shrugged his shoulders and

"What can I do? I can't tell what's wrong with her. She shrieks when they try to raise her. They can't even

move her chair from one place to another without her uttering the most distressing cries. I am bound to

believe what she tells me; I can't look into her inside. So long as I have no chance of seeing her walk I am not

A week passed, then a fortnight, then a month. Madame Simon did not leave her armchair. She ate from

morning to night, grew fat, chatted gaily with the other patients and seemed to enjoy her immobility as if it

were the rest to which she was entitled after fifty years of going up and down stairs, of turning mattresses, of

Hector, at his wits' end, came to see her every day. Every day he found her calm and serene, declaring:

They dismissed the servant, whose wages they could no longer afford. They economized more rigidly than

Then Hector summoned four noted doctors, who met in consultation over the old woman. She let them

Then they took hold of her, raised her and dragged her a short distance, but she slipped from their grasp and

fell to the floor, groaning and giving vent to such heartrending cries that they carried her back to her seat with

They pronounced a guarded opinionagreeing, however, that work was an impossibility to her.

About halfpast five one afternoon at the end of June when the sun was shining warm and bright into the

large courtyard, a very elegant victoria with two beautiful black horses drew up in front of the mansion.

The Comtesse de Mascaret came down the steps just as her husband, who was coming home, appeared in the

carriage entrance. He stopped for a few moments to look at his wife and turned rather pale. The countess was

very beautiful, graceful and distinguished looking, with her long oval face, her complexion like yellow ivory,

her large gray eyes and her black hair; and she got into her carriage without looking at him, without even

seeming to have noticed him, with such a particularly highbred air, that the furious jealousy by which he

had been devoured for so long again gnawed at his heart. He went up to her and said: "You are going for a

Without being surprised at the tone in which she answered him, he got in and sat down by his wife's side and

said: "Bois de Boulogne." The footman jumped up beside the coachman, and the horses as usual pranced and

tossed their heads until they were in the street. Husband and wife sat side by side without speaking. He was

thinking how to begin a conversation, but she maintained such an obstinately hard look that he did not

venture to make the attempt. At last, however, he cunningly, accidentally as it were, touched the countess'

gloved hand with his own, but she drew her arm away with a movement which was so expressive of disgust

that he remained thoughtful, in spite of his usual authoritative and despotic character, and he said:

She did not reply, but remained lying back in the carriage, looking like an irritated queen. By that time they

were driving up the Champs Elysees, toward the Arc de Triomphe. That immense monument, at the end of

the long avenue, raised its colossal arch against the red sky and the sun seemed to be descending on it,

The stream of carriages, with dashes of sunlight reflected in the silver trappings of the harness and the glass

of the lamps, flowed on in a double current toward the town and toward the Bois, and the Comte de Mascaret

Unable to control herself any longer, she replied in an exasperated voice: "Oh! do leave me in peace, pray! I

am not even allowed to have my carriage to myself now." He pretended not to hear her and continued: "You

Her patience had come to an end, and she replied with irrepressible anger: "You are wrong to notice it, for I

The count was decidedly stupefied and upset, and, his violent nature gaining the upper hand, he exclaimed:

"What do you mean by that?" in a tone that betrayed rather the brutal master than the lover. She replied in a

low voice, so that the servants might not hear amid the deafening noise of the wheels: "Ah! What do I mean

by that? What do I mean by that? Now I recognize you again! Do you want me to tell everything?"

"Everything that has weighed on my heart since I have been the victim of your terrible selfishness?"

He had grown red with surprise and anger and he growled between his closed teeth: "Yes, tell me

He was a tall, broadshouldered man, with a big red beard, a handsome man, a nobleman, a man of the

world, who passed as a perfect husband and an excellent father, and now, for the first time since they had

started, she turned toward him and looked him full in the face: "Ah! You will hear some disagreeable things,

but you must know that I am prepared for everything, that I fear nothing, and you less than any one today."

He also was looking into her eyes and was already shaking with rage as he said in a low voice: "You are

"No, but I will no longer be the victim of the hateful penalty of maternity, which you have inflicted on me for

eleven years! I wish to take my place in society as I have the right to do, as all women have the right to do."

"Oh! yes; you understand me well enough. It is now three months since I had my last child, and as I am still

very beautiful, and as, in spite of all your efforts you cannot spoil my figure, as you just now perceived, when

you saw me on the doorstep, you think it is time that I should think of having another child."

"No, I am not, I am thirty, and I have had seven children, and we have been married eleven years, and you

hope that this will go on for ten years longer, after which you will leave off being jealous."

He seized her arm and squeezed it, saying: "I will not allow you to talk to me like that much longer."

"And I shall talk to you till the end, until I have finished all I have to say to you, and if you try to prevent me,

I shall raise my voice so that the two servants, who are on the box, may hear. I only allowed you to come

with me for that object, for I have these witnesses who will oblige you to listen to me and to contain yourself,

so now pay attention to what I say. I have always felt an antipathy to you, and I have always let you see it, for

I have never lied, monsieur. You married me in spite of myself; you forced my parents, who were in

embarrassed circumstances, to give me to you, because you were rich, and they obliged me to marry you in

"So you bought me, and as soon as I was in your power, as soon as I had become your companion, ready to

attach myself to you, to forget your coercive and threatening proceedings, in order that I might only

remember that I ought to be a devoted wife and to love you as much as it might be possible for me to love

you, you became jealous, you, as no man has ever been before, with the base, ignoble jealousy of a spy,

which was as degrading to you as it was to me. I had not been married eight months when you suspected me

of every perfidiousness, and you even told me so. What a disgrace! And as you could not prevent me from

being beautiful and from pleasing people, from being called in drawingrooms and also in the newspapers

one of the most beautiful women in Paris, you tried everything you could think of to keep admirers from me,

and you hit upon the abominable idea of making me spend my life in a constant state of motherhood, until the

time should come when I should disgust every man. Oh, do not deny it. I did not understand it for some time,

but then I guessed it. You even boasted about it to your sister, who told me of it, for she is fond of me and

"Ah! Remember how you have behaved in the past! How for eleven years you have compelled me to give up

all society and simply be a mother to your children. And then you would grow disgusted with me and I was

sent into the country, the family chateau, among fields and meadows. And when I reappeared, fresh, pretty

and unspoiled, still seductive and constantly surrounded by admirers, hoping that at last I should live a little

more like a rich young society woman, you were seized with jealousy again, and you began once more to

persecute me with that infamous and hateful desire from which you are suffering at this moment by my side.

And it is not the desire of possessing mefor I should never have refused myself to you, but it is the wish to

"And then that abominable and mysterious thing occurred which I was a long time in understanding (but I

grew sharp by dint of watching your thoughts and actions): You attached yourself to your children with all

the security which they gave you while I bore them. You felt affection for them, with all your aversion to me,

and in spite of your ignoble fears, which were momentarily allayed by your pleasure in seeing me lose my

"Oh! how often have I noticed that joy in you! I have seen it in your eyes and guessed it. You loved your

children as victories, and not because they were of your own blood. They were victories over me, over my

youth, over my beauty, over my charms, over the compliments which were paid me and over those that were

whispered around me without being paid to me personally. And you are proud of them, you make a parade of

them, you take them out for drives in your break in the Bois de Boulogne and you give them donkey rides at

Montmorency. You take them to theatrical matinees so that you may be seen in the midst of them, so that the

He had seized her wrist with savage brutality, and he squeezed it so violently that she was quiet and nearly

"I love my children, do you hear? What you have just told me is disgraceful in a mother. But you belong to

me; I am masteryour master I can exact from you what I like and when I likeand I have the lawon

He was trying to crush her fingers in the strong grip of his large, muscular hand, and she, livid with pain, tried

in vain to free them from that vise which was crushing them. The agony made her breathe hard and the tears

came into her eyes. "You see that I am the master and the stronger," he said. When he somewhat loosened his

"Do you think that I could lie if I swore to the truth of anything to you before an altar on which Christ's body

She raised her voice and said: "Philippe!" And the coachman, bending down a little, without taking his eyes

from his horses, seemed to turn his ear alone toward his mistress, who continued: "Drive to St. Philippedu

Roule." And thevictoria, which had reached the entrance of the Bois de Boulogne returned to Paris.

Husband and wife (did riot exchange a word further during the drive, and when the carriage stopped before

the church Madame de Mascaret jumped out and entered it, followed by the count, a few yards distant. She

went, without stopping, as far as the choirscreen, and falling on her knees at a chair, she buried her face in

her hands. She prayed for a long time, and he, standing behind her could see that she was crying. She wept

noiselessly, as women weep when they are in great, poignant grief. There was a kind of undulation in her

But the Comte de Mascaret thought that the situation was lasting too long, and he touched her on the

shoulder. That contact recalled her to herself, as if she had been burned, and getting up, she looked straight

into his eyes. "This is what I have to say to you. I am afraid of nothing, whatever you may do to me. You may

kill me if you like. One of your children is not yours, and one only; that I swear to you before God, who hears

me here. That was the only revenge that was possible for me in return for all your abominable masculine

tyrannies, in return for the penal servitude of childbearing to which you have condemned me. Who was my

lover? That you never will know! You may suspect every one, but you never will find out. I gave myself to

him, without love and without pleasure, only for the sake of betraying you, and he also made me a mother.

Which is the child? That also you never will know. I have seven; try to find out! I intended to tell you this

later, for one has not avenged oneself on a man by deceiving him, unless he knows it. You have driven me to

She hurried through the church toward the open door, expecting to hear behind her the quick step: of her

husband whom she had defied and to be knocked to the ground by a blow of his fist, but she heard nothing

and reached her carriage. She jumped into it at a bound, overwhelmed with anguish and breathless with fear.

So she called out to the coachman: "Home!" and the horses set off at a quick trot.

The Comtesse de Mascaret was waiting in her room for dinner time as a criminal sentenced to death awaits

the hour of his execution. What was her husband going to do? Had he come home? Despotic, passionate,

ready for any violence as he was, what was he meditating, what had he made up his mind to do? There was

no sound in the house, and every moment she looked at the clock. Her lady's maid had come and dressed her

for the evening and had then left the room again. Eight o'clock struck and almost at the same moment there

For a little moment she felt inclined to arm herself with a small revolver which she had bought some time

before, foreseeing the tragedy which was being rehearsed in her heart. But she remembered that all the

children would be there, and she took nothing except a bottle of smelling salts. He rose somewhat

ceremoniously from his chair. They exchanged a slight bow and sat down. The three boys with their tutor,

Abbe Martin, were on her right and the three girls, with Miss Smith, their English governess, were on her left.

The youngest child, who was only three months old, remained upstairs with his nurse.

The abbe said grace as usual when there was no company, for the children did not come down to dinner when

guests were present. Then they began dinner. The countess, suffering from emotion, which she had not

calculated upon, remained with her eyes cast down, while the count scrutinized now the three boys and now

the three girls. with an uncertain, unhappy expression, which travelled from one to the other. Suddenly

pushing his wineglass from him, it broke, and the wine was spilt on the tablecloth, and at the slight noise

caused by this little accident the countess started up from her chair; and for the first time they looked at each

other. Then, in spite of themselves, in spite of the irritation of their nerves caused by every glance, they

The abbe, who felt that there was some cause for embarrassment which he could not divine, attempted to

begin a conversation and tried various subjects, but his useless efforts gave rise to no ideas and did not bring

out a word. The countess, with feminine tact and obeying her instincts of a woman of the world, attempted to

answer him two or three times, but in vain. She could not find words, in the perplexity of her mind, and her

own voice almost frightened her in the silence of the large room, where nothing was heard except the slight

Suddenly her husband said to her, bending forward: "Here, amid your children, will you swear to me that

The hatred which was fermenting in her veins suddenly roused her, and replying to that question with the

same firmness with which she had replied to his looks, she raised both her hands, the right pointing toward

the boys and the left toward the girls, and said in a firm, resolute voice and without any hesitation: "On the

He got up and throwing his table napkin on the table with a movement of exasperation, he turned round and

flung his chair against the wall, and then went out without another word, while she, uttering a deep sigh, as if

after a first victory, went on in a calm voice: "You must not pay any attention to what your father has just

said, my darlings; he was very much upset a short time ago, but he will be all right again in a few days."

Then she talked with the abbe and Miss Smith and had tender, pretty words for all her children, those sweet,

When dinner was over she went into the drawingroom, all her children following her. She made the elder

ones chatter, and when their bedtime came she kissed them for a long time and then went alone into her

She waited, for she had no doubt that the count would come, and she made up her mind then, as her children

were not with her, to protect herself as a woman of the world as she would protect her life, and in the pocket

of her dress she put the little loaded revolver which she had bought a few days previously. The hours went

by, the hours struck, and every sound was hushed in the house. Only the cabs, continued to rumble through

the streets, but their noise was only heard vaguely through the shuttered and curtained windows.

She waited, full of nervous energy, without any fear of him now, ready for anything, and almost triumphant,

for she had found means of torturing him continually during every moment of his life.

But the first gleam of dawn came in through the fringe at the bottom of her curtain without his having come

into her room, and then she awoke to the fact, with much amazement, that he was not coming. Having locked

and bolted her door, for greater security, she went to bed at last and remained there, with her eyes open,

thinking and barely understanding it all, without being able to guess what he was going to do.

When her maid brought her tea she at the same time handed her a letter from her husband. He told her that he

was going to undertake a longish journey and in a postscript added that his lawyer would provide her with

It was at the opera, between two acts of "Robert the Devil." In the stalls the men were standing up, with their

hats on, their waistcoats cut very low so as to show a large amount of white shirt front, in which gold and

jewelled studs glistened, and were looking at the boxes full of ladies in low dresses covered with diamonds

and pearls, who were expanding like flowers in that illuminated hothouse, where the beauty of their faces and

the whiteness of their shoulders seemed to bloom in order to be gazed at, amid the sound of the music and of

Two friends, with their backs to the orchestra, were scanning those rows of elegance, that exhibition of real or

false charms, of jewels, of luxury and of pretension which displayed itself in all parts of the Grand Theatre,

The older man in turn looked through his opera glasses at a tall lady in a box opposite. She appeared to be

still very young, and her striking beauty seemed to attract all eyes in every corner of the house. Her pale

complexion, of an ivory tint, gave her the appearance of a statue, while a small diamond coronet glistened on

When he had looked at her for some time, Bernard Grandin replied with a jocular accent of sincere

"Wait a moment. I can tell you exactly, for I have known her since she was a child and I saw her make her

"And what is more, they are all seven alive, as she is a very good mother. I occasionally go to the house,

which is a very quiet and pleasant one, where one may see the phenomenon of the family in the midst of

"Yes and no. Very likely there has been a little drama between them, one of those little domestic dramas

"I do not know anything about it. Mascaret leads a very fast life now, after being a model husband. As long as

he remained a good spouse he had a shocking temper, was crabbed and easily took offence, but since he has

been leading his present wild life he has become quite different, But one might surmise that he has some

Thereupon the two friends talked philosophically for some minutes about the secret, unknowable troubles

which differences of character or perhaps physical antipathies, which were not perceived at first, give rise to

in families, and then Roger de Salnis, who was still looking at Madame de Mascaret through his opera

glasses, said: "It is almost incredible that that woman can have had seven children!"

"Yes, in eleven years; after which, when she was thirty, she refused to have any more, in order to take her

"Why? Ah! my dear fellow, just consider! Eleven years in a condition of motherhood for such a woman!

What a hell! All her youth, all her beauty, every hope of success, every poetical ideal of a brilliant life

sacrificed to that abominable law of reproduction which turns the normal woman into a mere machine for

"Yes, but I say that Nature is our enemy, that we must always fight against Nature, for she is continually

bringing us back to an animal state. You may be sure that God has not put anything on this earth that is clean,

pretty, elegant or accessory to our ideal; the human brain has done it. It is man who has introduced a little

grace, beauty, unknown charm and mystery into creation by singing about it, interpreting it, by admiring it as

a poet, idealizing it as an artist and by explaining it through science, doubtless making mistakes, but finding

ingenious reasons, hidden grace and beauty, unknown charm and mystery in the various phenomena of

Nature. God created only coarse beings, full of the germs of disease, who, after a few years of bestial

enjoyment, grow old and infirm, with all the ugliness and all the want of power of human decrepitude. He

seems to have made them only in order that they may reproduce their species in an ignoble manner and then

die like ephemeral insects. I said reproduce their species in an ignoble manner and I adhere to that expression.

What is there as a matter of fact more ignoble and more repugnant than that act of reproduction of living

beings, against which all delicate minds always have revolted and always will revolt? Since all the organs

which have been invented by this economical and malicious Creator serve two purposes, why did He not

choose another method of performing that sacred mission, which is the noblest and the most exalted of all

human functions? The mouth, which nourishes the body by means of material food, also diffuses abroad

speech and thought. Our flesh renews itself of its own accord, while we are thinking about it. The olfactory

organs, through which the vital air reaches the lungs, communicate all the perfumes of the world to the brain:

the smell of flowers, of woods, of trees, of the sea. The ear, which enables us to communicate with our fellow

men, has also allowed us to invent music, to create dreams, happiness, infinite and even physical pleasure by

means of sound! But one might say that the cynical and cunning Creator wished to prohibit man from ever

ennobling and idealizing his intercourse with women. Nevertheless man has found love, which is not a bad

reply to that sly Deity, and he has adorned it with so much poetry that woman often forgets the sensual part of

it. Those among us who are unable to deceive themselves have invented vice and refined debauchery, which

is another way of laughing at God and paying homage, immodest homage, to beauty.

"But the normal man begets children just like an animal coupled with another by law.

"Look at that woman! Is it not abominable to think that such a jewel, such a pearl, born to be beautiful,

admired, feted and adored, has spent eleven years of her life in providing heirs for the Comte de Mascaret?"

Bernard Grandin replied with a laugh: "There is a great deal of truth in all that, but very few people would

Salnis became more and more animated. "Do you know how I picture God myself?" he said. "As an

enormous, creative organ beyond our ken, who scatters millions of worlds into space, just as one single fish

would deposit its spawn in the sea. He creates because it is His function as God to do so, but He does not

know what He is doing and is stupidly prolific in His work and is ignorant of the combinations of all kinds

which are produced by His scattered germs. The human mind is a lucky little local, passing accident which

was totally unforeseen, and condemned to disappear with this earth and to recommence perhaps here or

elsewhere the same or different with fresh combinations of eternally new beginnings. We owe it to this little

lapse of intelligence on His part that we are very uncomfortable in this world which was not made for us,

which had not been prepared to receive us, to lodge and feed us or to satisfy reflecting beings, and we owe it

to Him also that we have to struggle without ceasing against what are still called the designs of Providence,

Grandin, who was listening to him attentively as he had long known the surprising outbursts of his

imagination, asked him: "Then you believe that human thought is the spontaneous product of blind divine

"Naturally! A fortuitous function of the nerve centres of our brain, like the unforeseen chemical action due to

new mixtures and similar also to a charge of electricity, caused by friction or the unexpected proximity of

some substance, similar to all phenomena caused by the infinite and fruitful fermentation of living matter.

"But, my dear fellow, the truth of this must be evident to any one who looks about him. If the human mind,

ordained by an omniscient Creator, had been intended to be what it has become, exacting, inquiring, agitated,

tormentedso different from mere animal thought and resignationwould the world which was created to

receive the beings which we now are have been this unpleasant little park for small game, this salad patch,

this wooded, rocky and spherical kitchen garden where your improvident Providence had destined us to live

naked, in caves or under trees, nourished on the flesh of slaughtered animals, our brethren, or on raw

"But it is sufficient to reflect for a moment, in order to understand that this world was not made for such

creatures as we are. Thought, which is developed by a miracle in the nerves of the cells in our brain,

powerless, ignorant and confused as it is, and as it will always remain, makes all of us who are intellectual

"Look at this earth, as God has given it to those who inhabit it. Is it not visibly and solely made, planted and

covered with forests for the sake of animals? What is there for us? Nothing. And for them, everything, and

they have nothing to do but to eat or go hunting and eat each other, according to their instincts, for God never

foresaw gentleness and peaceable manners; He only foresaw the death of creatures which were bent on

destroying and devouring each other. Are not the quail, the pigeon and the partridge the natural prey of the

hawk? the sheep, the stag and the ox that of the great flesheating animals, rather than meat to be fattened

and served up to us with truffles, which have been unearthed by pigs for our special benefit?

"As to ourselves, the more civilized, intellectual and refined we are, the more we ought to conquer and

subdue that animal instinct, which represents the will of God in us. And so, in order to mitigate our lot as

brutes, we have discovered and made everything, beginning with houses, then exquisite food, sauces,

sweetmeats, pastry, drink, stuffs, clothes, ornaments, beds, mattresses, carriages, railways and innumerable

machines, besides arts and sciences, writing and poetry. Every ideal comes from us as do all the amenities of

life, in order to make our existence as simple reproducers, for which divine Providence solely intended us,

"Look at this theatre. Is there not here a human world created by us, unforeseen and unknown to eternal fate,

intelligible to our minds alone, a sensual and intellectual distraction, which has been invented solely by and

"Look at that woman, Madame de Mascaret. God intended her to live in a cave, naked or wrapped up in the

skins of wild animals. But is she not better as she is? But, speaking of her, does any one know why and how

her brute of a husband, having such a companion by his side, and especially after having been boorish enough

to make her a mother seven times, has suddenly left her, to run after bad women?"

Grandin replied: "Oh! my dear fellow, this is probably the only reason. He found that raising a family was

becoming too expensive, and from reasons of domestic economy he has arrived at the same principles which

Just then the curtain rose for the third act, and they turned round, took off their hats and sat down.

The Comte and Comtesse Mascaret were sitting side by side in the carriage which was taking them home

from the Opera, without speaking but suddenly the husband said to his wife: "Gabrielle!"

"The horrible punishment to which you have condemned me for the last six years?"

"Think that I can no longer see my children or feel them round me, without having my heart burdened with

this doubt. Tell me which of them it is, and I swear that I will forgive you and treat it like the others."

"Do you not see that I can no longer endure this life, this thought which is wearing me out, or this question

which I am constantly asking myself, this question which tortures me each time I look at them? It is driving

"Terribly. Should I, without that, have accepted the horror of living by your side, and the still greater horror

of feeling and knowing that there is one among them whom I cannot recognize and who prevents me from

"Yes, for do I not tell you every day that it is intolerable torture to me? Should I have remained in that house,

near you and them, if I did not love them? Oh! You have behaved abominably toward me. All the affection of

my heart I have bestowed upon my children, and that you know. I am for them a father of the olden time, as I

was for you a husband of one of the families of old, for by instinct I have remained a natural man, a man of

former days. Yes, I will confess it, you have made me terribly jealous, because you are a woman of another

race, of another soul, with other requirements. Oh! I shall never forget the things you said to me, but from

that day I troubled myself no more about you. I did not kill you, because then I should have had no means on

earth of ever discovering which of ourof your children is not mine. I have waited, but I have suffered more

than you would believe, for I can no longer venture to love them, except, perhaps, the two eldest; I no longer

venture to look at them, to call them to me, to kiss them; I cannot take them on my knee without asking

myself, 'Can it be this one?' I have been correct in my behavior toward you for six years, and even kind and

He thought, in spite of the darkness of the carriage, that he could perceive that she was moved, and feeling

certain that she was going to speak at last, he said: "I beg you, I beseech you to tell me" he said.

"I have been more guilty than you think perhaps," she replied, "but I could no longer endure that life of

continual motherhood, and I had only one means of driving you from me. I lied before God and I lied, with

He seized her arm in the darkness, and squeezing it as he had done on that terrible day of their drive in the

But, wild with grief, he said with a groan: "I shall have fresh doubts that will never end! When did you lie,

the last time or now? How am I to believe you at present? How can one believe a woman after that? I shall

never again know what I am to think. I would rather you had said to me, 'It is Jacques or it is Jeanne.'"

The carriage drove into the courtyard of the house and when it had drawn up in front of the steps the count

alighted first, as usual, and offered his wife his arm to mount the stairs. As soon as they reached the first floor

he said: "May I speak to you for a few moments longer?" And she replied, "I am quite willing."

They went into a small drawingroom and a footman, in some surprise, lighted the wax candles. As soon as

he had left the room and they were alone the count continued: "How am I to know the truth? I have begged

you a thousand times to speak, but you have remained dumb, impenetrable, inflexible, inexorable, and now

today you tell me that you have been lying. For six years you have actually allowed me to believe such a

thing! No, you are lying now, I do not know why, but out of pity for me, perhaps?"

She replied in a sincere and convincing manner: "If I had not done so, I should have had four more children

"Oh!" she replied, "I do not feel that I am the mother of children who never have been born; it is enough for

me to be the mother of those that I have and to love them with all my heart. I am a woman of the civilized

world, monsieurwe all areand we are no longer, and we refuse to be, mere females to restock the earth."

She got up, but he seized her hands. "Only one word, Gabrielle. Tell me the truth!"

He looked her full in the face, and how beautiful she was, with her gray eyes, like the cold sky. In her dark

hair sparkled the diamond coronet, like a radiance. He suddenly felt, felt by a kind of intuition, that this grand

creature was not merely a being destined to perpetuate the race, but the strange and mysterious product of all

our complicated desires which have been accumulating in us for centuries but which have been turned aside

from their primitive and divine object and have wandered after a mystic, imperfectly perceived and intangible

beauty. There are some women like that, who blossom only for our dreams, adorned with every poetical

attribute of civilization, with that ideal luxury, coquetry and esthetic charm which surround woman, a living

Her husband remained standing before her, stupefied at his tardy and obscure discovery, confusedly hitting

on the cause of his former jealousy and understanding it all very imperfectly, and at last lie said: "I believe

you, for I feel at this moment that you are not lying, and before I really thought that you were."

He took her hand and kissed it and replied: "We are friends. Thank you, Gabrielle."

Then he went out, still looking at her, and surprised that she was still so beautiful and feeling a strange

He was a clerk in the Bureau of Public Education and lived at Batignolles. He took the omnibus to Paris

She was employed in a shop and went in at the same time every day. She was a little brunette, one of those

girls whose eyes are so dark that they look like black spots, on a complexion like ivory. He always saw her

coming at the corner of the same street, and she generally had to run to catch the heavy vehicle, and sprang

upon the steps before the horses had quite stopped. Then she got inside, out of breath, and, sitting down,

The first time that he saw her, Francois Tessier liked the face. One sometimes meets a woman whom one

longs to clasp in one's arms without even knowing her. That girl seemed to respond to some chord in his

being, to that sort of ideal of love which one cherishes in the depths of the heart, without knowing it.

He looked at her intently, not meaning to be rude, and she became embarrassed and blushed. He noticed it,

and tried to turn away his eyes; but he involuntarily fixed them upon her again every moment, although he

tried to look in another direction; and, in a few days, they seemed to know each other without having spoken.

He gave up his place to her when the omnibus was full, and got outside, though he was very sorry to do it. By

this time she had got so far as to greet him with a little smile; and, although she always dropped her eyes

under his looks, which she felt were too ardent, yet she did not appear offended at being looked at in such a

They ended by speaking. A kind of rapid friendship had become established between them, a daily

freemasonry of half an hour, and that was certainly one of the most charming half hours in his life to him. He

thought of her all the rest of the day, saw her image continually during the long office hours. He was haunted

and bewitched by that floating and yet tenacious recollection which the form of a beloved woman leaves in

us, and it seemed to him that if he could win that little person it would be maddening happiness to him,

Every morning she now shook hands with him, and he preserved the sense of that touch and the recollection

of the gentle pressure of her little fingers until the next day, and he almost fancied that he preserved the

imprint on his palm. He anxiously waited for this short omnibus ride, while Sundays seemed to him

heartbreaking days. However, there was no doubt that she loved him, for one Saturday, in spring, she

She was at the railway station first, which surprised him, but she said: "Before going, I want to speak to you.

We have twenty minutes, and that is more than I shall take for what I have to say."

She trembled as she hung on his arm, and looked down, her cheeks pale, as she continued: "I do not want you

to be deceived in me, and I shall not go there with you, unless you promise, unless you swearnot to

She had suddenly become as red as a poppy, and said no more. He did not know what to reply, for he was

happy and disappointed at the same time. He should love her less, certainly, if he knew that her conduct was

light, but then it would be so charming, so delicious to have a little flirtation.

As he did not say anything, she began to speak again in an agitated voice and with tears in her eyes. "If you

do not promise to respect me altogether, I shall return home." And so he squeezed her arm tenderly and

replied: "I promise, you shall only do what you like." She appeared relieved in mind, and asked, with a smile:

"Do you really mean it?" And he looked into her eyes and replied: "I swear it" "Now you may take the

During the journey they could hardly speak, as the carriage was full, and when they reached MaisonsLaffite

they went toward the Seine. The sun, which shone full on the river, on the leaves and the grass, seemed to be

reflected in their hearts, and they went, hand in hand, along the bank, looking at the shoals of little fish

swimming near the bank, and they walked on, brimming over with happiness, as if they were walking on air.

"Certainly not; it is quite natural." "No, no; it is not natural for me because I do not wish to commit a fault,

and yet this is how girls fall. But if you only knew how wretched it is, every day the same thing, every day in

the month and every month in the year. I live quite alone with mamma, and as she has had a great deal of

trouble, she is not very cheerful. I do the best I can, and try to laugh in spite of everything, but I do not

always succeed. But, all the same, it was wrong in me to come, though you, at any rate, will not be sorry."

By way of an answer, he kissed her ardently on the ear that was nearest him, but she moved from him with an

abrupt movement, and, getting suddenly angry, exclaimed: "Oh! Monsieur Francois, after what you swore to

They had lunch at the PetitHavre, a low house, buried under four enormous poplar trees, by the side of the

river. The air, the heat, the weak white wine and the sensation of being so close together made them silent;

their faces were flushed and they had a feeling of oppression; but, after the coffee, they regained their high

spirits, and, having crossed the Seine, started off along the bank, toward the village of La Frette. Suddenly he

The girl picked daisies and made them into a great bunch, while he sang vigorously, as unrestrained as a colt

that has been turned into a meadow. On their left a vinecovered slope followed the river. Francois stopped

The vines had come to an end, and the whole slope was covered with lilac bushes in flower. It was a purple

wood! A kind of great carpet of flowers stretched over the earth, reaching as far as the village, more than two

miles off. She also stood, surprised and delighted, and murmured: "Oh! how pretty!" And, crossing a

meadow, they ran toward that curious low hill, which, every year, furnishes all the lilac that is drawn through

There was a narrow path beneath the trees, so they took it, and when they came to a small clearing, sat down.

Swarms of flies were buzzing around them and making a continuous, gentle sound, and the sun, the bright

sun of a perfectly still day, shone over the bright slopes and from that forest of blossoms a powerful fragrance

A church clock struck in the distance, and they embraced gently, then, without the knowledge of anything but

that kiss, lay down on the grass. But she soon came to herself with the feeling of a great misfortune, and

He tried to console her, but she wanted to start to return and to go home immediately; and she kept saying, as

He said to her: "Louise! Louise! Please let us stop here." But now her cheeks were red and her eyes hollow,

and, as soon as they got to the railway station in Paris, she left him without even saying goodby.

When he met her in the omnibus, next day, she appeared to him to be changed and thinner, and she said to

"We must bid each other goodby; I cannot meet you again." "But why?" he asked. "Because I cannot; I have

Then he implored her, tortured by his love, but she replied firmly: "No, I cannot, I cannot." He, however,

only grew all the more excited and promised to marry her, but she said again: "No," and left him.

For a week he did not see her. He could not manage to meet her, and, as he did not know her address, he

thought that he had lost her altogether. On the ninth day, however, there was a ring at his bell, and when he

opened the door, she was there. She threw herself into his arms and did not resist any longer, and for three

months they were close friends. He was beginning to grow tired of her, when she whispered something to

him, and then he had one idea and wish: to break with her at any price. As, however, he could not do that, not

knowing how to begin, or what to say, full of anxiety through fear of the consequences of his rash

indiscretion, he took a decisive step: one night he changed his lodgings and disappeared.

The blow was so heavy that she did not look, for the man who had abandoned her, but threw herself at her

mother's knees and confessed her misfortune, and, some months after, gave birth to a boy.

Years passed, and Francois Tessier grew old, without there having been any alteration in his life. He led the

dull, monotonous life of an office clerk, without hope and without expectation. Every day he got up at the

same time, went through the same streets, went through the same door, past the same porter, went into the

same office, sat in the same chair, and did the same work. He was alone in the world, alone during the day in

the midst of his different colleagues, and alone at night in his bachelor's lodgings, and he laid by a hundred

Every Sunday he went to the ChampsElysees, to watch the elegant people, the carriages and the pretty

women, and the next day he used to say to one of his colleagues: "The return of the carriages from the Bois

du Boulogne was very brilliant yesterday." One fine Sunday morning, however, he went into the Parc

Monceau, where the mothers and nurses, sitting on the sides of the walks, watched the children playing, and

suddenly Francois Tessier started. A woman passed by, holding two children by the hand, a little boy of

He walked another hundred yards anti then fell into a chair, choking with emotion. She had not recognized

him, and so he came back, wishing to see her again. She was sitting down now, and the boy was standing by

her side very quietly, while the little girl was making sand castles. It was she, it was certainly she, but she had

the reserved appearance of a lady, was dressed simply, and looked selfpossessed and dignified. He looked at

her from a distance, for he did not venture to go near; but the little boy raised his head, and Francois Tessier

felt himself tremble. It was his own son, there could be no doubt of that. And, as he looked at him, he thought

he could recognize himself as he appeared in an old photograph taken years ago. He remained hidden behind

He did not sleep that night. The idea of the child especially tormented him. His son! Oh, if he could only have

known, have been sure! But what could he have done? However, he went to the house where she lived and

asked about her. He was told that a neighbor, an honorable man of strict morals, had been touched by her

distress and had married her; he knew the fault she had committed and had married her, and had even

He returned to the Parc Monceau every Sunday, for then he always saw her, and each time he was seized with

a mad, an irresistible longing to take his son into his arms, to cover him with kisses and to steal him, to carry

He suffered horribly in his wretched isolation as an old bachelor, with nobody to care for him, and he also

suffered atrocious mental torture, torn by paternal tenderness springing from remorse, longing and jealousy

and from that need of loving one's own children which nature has implanted in all. At last he determined to

make a despairing attempt, and, going up to her, as she entered the park, he said, standing in the middle of the

path, pale and with trembling lips: "You do not recognize me." She raised her eyes, looked at him, uttered an

exclamation of horror, of terror, and, taking the two children by the hand, she rushed away, dragging them

Months passed without his seeing her again, but he suffered, day and night, for he was a prey to his paternal

love. He would gladly have died, if he could only have kissed his son; he would have committed murder,

performed any task, braved any danger, ventured anything. He wrote to her, but she did not reply, and, after

writing her some twenty letters, he saw that there was no hope of altering her determination, and then he

formed the desperate resolution of writing to her husband, being quite prepared to receive a bullet from a

"Monsieur: You must have a perfect horror of my name, but I am so wretched, so overcome by misery that

my only hope is in you, and, therefore, I venture to request you to grant me an interview of only five minutes.

As he went up the staircase, Francois Tessier's heart beat so violently that he had to stop several times. There

was a dull and violent thumping noise in his breast, as of some animal galloping; and he could breathe only

He rang the bell on the third floor, and when a maid servant had opened the door, he asked: "Does Monsieur

He was shown into the drawingroom; he was alone, and waited, feeling bewildered, as in the midst of a

catastrophe, until a door opened, and a man came in. He was tall, serious and rather stout, and wore a black

frock coat, and pointed to a chair with his hand. Francois Tessier sat down, and then said, with choking

breath: "MonsieurmonsieurI do not know whether you know my namewhether you know"

Monsieur Flamel interrupted him. "You need not tell it me, monsieur, I know it. My wife has spoken to me

about you." He spoke in the dignified tone of voice of a good man who wishes to be severe, and with the

"Well, monsieur, I want to say this: I am dying of grief, of remorse, of shame, and I would like once, only

Monsieur Flamel got up and rang the bell, and when the servant came in, he said: "Will you bring Louis

here?" When she had gone out, they remained face to face, without speaking, as they had nothing more to say

to one another, and waited. Then, suddenly, a little boy of ten rushed into the room and ran up to the man

whom he believed to be his father, but he stopped when he saw the stranger, and Monsieur Flamel kissed him

and said: "Now, go and kiss that gentleman, my dear." And the child went up to the stranger and looked at

Francois Tessier had risen. He let his hat fall, and was ready to fall himself as he looked at his son, while

Monsieur Flamel had turned away, from a feeling of delicacy, and was looking out of the window.

The child waited in surprise; but he picked up the hat and gave it to the stranger. Then Francois, taking the

child up in his arms, began to kiss him wildly all over his face; on his eyes, his cheeks, his mouth, his hair;

and the youngster, frightened at the shower of kisses, tried to avoid them, turned away his head, and pushed

away the man's face with his little hands. But suddenly Francois Tessier put him down and cried: "Goodby!

Some people are Freethinkers from sheer stupidity. My Uncle Sosthenes was one of these. Some people are

often religious for the same reason. The very sight of a priest threw my uncle into a violent rage. He would

shake his fist and make grimaces at him, and would then touch a piece of iron when the priest's back was

turned, forgetting that the latter action showed a belief after all, the belief in the evil eye. Now, when beliefs

are unreasonable, one should have all or none at all. I myself am a Freethinker; I revolt at all dogmas, but feel

no anger toward places of worship, be they Catholic, Apostolic, Roman, Protestant, Greek, Russian,

My uncle was a Freemason, and I used to declare that they are stupider than old women devotees. That is my

opinion, and I maintain it; if we must have any religion at all, the old one is good enough for me.

What is their object? Mutual help to be obtained by tickling the palms of each other's hands. I see no harm in

it, for they put into practice the Christian precept: "Do unto others as ye would they should do unto you." The

only difference consists in the tickling, but it does not seem worth while to make such a fuss about lending a

"We are raising up a religion against a religion; Free Thought will kill clericalism. Freemasonry is the

"Very well, my dear uncle," I would replyin my heart I felt inclined to say, "You old idiot! it is just that

which I am blaming you for. Instead of destroying, you are organizing competition; it is only a case of

lowering prices. And then, if you admitted only Freethinkers among you, I could understand it, but you admit

anybody. You have a number of Catholics among you, even the leaders of the party. Pius IX is said to have

been one of you before he became pope. If you call a society with such an organization a bulwark against

"My dear boy," my uncle would reply, with a wink, "we are most to be dreaded in politics; slowly and surely

Then I broke out: "Yes, you are very clever! If you tell me that Freemasonry is an election machine, I will

grant it. I will never deny that it is used as a machine to control candidates of all shades; if you say that it is

only used to hoodwink people, to drill them to go to the polls as soldiers are sent under fire, I agree with you;

if you declare that it is indispensable to all political ambitions because it changes all its members into

electoral agents, I should say to you: 'That is as clear as the sun.' But when you tell me that it serves to

"Just consider that gigantic and secret democratic association which had Prince Napoleon for its grand master

under the Empire; which has the Crown Prince for its grand master in Germany, the Czar's brother in Russia,

and to which the Prince of Wales and King Humbert, and nearly all the crowned heads of the globe belong."

"You are quite right," my uncle said; "but all these persons are serving our projects without guessing it."

It was, however, indeed a sight to see my uncle when he had a Freemason to dinner.

On meeting they shook hands in a manner that was irresistibly funny; one could see that they were going

Then my uncle would take his friend into a corner to tell him something important, and at dinner they had a

peculiar way of looking at each other, and of drinking to each other, in a manner as if to say: "We know all

And to think that there are millions on the face of the globe who are amused at such monkey tricks! I would

Now, in our town there really was an old Jesuit who was my uncle's detestation. Every time he met him, or if

he only saw him at a distance, he used to say: "Get away, you toad." And then, taking my arm, he would

"See here, that fellow will play me a trick some day or other, I feel sure of it."

It was close on Holy Week, and my uncle made up his mind to give a dinner on Good Friday, a real dinner,

with his favorite chitterlings and black puddings. I resisted as much as I could, and said:

"I shall eat meat on that day, but at home, quite by myself. Your manifestation, as you call it, is an idiotic

idea. Why should you manifest? What does it matter to you if people do not eat any meat?"

But my uncle would not be persuaded. He asked three of his friends to dine with him at one of the best

restaurants in the town, and as he was going to pay the bill I had certainly, after all, no scruples about

At four o'clock we took a conspicuous place in the most frequented restaurant in the town, and my uncle

We sat down punctually, and at ten o'clock we had not yet finished. Five of us had drunk eighteen bottles of

choice, still wine and four of champagne. Then my uncle proposed what he was in the habit of calling "the

archbishop's circuit." Each man put six small glasses in front of him, each of them filled with a different

liqueur, and they had all to be emptied at one gulp, one after another, while one of the waiters counted

twenty. It was very stupid, but my uncle thought it was very suitable to the occasion.

At eleven o'clock he was as drunk as a fly. So we had to take him home in a cab and put him to bed, and one

could easily foresee that his anti clerical demonstration would end in a terrible fit of indigestion.

As I was going back to my lodgings, being rather drunk myself, with a cheerful drunkenness, a Machiavellian

I arranged my necktie, put on a look of great distress, and went and, rang loudly at the old Jesuit's door. As he

was deaf he made me wait a longish while, but at length appeared at his window in a cotton nightcap and

"Make haste, reverend sir, and open the door; a poor, despairing, sick man is in need of your spiritual

The good, kind man put on his trousers as quickly as he could, and came down without his cassock. I told

him in a breathless voice that my uncle, the Freethinker, had been taken suddenly ill, and fearing it was going

to be something serious, he had been seized with a sudden dread of death, and wished to see the priest and

talk to him; to have his advice and comfort, to make his peace with the Church, and to confess, so as to be

able to cross the dreaded threshold at peace with himself; and I added in a mocking tone:

"Wait a moment, my son; I will come with you." But I replied: "Pardon me, reverend father, if I do not go

with you; but my convictions will not allow me to do so. I even refused to come and fetch you, so I beg you

not to say that you have seen me, but to declare that you had a presentimenta sort of revelation of his

The priest consented and went off quickly; knocked at my uncle's door, and was soon let in; and I saw the

I hid under a neighboring gateway to wait results. Had he been well, my uncle would have halfmurdered the

Jesuit, but I knew that he would scarcely be able to move an arm, and I asked myself gleefully what sort of a

scene would take place between these antagonists, what disputes, what arguments, what a hubbub, and what

would be the issue of the situation, which my uncle's indignation would render still more tragic?

I laughed till my sides ached, and said half aloud: "Oh, what a joke, what a joke!"

Meanwhile it was getting very cold, and I noticed that the Jesuit stayed a long time, and I thought: "They are

One, two, three hours passed, and still the reverend father did not come out. What had happened? Had my

uncle died in a fit when he saw him, or had he killed the cassocked gentleman? Perhaps they had mutually

devoured each other? This last supposition appeared very unlikely, for I fancied that my uncle was quite

I was very uneasy, and, not venturing to go into the house myself, went to one of my friends who lived

opposite. I woke him up, explained matters to him, much to his amusement and astonishment, and took

At nine o'clock he relieved me, and I got a little sleep. At two o'clock I, in my turn, replaced him. We were

At six o'clock the Jesuit left, with a very happy and satisfied look on his face, and we saw him go away with a

Then, timid and ashamed, I went and knocked at the door of my uncle's house; and when the servant opened

it I did not dare to ask her any questions, but went upstairs without saying a word.

My uncle was lying, pale and exhausted, with weary, sorrowful eyes and heavy arms, on his bed. A little

"I don't know; it was most surprising. But what is stranger still is that the Jesuit priest who has just leftyou

know, that excellent man whom I have made such fun ofhad a divine revelation of my state, and came to

I was seized with an almost uncontrollable desire to laugh, and with difficulty said: "Oh, really!"

"Yes, he came. He heard a voice telling him to get up and come to me, because I was going to die. I was a

I pretended to sneeze, so as not to burst out laughing; I felt inclined to roll on the ground with amusement.

"And you received him, uncle? You, a Freethinker, a Freemason? You did not have him thrown out of

"Listen a moment, it is so astonishingso astonishing and providential! He also spoke to me about my

"I know that, but I was very ill, and he looked after me most devotedly all night long. He was perfect; no

"Oh! he looked after you all night? But you said just now that he had only been gone a very short time."

"That is quite true; I kept him to breakfast after all his kindness. He had it at a table by my bedside while I

My uncle looked vexed, as if I had said something very uncalled for, and then added:

"Don't joke, Gaston; such things are out of place at times. He has shown me more devotion than many a

This rather upset me, but I answered, nevertheless: "Very well, uncle; and what did you do after breakfast?"

"We played a game of bezique, and then he repeated his breviary while I read a little book which he

"Yes, and no, or, ratherno. It is the history of their missions in Central Africa, and is rather a book of

I began to feel that matters were going badly, so I got up. "Well, good by, uncle," I said, "I see you are

My joke turned out very badly for me! My uncle became thoroughly converted, and if that had been all I

should not have cared so much. Clerical or Freemason, to me it is all the same; six of one and half a dozen of

the other; but the worst of it is that he has just made his willyes, made his willand he has disinherited

"Come with me," said my friend Boisrene, "you will see some very interesting bricabrac and works of art

He conducted me to the first floor of an elegant house in one of the big streets of Paris. We were welcomed

by a very pleasing man, with excellent manners, who led us from room to room, showing us rare things, the

price of which he mentioned carelessly. Large sums, ten, twenty, thirty, fifty thousand francs, dropped from

his lips with such grace and ease that one could not doubt that this gentlemanmerchant had millions shut up

I had known him by reputation for a long time Very bright, clever, intelligent, he acted as intermediary in all

sorts of transactions. He kept in touch with all the richest art amateurs in Paris, and even of Europe and

America, knowing their tastes and preferences; he apprised them by letter, or by wire if they lived in a distant

Men of the best society had had recourse to him in times of difficulty, either to find money for gambling, or

Boisrene seemed very intimate with this strange merchant. They must have worked together in many a deal. I

He was tall, thin, bald, and very elegant. His soft, insinuating voice had a peculiar, tempting charm which

seemed to give the objects a special value. When he held anything in his hands, he turned it round and round,

looking at it with such skill, refinement, and sympathy that the object seemed immediately to be beautiful and

transformed by his look and touch. And its value increased in one's estimation, after the object had passed

"And your Crucifix," said Boisrene, "that beautiful Renaissance Crucifix which you showed me last year?"

"It has been sold, and in a very peculiar manner. There is a real Parisian story for you! Would you like to hear

"Certainly. Mme. Samoris is a woman of the world who has a daughter, without anyone having known her

husband. At any rate, she is received in a certain tolerant, or blind society. She goes to church and devoutly

partakes of Communion, so that everyone may know it, and she never compromises herself. She expects her

"Yes, but I will complete your information. She is a woman who makes herself respected by her admirers in

spite of everything. That is a rare quality, for in this manner she can get what she wishes from a man. The

man whom she has chosen without his suspecting it courts her for a long time, longs for her timidly, wins her

with astonishment and possesses her with consideration. He does not notice that he is paying, she is so

tactful; and she maintains her relations on such a footing of reserve and dignity that he would slap the first

"Several times I have been able to render little services to this woman. She has no secrets from me.

"Toward the beginning of January she came to me in order to borrow thirty thousand francs. Naturally, I did

not lend them to her; but, as I wished to oblige her, I told her to explain her situation to me completely, so

"She told me her troubles in such cautious language that she could not have spoken more delicately of her

child's first communion. I finally managed to understand that times were hard, and that she was penniless.

"The commercial crisis, political unrest, rumors of war, had made money scarce even in the hands of her

"She would associate only with a man in the best of society, who could strengthen her reputation as well as

help her financially. A reveller, no matter how rich, would have compromised her forever, and would have

"She had to maintain her household expenses and continue to entertain, in order not to lose the opportunity of

finding, among her numerous visitors, the discreet and distinguished friend for whom she was waiting, and

"I showed her that my thirty thousand francs would have but little likelihood of returning to me; for, after

spending them all, she would have to find at least sixty thousand more, in a lump, to pay me back.

"She seemed very disheartened when she heard this. I did not know just what to do, when an idea, a really

"I had just bought this Renaissance Crucifix which I showed you, an admirable piece of workmanship, one of

"'My dear friend,' I said to her, 'I am going to send you that piece of ivory. You will invent some ingenious,

touching, poetic story, anything that you wish, to explain your desire for parting with it. It is, of course, a

"'I myself will send you amateurs, or will bring them to you. The rest concerns you. Before they come I will

drop you a line about their position, both social and financial. This Crucifix is worth fifty thousand francs;

"She considered the matter seriously for several minutes, and then answered: 'Yes, it is, perhaps, a good idea.

"The next day I sent her my Crucifix, and the same evening the Baron de SaintHospital.

"For three months I sent her my best clients, from a business point of view. But I heard nothing more from

"One day I received a visit from a foreigner who spoke very little French. I decided to introduce him

"A footman in black livery received us and ushered us into a quiet little parlor, furnished with taste, where we

waited for several minutes. She appeared, charming as usual, extended her hand to me and invited us to be

"'See if Mlle. Isabelle can let us go into her oratory.' The young girl herself brought the answer. She was

about fifteen years of age, modest and good to look upon in the sweet freshness of her youth. She wished to

"It was a kind of religious boudoir where a silver lamp was burning before the Crucifix, my Crucifix, on a

background of black velvet. The setting was charming and very clever. The child crossed herself and then

"I took the object, examined it and declared it to be remarkable. The foreigner also examined it, but he

"A delicate odor of incense, flowers and perfume pervaded the whole house. One felt at home there. This

"When we had returned to the parlor I delicately broached the subject of the price. Mme. Samoris, lowering

"Then she added: 'If you wish to see it again, monsieur, I very seldom go out before three o'clock; and I can

"In the street the stranger asked me for some details about the baroness, whom he had found charming. But I

"One morning, hardly two weeks ago, she came here at about lunch time, and, placing a roll of bills in my

hand, said: 'My dear, you are an angel! Here are fifty thousand francs; I am buying your crucifix, and I am

paying twenty thousand francs more for it than the price agreed upon, on condition that you alwaysalways

A party of men were chatting in the smoking room after dinner. We were talking of unexpected legacies,

strange inheritances. Then M. le Brument, who was sometimes called "the illustrious judge" and at other

"I have," said he, "to search for an heir who disappeared under peculiarly distressing circumstances. It is one

of those simple and terrible dramas of ordinary life, a thing which possibly happens every day, and which is

"Nearly six months ago I was called to the bedside of a dying woman. She said to me:

"'Monsieur, I want to intrust to you the most delicate, the most difficult, and the most wearisome mission that

can be conceived. Be good enough to notice my will, which is there on the table. A sum of five thousand

francs is left to you as a fee if you do not succeed, and of a hundred thousand francs if you do succeed. I want

"She asked me to assist her to sit up in bed, in order that she might talk with greater ease, for her voice,

"It was a very wealthy establishment. The luxurious apartment, of an elegant simplicity, was upholstered with

"'You are the first to hear my horrible story. I will try to have strength ,enough to finish it. You must know

all, in order that you, whom I know to be a kindhearted man as well as a man of the world, may have a

"'Before my marriage, I loved a young man, whose suit was rejected by my family because he was not rich

enough. Not long afterward, I married a man of great wealth. I married him through ignorance, through

"'He whom I had loved had married, in his turn. When he saw that I was a widow, he was crushed by grief at

knowing he was not free. He came to see me; he wept and sobbed so bitterly, that it was enough to break my

heart. He came to see me at first as a friend. Perhaps I ought not to have received him. What could I do? I was

alone, so sad, so solitary, so hopeless! And I loved him still. What sufferings we women have sometimes to

"'I had only him in the world, my parents being dead. He came frequently; he spent whole evenings with me.

I should not have let him come so often, seeing that he was married. But I had not enough will power to

"'How can I tell it?he became my lover. How did this come about? Can I explain it? Can any one explain

such things? Do you think it could be otherwise when two human beings are drawn to each other by the

irresistible force of mutual affection? Do you believe, monsieur, that it is always in our power to resist, that

we can keep up the struggle forever, and refuse to yield to the prayers, the supplications, the tears, the

frenzied words, the appeals on bended knees, the transports of passion, with which we are pursued by the

man we adore, whom we want to gratify even in his slightest wishes, whom we desire to crown with every

possible happiness, and whom, if we are to be guided by a worldly code of honor, we must drive to despair?

What strength would it not require? What a renunciation of happiness? what selfdenial? and even what

"'In short, monsieur, I was his mistress; and I was happy. I becameand this was my greatest weakness and

"'We brought up my son together; we made a man of him, a thorough man, intelligent, full of sense and

"'He, the young man, was fond of mymy lover, almost as fond of him as I was myself, for he had been

equally cherished and cared for by both of us. He used to call him his 'dear friend,' and respected him

immensely, having never received from him anything but wise counsels and an example of integrity, honor,

and probity. He looked upon him as an old loyal and devoted comrade of his mother, as a sort of moral father,

"'Perhaps the reason why he never asked any questions was that he had been accustomed from his earliest

years to see this man in my house, at my side, and at his side, always concerned about us both.

"'One evening the three of us were to dine togetherthis was my chief amusementand I waited for the two

men, asking myself which of them would be the first to arrive. The door opened; it was my old friend. I went

toward him, with outstretched arms; and he pressed my lips in a long, delicious kiss.

"'All of a sudden, a slight sound, a faint rustling, that mysterious sensation which indicates the presence of

another person, made us start and turn round abruptly. Jean, my son, stood there, livid, staring at us.

"'There was a moment of atrocious confusion. I drew back, holding out my hand toward my son as if in

"'We remained facing each othermy lover and Icrushed, unable to utter a word. I sank into an armchair,

and I felt a desire, a vague, powerful desire, to flee, to go out into the night, and to disappear forever. Then

convulsive sobs rose in my throat, and I wept, shaken with spasms, my heart breaking, all my nerves writhing

with the horrible sensation of an irreparable, misfortune, and with that dreadful sense of shame which, in such

"'He looked at me in a terrified manner, not venturing to approach, to speak to me, or to touch me, for fear of

"'I am going to follow himto talk to himto explain matters to him. In short, I must see him and let him

"'I waitedwaited in a distracted frame of mind, trembling at the least sound, starting with fear and with

some unutterably strange and intolerable emotion at every slight crackling of the fire in the grate.

"'I waited an hour, two hours, feeling my heart swell with a dread I had never before experienced, such

anguish that I would not wish the greatest criminal to endure ten minutes of such misery. Where was my son?

"'About midnight, a messenger brought me a note from my lover. I still know its contents by heart:

"'Has your son returned? I did not find him. I am down here. I do not want to go up at this hour."

"'I felt as if I were going mad. I longed to run wildly about, to roll on the ground. And yet I did not even stir,

but kept waiting hour after hour. What was going to happen? I tried to imagine, to guess. But I could form no

"'And now I feared that they might meet. What would they do in that case? What would my son do? My mind

"'You can understand my feelings, can you not, monsieur? "'My chambermaid, who knew nothing, who

understood nothing, came into the room every moment, believing, naturally, that I had lost my reason. I sent

her away with a word or a movement of the hand. She went for the doctor, who found me in the throes of a

"'When I regained consciousness, after a long illness, I saw beside my bed myloveralone.

"'Then, becoming suddenly exasperated and even indignantfor women are subject to such outbursts of

"'I have never seen one or the other of them since, monsieur, and thus I have lived for the last twenty years.

"'Can you imagine what all this meant to me? Can you understand this monstrous punishment, this slow,

perpetual laceration of a mother's heart, this abominable, endless waiting? Endless, did I say? No; it is about

to end, for I am dying. I am dying without ever again seeing either of themeither one or the other!

"'Hethe man I lovedhas written to me every day for the last twenty years; and II have never

consented to see him, even for one second; for I had a strange feeling that, if he were to come back here, my

son would make his appearance at the same moment. Oh! my son! my son! Is he dead? Is he living? Where is

he hiding? Over there, perhaps, beyond the great ocean, in some country so far away that even its very name

is unknown to me! Does he ever think of me? Ah! if he only knew! How cruel one's children are! Did he

understand to what frightful suffering he condemned me, into what depths of despair, into what tortures, he

cast me while I was still in the prime of life, leaving me to suffer until this moment, when I am about to

dieme, his mother, who loved him with all the intensity of a mother's love? Oh! isn't it cruel, cruel?

"'You will tell him all this, monsieurwill you not? You will repeat to him my last words:

"'My child, my dear, dear child, be less harsh toward poor women! Life is already brutal and savage enough

in its dealings with them. My dear son, think of what the existence of your poor mother has been ever since

the day you left her. My dear child, forgive her, and love her, now that she is dead, for she has had to endure

"She gasped for breath, trembling, as if she had addressed the last words to her son and as if he stood by her

"'Leave me now, I beg of you. I want to die all alone, since they are not with me.'"

"And I left the house, monsieurs, crying like a fool, so bitterly, indeed, that my coachman turned round to

"And to think that, every day, dramas like this are being enacted all around us!

"I have not found the sonthat sonwell, say what you like about him, but I call him that criminal son!"

All were crowding around M. Bermutier, the judge, who was giving his opinion about the SaintCloud

mystery. For a month this in explicable crime had been the talk of Paris. Nobody could make head or tail of

M. Bermutier, standing with his back to the fireplace, was talking, citing the evidence, discussing the various

Some women had risen, in order to get nearer to him, and were standing with their eyes fastened on the

cleanshaven face of the judge, who was saying such weighty things. They, were shaking and trembling,

moved by fear and curiosity, and by the eager and insatiable desire for the horrible, which haunts the soul of

"True, madame, it is likely that the actual facts will never be discovered. As for the word 'supernatural' which

you have just used, it has nothing to do with the matter. We are in the presence of a very cleverly conceived

and executed crime, so well enshrouded in mystery that we cannot disentangle it from the involved

circumstances which surround it. But once I had to take charge of an affair in which the uncanny seemed to

"Do not think, however, that I, for one minute, ascribed anything in the case to supernatural influences. I

believe only in normal causes. But if, instead of using the word 'supernatural' to express what we do not

understand, we were simply to make use of the word 'inexplicable,' it would be much better. At any rate, in

the affair of which I am about to tell you, it is especially the surrounding, preliminary circumstances which

"I was, at that time, a judge at Ajaccio, a little white city on the edge of a bay which is surrounded by high

"The majority of the cases which came up before me concerned vendettas. There are some that are superb,

dramatic, ferocious, heroic. We find there the most beautiful causes for revenge of which one could dream,

enmities hundreds of years old, quieted for a time but never extinguished; abominable stratagems, murders

becoming massacres and almost deeds of glory. For two years I heard of nothing but the price of blood, of

this terrible Corsican prejudice which compels revenge for insults meted out to the offending person and all

his descendants and relatives. I had seen old men, children, cousins murdered; my head was full of these

"One day I learned that an Englishman had just hired a little villa at the end of the bay for several years. He

had brought with him a French servant, whom he had engaged on the way at Marseilles.

"Soon this peculiar person, living alone, only going out to hunt and fish, aroused a widespread interest. He

never spoke to any one, never went to the town, and every morning he would practice for an hour or so with

"Legends were built up around him. It was said that he was some high personage, fleeing from his fatherland

for political reasons; then it was affirmed that he was in hiding after having committed some abominable

"In my judicial position I thought it necessary to get some information about this man, but it was impossible

"I therefore had to be satisfied with watching him as closely as I could, but I could see nothing suspicious

"However, as rumors about him were growing and becoming more widespread, I decided to try to see this

stranger myself, and I began to hunt regularly in the neighborhood of his grounds.

"For a long time I watched without finding an opportunity. At last it came to me in the shape of a partridge

which I shot and killed right in front of the Englishman. My dog fetched it for me, but, taking the bird, I went

"He was a big man, with red hair and beard, very tall, very broad, a kind of calm and polite Hercules. He had

nothing of the socalled British stiffness, and in a broad English accent he thanked me warmly for my

"One night, at last, as I was passing before his door, I saw him in the garden, seated astride a chair, smoking

his pipe. I bowed and he invited me to come in and have a glass of beer. I needed no urging.

"He received me with the most punctilious English courtesy, sang the praises of France and of Corsica, and

"Then, with great caution and under the guise of a vivid interest, I asked him a few questions about his life

and his plans. He answered without embarrassment, telling me that he had travelled a great deal in Africa, in

"Then I turned the conversation on hunting, and he gave me the most curious details on hunting the

"And he laughed a good broad laugh, the wholesome laugh of a contented Englishman.

"Then he began to talk about weapons, and he invited me to come in and see different makes of guns.

"His parlor was draped in black, black silk embroidered in gold. Big yellow flowers, as brilliant as fire, were

"But in the middle of the widest panel a strange thing attracted my attention. A black object stood out against

a square of red velvet. I went up to it; it was a hand, a human hand. Not the clean white hand of a skeleton,

but a dried black hand, with yellow nails, the muscles exposed and traces of old blood on the bones, which

were cut off as clean as though it had been chopped off with an axe, near the middle of the forearm.

"Around the wrist, an enormous iron chain, riveted and soldered to this unclean member, fastened it to the

"'That is my best enemy. It comes from America, too. The bones were severed by a sword and the skin cut off

"I touched these human remains, which must have belonged to a giant. The uncommonly long fingers were

attached by enormous tendons which still had pieces of skin hanging to them in places. This hand was terrible

"But his face remained inscrutable, calm and friendly. I turned to other subjects, and admired his rifles.

"However, I noticed that he kept three loaded revolvers in the room, as though constantly in fear of some

"I paid him several calls. Then I did not go any more. People had become used to his presence; everybody

"A whole year rolled by. One morning, toward the end of November, my servant awoke me and announced

"Half an hour later I entered the Englishman's house, together with the police commissioner and the captain

of the gendarmes. The servant, bewildered and in despair, was crying before the door. At first I suspected this

"On entering Sir John's parlor, I noticed the body, stretched out on its back, in the middle of the room.

"His vest was torn, the sleeve of his jacket had been pulled off, everything pointed to, a violent struggle.

"The Englishman had been strangled! His face was black, swollen and frightful, and seemed to express a

terrible fear. He held something between his teeth, and his neck, pierced by five or six holes which looked as

"A physician joined us. He examined the finger marks on the neck for a long time and then made this strange

"A cold chill seemed to run down my back, and I looked over to where I had formerly seen the terrible hand.

"I bent over the dead man and, in his contracted mouth, I found one of the fingers of this vanished hand,

"Then the investigation began. Nothing could be discovered. No door, window or piece of furniture had been

"For a month his master had seemed excited. He had received many letters, which he would immediately

"Often, in a fit of passion which approached madness, he had taken a switch and struck wildly at this dried

hand riveted to the wall, and which had disappeared, no one knows how, at the very hour of the crime.

"He would go to bed very late and carefully lock himself in. He always kept weapons within reach. Often at

"That night, somehow, he had made no noise, and it was only on going to open the windows that the servant

"I communicated what I knew of the dead man to the judges and public officials. Throughout the whole

"One night, about three months after the crime, I had a terrible nightmare. I seemed to see the horrible hand

running over my curtains and walls like an immense scorpion or spider. Three times I awoke, three times I

went to sleep again; three times I saw the hideous object galloping round my room and moving its fingers

"The following day the hand was brought me, found in the cemetery, on the grave of Sir John Rowell, who

had been buried there because we had been unable to find his family. The first finger was missing.

"But that is neither a climax nor an explanation! We will be unable to sleep unless you give us your opinion

"Oh! Ladies, I shall certainly spoil your terrible dreams. I simply believe that the legitimate owner of the

hand was not dead, that he came to get it with his remaining one. But I don't know how. It was a kind of

The walls of the cell were bare and white washed. A narrow grated window, placed so high that one could not

reach it, lighted this sinister little room. The mad inmate, seated on a straw chair, looked at us with a fixed,

vacant and haunted expression. He was very thin, with hollow cheeks and hair almost white, which one

guessed might have turned gray in a few months. His clothes appeared to be too large for his shrunken limbs,

his sunken chest and empty paunch. One felt that this man's mind was destroyed, eaten by his thoughts, by

one thought, just as a fruit is eaten by a worm. His craze, his idea was there in his brain, insistent, harassing,

destructive. It wasted his frame little by little. Itthe invisible, impalpable, intangible, immaterial ideawas

What a mystery was this man, being killed by an ideal! He aroused sorrow, fear and pity, this madman. What

strange, tremendous and deadly thoughts dwelt within this forehead which they creased with deep wrinkles

"He has terrible attacks of rage," said the doctor to me. "His is one of the most peculiar cases I have ever

seen. He has seizures of erotic and macaberesque madness. He is a sort of necrophile. He has kept a journal in

which he sets forth his disease with the utmost clearness. In it you can, as it were, put your finger on it. If it

I followed the doctor into his office, where he handed me this wretched man's diary, saying: "Read it and tell

"Until the age of thirtytwo I lived peacefully, without knowing love. Life appeared very simple, very

pleasant and very easy. I was rich. I enjoyed so many things that I had no passion for anything in particular. It

was good to be alive! I awoke happy every morning and did those things that pleased me during the day and

went to bed at night contented, in the expectation of a peaceful tomorrow and a future without anxiety.

"I had had a few flirtations without my heart being touched by any true passion or wounded by any of the

sensations of true love. It is good to live like that. It is better to love, but it is terrible. And yet those who love

in the ordinary way must experience ardent happiness, though less than mine possibly, for love came to me in

"As I was wealthy, I bought all kinds of old furniture and old curiosities, and I often thought of the unknown

hands that had touched these objects, of the eyes that had admired them, of the hearts that had loved them; for

one does love things! I sometimes remained hours and hours looking at a little watch of the last century. It

was so tiny, so pretty with its enamel and gold chasing. And it kept time as on the day when a woman first

bought it, enraptured at owning this dainty trinket. It had not ceased to vibrate, to live its mechanical life, and

it had kept up its regular ticktock since the last century. Who had first worn it on her bosom amid the

warmth of her clothing, the heart of the watch beating beside the heart of the woman? What hand had held it

in its warm fingers, had turned it over and then wiped the enamelled shepherds on the case to remove ,the

slight moisture from her fingers? What eyes had watched the hands on its ornamental face for the expected,

"How I wished I had known her, seen her, the woman who had selected this exquisite and rare object! She is

dead! I am possessed with a longing for women of former days. I love, from afar, all those who have loved.

The story of those dead and gone loves fills my heart with regrets. Oh, the beauty, the smiles, the youthful

"How I have wept whole nightsthinking of those poor women of former days, so beautiful, so loving, so

sweet, whose arms were extended in an embrace, and who now are dead! A kiss is immortal! It goes from

lips to lips, from century to century, from age to age. Men receive them, give them and die.

"The past attracts me, the present terrifies me because the future means death. I regret all that has gone by. I

mourn all who have lived; I should like to check time, to stop the clock. But time goes, it goes, it passes, it

takes from me each second a little of myself for the annihilation of tomorrow. And I shall never live again.

"But I am not to be pitied. I found her, the one I was waiting for, and through her I enjoyed inestimable

"I was sauntering in Paris on a bright, sunny morning, with a happy heart and a high step, looking in at the

shop windows with the vague interest of an idler. All at once I noticed in the shop of a dealer in antiques a

piece of Italian furniture of the seventeenth century. It was very handsome, very rare. I set it down as being

"Why did the remembrance of that piece of furniture haunt me with such insistence that I retraced my steps? I

again stopped before the shop, in order to take another look at it, and I felt that it tempted me.

"What a singular thing temptation is! One gazes at an object, and, little by little, it charms you, it disturbs

you, it fills your thoughts as a woman's face might do. The enchantment of it penetrates your being, a strange

enchantment of form, color and appearance of an inanimate object. And one loves it, one desires it, one

wishes to have it. A longing to own it takes possession of you, gently at first, as though it were timid, but

"And the dealers seem to guess, from your ardent gaze, your secret and increasing longing.

"I bought this piece of furniture and had it sent home at once. I placed it in my room.

"Oh, I am sorry for those who do not know the honeymoon of the collector with the antique he has just

purchased. One looks at it tenderly and passes one's hand over it as if it were human flesh; one comes back to

it every moment, one is always thinking of it, wherever ore goes, whatever one does. The dear recollection of

it pursues you in the street, in society, everywhere; and when you return home at night, before taking off your

"Truly, for eight days I worshipped this piece of furniture. I opened its doors and pulled out the drawers every

"But one evening I surmised, while I was feeling the thickness of one of the panels, that there must be a

secret drawer in it: My heart began to beat, and I spent the night trying to discover this secret cavity.

"I succeeded on the following day by driving a knife into a slit in the wood. A panel slid back and I saw,

"Yes, a woman's hair, an immense coil of fair hair, almost red, which must have been cut off close to the

"I stood amazed, trembling, confused. An almost imperceptible perfume, so ancient that it seemed to be the

spirit of a perfume, issued from this mysterious drawer and this remarkable relic.

"I lifted it gently, almost reverently, and took it out of its hiding place. It at once unwound in a golden shower

that reached to the floor, dense but light; soft and gleaming like the tail of a comet.

"A strange emotion filled me. What was this? When, how, why had this hair been shut up in this drawer?

What adventure, what tragedy did this souvenir conceal? Who had cut it off? A lover on a day of farewell, a

husband on a day of revenge, or the one whose head it had graced on the day of despair?

"Was it as she was about to take the veil that they had cast thither that love dowry as a pledge to the world of

the living? Was it when they were going to nail down the coffin of the beautiful young corpse that the one

who had adored her had cut off her tresses, the only thing that he could retain of her, the only living part of

her body that would not suffer decay, the only thing he could still love, and caress, and kiss in his paroxysms

"Was it not strange that this tress should have remained as it was in life, when not an atom of the body on

"It fell over my fingers, tickled the skin with a singular caress, the caress of a dead woman. It affected me so

"I held it in my hands for a long time, then it seemed as if it disturbed me, as though something of the soul

had remained in it. And I put it back on the velvet, rusty from age, and pushed in the drawer, closed the doors

"I walked along, filled with sadness and also with unrest, that unrest that one feels when in love. I felt as

Echo answers in the breeze O'er river and lake that blows, Their beauty was above all praise, But where are

The queen, white as lilies, Who sang as sing the birds, Bertha Broadfoot, Beatrice, Alice, Ermengarde,

princess of Maine, And Joan, the good Lorraine, Burned by the English at Rouen, Where are they, Virgin

"When I got home again I felt an irresistible longing to see my singular treasure, and I took it out and, as I

"For some days, however, I was in my ordinary condition, although the thought of that tress of hair was

"Whenever I came into the house I had to see it and take it in my, hands. I turned the key of the cabinet with

the same hesitation that one opens the door leading to one's beloved, for in my hands and my heart I felt a

confused, singular, constant sensual longing to plunge my hands in the enchanting golden flood of those dead

"Then, after I had finished caressing it and had locked the cabinet I felt as if it were a living thing, shut up in

there, imprisoned; and I longed to see it again. I felt again the imperious desire to take it in my hands, to

touch it, to even feel uncomfortable at the cold, slippery, irritating, bewildering contact.

"I lived thus for a month or two, I forget how long. It obsessed me, haunted me. I was happy and tormented

by turns, as when one falls in love, and after the first vows have been exchanged.

"I shut myself in the room with it to feel it on my skin, to bury my lips in it, to kiss it. I wound it round my

face, covered my eyes with the golden flood so as to see the day gleam through its gold.

"I loved it! Yes, I loved it. I could not be without it nor pass an hour without looking at it.

"I was alone, nevertheless, but I could not go to sleep again, and, as I was tossing about feverishly, I got up to

look at the golden tress. It seemed softer than usual, more lifelike. Do the dead come back? I almost lost

consciousness as I kissed it. I took it back with me to bed and pressed it to my lips as if it were my

"Do the dead come back? She came back. Yes, I saw her; I held her in my arms, just as she was in life, tall,

fair and round. She came back every eveningthe dead woman, the beautiful, adorable, mysterious

"My happiness was so great that I could not conceal it. No lover ever tasted such intense, terrible enjoyment.

I loved her so well that I could not be separated from her. I took her with me always and everywhere. I

walked about the town with her as if she were my wife, and took her to the theatre, always to a private box.

But they saw herthey guessedthey arrested me. They put me in prison like a criminal. They took her.

Here the manuscript stopped. And as I suddenly raised my astonished eyes to the doctor a terrific cry, a howl

"Listen," said the doctor. "We have to douse the obscene madman with water five times a day. Sergeant

The doctor rose, opened a cabinet full of phials and instruments and tossed over a long tress of fair hair which

I shivered at feeling its soft, light touch on my hands. And I sat there, my heart beating with disgust and

desire, disgust as at the contact of anything accessory to a crime and desire as at the temptation of some

I rented a little country house last summer on the banks of the Seine, several leagues from Paris, and went out

there to sleep every evening. After a few days I made the acquaintance of one of my neighbors, a man

between thirty and forty, who certainly was the most curious specimen I ever met. He was an old boating

man, and crazy about boating. He was always beside the water, on the water, or in the water. He must have

One evening as we were walking along the banks of the Seine I asked him to tell me some stories about his

life on the water. The good man at once became animated, his whole expression changed, he became

eloquent, almost poetical. There was in his heart one great passion, an absorbing, irresistible passionthe

Ah, he said to me, how many memories I have, connected with that river that you see flowing beside us! You

people who live in streets know nothing about the river. But listen to a fisherman as he mentions the word. To

him it is a mysterious thing, profound, unknown, a land of mirages and phantasmagoria, where one sees by

night things that do not exist, hears sounds that one does not recognize, trembles without knowing why, as in

passing through a cemeteryand it is, in fact, the most sinister of cemeteries, one in which one has no tomb.

The land seems limited to the river boatman, and on dark nights, when there is no moon, the river seems

limitless. A sailor has not the same feeling for the sea. It is often remorseless and cruel, it is true; but it

shrieks, it roars, it is honest, the great sea; while the river is silent and perfidious. It does not speak, it flows

along without a sound; and this eternal motion of flowing water is more terrible to me than the high waves of

Dreamers maintain that the sea hides in its bosom vast tracts of blue where those who are drowned roam

among the big fishes, amid strange forests and crystal grottoes. The river has only black depths where one

rots in the slime. It is beautiful, however, when it sparkles in the light of the rising sun and gently laps its

Well, I think that the stories whispered by the slender reeds, with their little soft voices, must be more sinister

But as you have asked for some of my recollections, I will tell you of a singular adventure that happened to

I was living, as I am now, in Mother Lafon's house, and one of my closest friends, Louis Bernet who has now

given up boating, his low shoes and his bare neck, to go into the Supreme Court, was living in the village of

C., two leagues further down the river. We dined together every day, sometimes at his house, sometimes at

One evening as I was coming home along and was pretty tired, rowing with difficulty my big boat, a

twelvefooter, which I always took out at night, I stopped a few moments to draw breath near the

It was a magnificent night, the moon shone brightly, the river gleamed, the air was calm and soft. This

peacefulness tempted me. I thought to myself that it would be pleasant to smoke a pipe in this spot. I took up

The boat floated downstream with the current, to the end of the chain, and then stopped, and I seated myself

in the stern on my sheepskin and made myself as comfortable as possible. There was not a sound to be heard,

except that I occasionally thought I could perceive an almost imperceptible lapping of the water against the

bank, and I noticed taller groups of reeds which assumed strange shapes and seemed, at times, to move.

The river was perfectly calm, but I felt myself affected by the unusual silence that surrounded me. All the

Suddenly a frog croaked to my right, and close beside me. I shuddered. It ceased, and I heard nothing more,

and resolved to smoke, to soothe my mind. But, although I was a noted colorer of pipes, I could not smoke; at

the second draw I was nauseated, and gave up trying. I began to sing. The sound of my voice was distressing

to me. So I lay still, but presently the slight motion of the boat disturbed me. It seemed to me as if she were

making huge lurches, from bank to bank of the river, touching each bank alternately. Then I felt as though an

invisible force, or being, were drawing her to the surface of the water and lifting her out, to let her fall again.

I was tossed about as in a tempest. I heard noises around me. I sprang to my feet with a single bound. The

I saw that my nerves were somewhat shaky, and I resolved to leave the spot. I pulled the anchor chain, the

boat began to move; then I felt a resistance. I pulled harder, the anchor did not come up; it had caught on

something at the bottom of the river and I could not raise it. I began pulling again, but all in vain. Then, with

my oars, I turned the boat with its head up stream to change the position of the anchor. It was no use, it was

still caught. I flew into a rage and shook the chain furiously. Nothing budged. I sat down, disheartened, and

began to reflect on my situation. I could not dream of breaking this chain, or detaching it from the boat, for it

was massive and was riveted at the bows to a piece of wood as thick as my arm. However, as the weather was

so fine I thought that it probably would not be long before some fisherman came to my aid. My illluck had

quieted me. I sat down and was able, at length, to smoke my pipe. I had a bottle of rum; I drank two or three

glasses, and was able to laugh at the situation. It was very warm; so that, if need be, I could sleep out under

All at once there was a little knock at the side of the boat. I gave a start, and a cold sweat broke out all over

me. The noise was, doubtless, caused by some piece of wood borne along by the current, but that was

enough, and I again became a prey to a strange nervous agitation. I seized the chain and tensed my muscles in

The river had slowly become enveloped in a thick white fog which lay close to the water, so that when I

stood up I could see neither the river, nor my feet, nor my boat; but could perceive only the tops of the reeds,

and farther off in the distance the plain, lying white in the moonlight, with big black patches rising up from it

towards the sky, which were formed by groups of Italian poplars. I was as if buried to the waist in a cloud of

cotton of singular whiteness, and all sorts of strange fancies came into my mind. I thought that someone was

trying to climb into my boat which I could no longer distinguish, and that the river, hidden by the thick fog,

was full of strange creatures which were swimming all around me. I felt horribly uncomfortable, my forehead

felt as if it had a tight band round it, my heart beat so that it almost suffocated me, and, almost beside myself,

I thought of swimming away from the place. But then, again, the very idea made me tremble with fear. I saw

myself, lost, going by guesswork in this heavy fog, struggling about amid the grasses and reeds which I could

not escape, my breath rattling with fear, neither seeing the bank, nor finding my boat; and it seemed as if I

In fact, as I should have had to ascend the stream at least five hundred metres before finding a spot free from

grasses and rushes where I could land, there were nine chances to one that I could not find my way in the fog

I tried to reason with myself. My will made me resolve not to be afraid, but there was something in me

besides my will, and that other thing was afraid. I asked myself what there was to be afraid of. My brave

"ego" ridiculed my coward "ego," and never did I realize, as on that day, the existence in us of two rival

personalities, one desiring a thing, the other resisting, and each winning the day in turn.

This stupid, inexplicable fear increased, and became terror. I remained motionless, my eyes staring, my ears

on the stretch with expectation. Of what? I did not know, but it must be something terrible. I believe if it had

occurred to a fish to jump out of the water, as often happens, nothing more would have been required to make

However, by a violent effort I succeeded in becoming almost rational again. I took up my bottle of rum and

took several pulls. Then an idea came to me, and I began to shout with all my might towards all the points of

the compass in succession. When my throat was absolutely paralyzed I listened. A dog was howling, at a

I drank some more rum and stretched myself out at the bottom of the boat. I remained there about an hour,

perhaps two, not sleeping, my eyes wide open, with nightmares all about me. I did not dare to rise, and yet I

intensely longed to do so. I delayed it from moment to moment. I said to myself: "Come, get up!" and I was

afraid to move. At last I raised myself with infinite caution as though my life depended on the slightest sound

that I might make; and looked over the edge of the boat. I was dazzled by the most marvellous, the most

astonishing sight that it is possible to see. It was one of those phantasmagoria of fairyland, one of those sights

described by travellers on their return from distant lands, whom we listen to without believing.

The fog which, two hours before, had floated on the water, had gradually cleared off and massed on the

banks, leaving the river absolutely clear; while it formed on either bank an uninterrupted wall six or seven

metres high, which shone in the moonlight with the dazzling brilliance of snow. One saw nothing but the

river gleaming with light between these two white mountains; and high above my head sailed the great full

All the creatures in the water were awake. The frogs croaked furiously, while every few moments I heard,

first to the right and then to the left, the abrupt, monotonous and mournful metallic note of the bullfrogs.

Strange to say, I was no longer afraid. I was in the midst of such an unusual landscape that the most

How long this lasted I do not know, for I ended by falling asleep. When I opened my eyes the moon had gone

down and the sky was full of clouds. The water lapped mournfully, the wind was blowing, it was pitch dark. I

drank the rest of the rum, then listened, while I trembled, to the rustling of the reeds and the foreboding sound

of the river. I tried to see, but could not distinguish my boat, nor even my hands, which I held up close to my

Little by little, however, the blackness became less intense. All at once I thought I noticed a shadow gliding

past, quite near me. I shouted, a voice replied; it was a fisherman. I called him; he came near and I told him of

my illluck. He rowed his boat alongside of mine and, together, we pulled at the anchor chain. The anchor

did not move. Day came, gloomy gray, rainy and cold, one of those days that bring one sorrows and

misfortunes. I saw another boat. We hailed it. The man on board of her joined his efforts to ours, and

gradually the anchor yielded. It rose, but slowly, slowly, loaded down by a considerable weight. At length we

perceived a black mass and we drew it on board. It was the corpse of an old women with a big stone round

The following adventure happened to me about 1882. I had just taken the train and settled down in a corner,

hoping that I should be left alone, when the door suddenly opened again and I heard a voice say: "Take care,

Another voice answered: "That's all right, Laurent, I have a firm hold on the handle."

Then a head appeared, and two hands seized the leather straps hanging on either side of the door and slowly

pulled up an enormous body, whose feet striking on the step, sounded like two canes. When the man had

hoisted his torso into the compartment I noticed, at the loose edge of his trousers, the end of a wooden leg,

which was soon followed by its mate. A head appeared behind this traveller and asked; "Are you all right,

And a servant, who looked like an old soldier, climbed in, carrying in his arms a stack of bundles wrapped in

black and yellow papers and carefully tied; he placed one after the other in the net over his master's head.

Then he said: "There, monsieur, that is all. There are five of themthe candy, the doll the drum, the gun, and

The man closed the door and walked away, and I looked at my neighbor. He was about thirtyfive, although

his hair was almost white; he wore the ribbon of the Legion of Honor; he had a heavy mustache and was quite

stout, with the stoutness of a strong and active man who is kept motionless on account of some infirmity. He

wiped his brow, sighed, and, looking me full in the face, he asked: "Does smoking annoy you, monsieur?"

Surely I knew that eye, that voice, that face. But when and where had I seen them? I had certainly met that

man, spoken to him, shaken his hand. That was a long, long time ago. It was lost in the haze wherein the

mind seems to feel around blindly for memories and pursues them like fleeing phantoms without being able

to seize them. He, too, was observing me, staring me out of countenance, with the persistence of a man who

remembers slightly but not completely. Our eyes, embarrassed by this persistent contact, turned away; then,

after a few minutes, drawn together again by the obscure and tenacious will of working memory, they met

once more, and I said: "Monsieur, instead of staring at each other for an hour or so, would it not be better to

He hesitated for a few minutes; then, with the vague look and voice which accompany great mental tension,

he said: "Oh, I remember perfectly. I met you twelve years ago, before the war, at the Poincels!"

"Yes. I was Captain Revaliere even up to the time when I lost my feet both of them together from one

Now that we knew each other's identity we looked at each other again. I remembered perfectly the handsome,

slender youth who led the cotillons with such frenzied agility and gracefulness that he had been nicknamed

"the fury." Going back into the dim, distant past, I recalled a story which I had heard and forgotten, one of

those stories to which one listens but forgets, and which leave but a faint impression upon the memory.

There was something about love in it. Little by little the shadows cleared up, and the face of a young girl

appeared before my eyes. Then her name struck me with the force of an explosion: Mademoiselle de Mandel.

I remembered everything now. It was indeed a love story, but quite commonplace. The young girl loved this

young man, and when I had met them there was already talk of the approaching wedding. The youth seemed

I raised my eye to the net, where all the packages which had been brought in by the servant were trembling

from the motion of the train, and the voice of the servant came back to me, as if he had just finished speaking.

He had said: "There, monsieur, that is all. There are five of them: the candy, the doll, the drum, the gun, and

Then, in a second, a whole romance unfolded itself in my head. It was like all those which I had already read,

where the young lady married notwithstanding the catastrophe, whether physical or financial; therefore, this

officer who had been maimed in the war had returned, after the campaign, to the young girl who had given

I considered that very beautiful, but simple, just as one, considers simple all devotions and climaxes in books

or in plays. It always seems, when one reads or listens to these stories of magnanimity, that one could

sacrifice one's self with enthusiastic pleasure and overwhelming joy. But the following day, when an

unfortunate friend comes to borrow some money, there is a strange revulsion of feeling.

But, suddenly, another supposition, less poetic and more realistic, replaced the first one. Perhaps he had

married before the war, before this frightful accident, and she, in despair and resignation, had been forced to

receive, care for, cheer, and support this husband, who had departed, a handsome man, and had returned

without his feet, a frightful wreck, forced into immobility, powerless anger, and fatal obesity.

Was he happy or in torture? I was seized with an irresistible desire to know his story, or, at least, the principal

points, which would permit me to guess that which he could not or would not tell me. Still thinking the matter

over, I began talking to him. We had exchanged a few commonplace words; and I raised my eyes to the net,

and thought: "He must have three children: the bonbons are for his wife, the doll for his little girl, the drum

I suddenly felt confused, as if I had been guilty of some breach of etiquette, and I continued: "I beg your

pardon. I had thought that you were when I heard your servant speaking about the toys. One listens and draws

He smiled and then murmured: "No, I am not even married. I am still at the preliminary stage."

"Oh! that's true! When I knew you, you were engaged to Mademoiselle de Mandel, I believe."

I grew very bold and added: "I also seem to remember hearing that Mademoiselle de Mandel married

"Yes, that's it! I remember it was on that occasion that I heard of your wound."

I looked him full in the face, and he blushed. His full face, which was already red from the oversupply of

blood, turned crimson. He answered quickly, with a sudden ardor of a man who is pleading a cause which is

"It is wrong, monsieur, to couple my name with that of Madame de Fleurel. When I returned from the

warwithout my feet, alas! I never would have permitted her to become my wife. Was it possible? When one

marries, monsieur, it is not in order to parade one's generosity; it is in order to live every day, every hour,

every minute, every second beside a man; and if this man is disfigured, as I am, it is a death sentence to marry

him! Oh, I understand, I admire all sacrifices and devotions when they have a limit, but I do not admit that a

woman should give up her whole life, all joy, all her dreams, in order to satisfy the admiration of the gallery.

When I hear, on the floor of my room, the tapping of my wooden legs and of my crutches, I grow angry

enough to strangle my servant. Do you think that I would permit a woman to do what I myself am unable to

He was silent. What could I say? He certainly was right. Could I blame her, hold her in contempt, even say

that she was wrong? No. However, the end which conformed to the rule, to the truth, did not satisfy my

poetic appetite. These heroic deeds demand a beautiful sacrifice, which seemed to be lacking, and I felt a

certain disappointment. I suddenly. asked: "Has Madame de Fleurel any children?"

"Yes, one girl and two boys. It is for them that I am bringing these toys. She and her husband are very kind to

The train was going up the incline to SaintGermain. It passed through the tunnels, entered the station, and

stopped. I was about to offer my arm to the wounded officer, in order to help him descend, when two hands

Standing behind the man, the woman, still beautiful, was smiling and waving her hands to him. A little girl,

standing beside her, was jumping for joy, and two young boys were eagerly watching the drum and the gun,

When the cripple was on the ground, all the children kissed him. Then they set off, the little girl holding in

her hand the small varnished rung of a crutch, just as she might walk beside her big friend and hold his

When Old Man Leras, bookkeeper for Messieurs Labuze and Company, left the store, he stood for a minute

bewildered at the glory of the setting sun. He had worked all day in the yellow light of a small jet of gas, far

in the back of the store, on a narrow court, as deep as a well. The little room where he had been spending his

days for forty years was so dark that even in the middle of summer one could hardly see without gaslight

It was always damp and cold, and from this hole on which his window opened came the musty odor of a

For forty years Monsieur Leras had been arriving every morning in this prison at eight o'clock, and he would

remain there until seven at night, bending over his books, writing with the industry of a good clerk.

He was now making three thousand francs a year, having started at fifteen hundred. He had remained a

bachelor, as his means did not allow him the luxury of a wife, and as he had never enjoyed anything, he

desired nothing. From time to time, however, tired of this continuous and monotonous work, he formed a

platonic wish: "Gad! If I only had an income of fifteen thousand francs, I would take life easy."

He had never taken life easy, as he had never had anything but his monthly salary. His life had been

uneventful, without emotions, without hopes. The faculty of dreaming with which every one is blessed had

When he was twentyone he entered the employ of Messieurs Labuze and Company. And he had never left

In 1856 he had lost his father and then his mother in 1859. Since then the only incident in his life was when

Every day his alarm clock, with a frightful noise of rattling chains, made him spring out of bed at 6 o'clock

Twice, however, this piece of mechanism had been out of orderonce in 1866 and again in 1874; he had

never been able to find out the reason why. He would dress, make his bed, sweep his room, dust his chair and

Then he would go out, buy a roll at the Lahure Bakery, in which he had seen eleven different owners without

His entire existence had been spent in the narrow, dark office, which was still decorated with the same wall

paper. He had entered there as a young man, as assistant to Monsieur Brument, and with the desire to replace

The whole harvest of memories which other men reap in their span of years, the unexpected events, sweet or

tragic loves, adventurous journeys, all the occurrences of a free existence, all these things had remained

Days, weeks, months, seasons, years, all were alike to him. He got up every day at the same hour, started out,

arrived at the office, ate luncheon, went away, had dinner and went to bed without ever interrupting the

Formerly he used to look at his blond mustache and wavy hair in the little round mirror left by his

predecessor. Now, every evening before leaving, he would look at his white mustache and bald head in the

same mirror. Forty years had rolled by, long and rapid, dreary as a day of sadness and as similar as the hours

of a sleepless night. Forty years of which nothing remained, not even a memory, not even a misfortune, since

That day Monsieur Leras stood by the door, dazzled at the brilliancy of the setting sun; and instead of

returning home he decided to take a little stroll before dinner, a thing which happened to him four or five

He reached the boulevards, where people were streaming along under the green trees. It was a spring evening,

one of those first warm and pleasant evenings which fill the heart with the joy of life.

Monsieur Leras went along with his mincing old man's step; he was going along with joy in his heart, at

peace with the world. He reached the ChampsElysees, and he continued to walk, enlivened by the sight of

The whole sky was aflame; the Arc de Triomphe stood out against the brilliant background of the horizon,

like a giant surrounded by fire. As he approached the immense monument, the old bookkeeper noticed that he

The meal was served in front of the store, on the sidewalk. It consisted of some mutton, salad and asparagus.

It was the best dinner that Monsieur Leras had had in a long time. He washed down his cheese with a small

bottle of burgundy, had his afterdinner cup of coffee, a thing which he rarely took, and finally a little pony

When he had paid he felt quite youthful, even a little moved. And he said to himself: "What a fine evening! I

will continue my stroll as far as the entrance to the Bois de Boulogne. It will do me good." He set out. An old

tune which one of his neighbors used to sing kept returning to his mind. He kept on humming it over and over

again. A hot, still night had fallen over Paris. Monsieur Leras walked along the Avenue du Bois de Boulogne

and watched the cabs drive by. They kept coming with their shining lights, one behind the other, giving horn

a glimpse of the couples inside, the women in their light dresses and the men dressed in black.

It was one long procession of lovers, riding under the warm, starlit sky. They kept on coming in rapid

succession. They passed by in the carriages, silent, side by side, lost in their dreams, in the emotion of desire,

in the anticipation of the approaching embrace. The warm shadows seemed to be full of floating kisses. A

sensation of tenderness filled the air. All these carriages full of tender couples, all these people intoxicated

with the same idea, with the same thought, seemed to give out a disturbing, subtle emanation.

At last Monsieur Leras grew a little tired of walking, and he sat down on a bench to watch these carriages

pass by with their burdens of love. Almost immediately a woman walked up to him and sat down beside him.

She slipped her arm through his, saying: "Come along, now; don't be foolish. Listen"

He arose and walked away, with sadness in his heart. A few yards away another woman walked up to him

and asked: "Won't you sit down beside me?" He said: "What makes you take up this life?"

She grumbled: "I've got to live! Foolish question!" And she walked away, humming.

Monsieur Leras stood there bewildered. Other women were passing near him, speaking to him and calling to

He sat down again on a bench. The carriages were still rolling by. He thought: "I should have done better not

to come here; I feel all upset." He began to think of all this venal or passionate love, of all these kisses, sold

or given, which were passing by it front of him. Love! He scarcely knew it. In his lifetime he had only known

two or three women, his means forcing him to live a quiet life, and he looked back at the life which he had

Some people are really unfortunate. And suddenly, as though a veil had been torn from his eyes, he perceived

the infinite misery, the monotony of his existence: the past, present and future misery; his last day similar to

his first one, with nothing before him, behind him or about him, nothing in his heart or any place.

The stream of carriages was still going by. In the rapid passage of the open carriage he still saw the two

silent, loving creatures. It seemed to him that the whole of humanity was flowing on before him, intoxicated

with joy, pleasure and happiness. He alone was looking on. Tomorrow he would again be alone, always

alone, more so than any one else. He stood up, took a few steps, and suddenly he felt as tired as though he

What was he waiting for? What was he hoping for? Nothing. He was thinking of how pleasant it must be in

old age to return home and find the little children. It is pleasant to grow old when one is surrounded by those

beings who owe their life to you, who love you, who caress you, who tell you charming and foolish little

And, thinking of his empty room, clean and sad, where no one but himself ever entered, a feeling of distress

filled his soul; and the place seemed to him more mournful even than his little office. Nobody ever came

there; no one ever spoke in it. It was dead, silent, without the echo of a human voice. It seems as though walls

retain something of the people who live within them, something of their manner, face and voice. The very

houses inhabited by happy families are gayer than the dwellings of the unhappy. His room was as barren of

memories as his life. And the thought of returning to this place, all alone, of getting into his bed, of again

repeating all the duties and actions of every evening, this thought terrified him. As though to escape farther

from this sinister home, and from the time when he would have to return to it, he arose and walked along a

About him, above him, everywhere, he heard a continuous, tremendous, confused rumble, composed of

countless and different noises, a vague and throbbing pulsation of life: the life breath of Paris, breathing like a

The sun was already high and shed a flood of light on the Bois de Boulogne. A few carriages were beginning

Suddenly the young woman raised her eyes and saw something brown in the branches. Surprised and

Then she shrieked and fell into the arms of her companion, who was forced to lay her on the ground.

The policeman who had been called cut down an old man who had hung himself with his suspenders.

Examination showed that he had died the evening before. Papers found on him showed that he was a

His death was attributed to suicide, the cause of which could not be suspected. Perhaps a sudden access of

At four o'clock that day, as on every other day, Alexandre rolled the threewheeled chair for cripples up to

the door of the little house; then, in obedience to the doctor's orders, he would push his old and infirm

When he had placed the light vehicle against the step, just at the place where the old lady could most easily

enter it, he went into the house; and soon a furious, hoarse old soldier's voice was heard cursing inside the

house: it issued from the master, the retired excaptain of infantry, Joseph Maramballe.

Then could be heard the noise of doors being slammed, chairs being pushed about, and hasty footsteps; then

nothing more. After a few seconds, Alexandre reappeared on the threshold, supporting with all his strength

Madame Maramballe, who was exhausted from the exertion of descending the stairs. When she was at last

settled in the rolling chair, Alexandre passed behind it, grasped the handle, and set out toward the river.

Thus they crossed the little town every day amid the respectful greeting, of all. These bows were perhaps

meant as much for the servant as for the mistress, for if she was loved and esteemed by all, this old trooper,

The July sun was beating down unmercifully on the street, bathing the low houses in its crude and burning

light. Dogs were sleeping on the sidewalk in the shade of the houses, and Alexandre, a little out of breath,

hastened his footsteps in order sooner to arrive at the avenue which leads to the water.

Madame Maramballe was already slumbering under her white parasol, the point of which sometimes grazed

along the man's impassive face. As soon as they had reached the Allee des Tilleuls, she awoke in the shade of

the trees, and she said in a kindly voice: "Go more slowly, my poor boy; you will kill yourself in this heat."

Along this path, completely covered by arched linden trees, the Mavettek flowed in its winding bed bordered

The gurgling of the eddies and the splashing of the little waves against the rocks lent to the walk the

charming music of babbling water and the freshness of damp air. Madame Maramballe inhaled with deep

delight the humid charm of this spot and then murmured: "Ah! I feel better now! But he wasn't in a good

For thirtyfive years he had been in the service of this couple, first as officer's orderly, then as simple valet

who did not wish to leave his masters; and for the last six years, every afternoon, he had been wheeling his

mistress about through the narrow streets of the town. From this long and devoted service, and then from this

daily teteatete, a kind of familiarity arose between the old lady and the devoted servant, affectionate on her

They talked over the affairs of the house exactly as if they were equals. Their principal subject of

conversation and of worry was the bad disposition of the captain, soured by a long career which had begun

Madame Maramballe continued: "He certainly was not in a good humor today. This happens too often since

And Alexandre, with a sigh, completed his mistress's thoughts, "Oh, madame might say that it happens every

"That is true. But the poor man has been so unfortunate. He began with a brave deed, which obtained for him

the Legion of Honor at the age of twenty; and then from twenty to fifty he was not able to rise higher than

captain, whereas at the beginning he expected to retire with at least the rank of colonel."

"Madame might also admit that it was his fault. If he had not always been as cutting as a whip, his superiors

would have loved and protected him better. Harshness is of no use; one should try to please if one wishes to

advance. As far as his treatment of us is concerned, it is also our fault, since we are willing to remain with

Madame Maramballe was thinking. Oh, for how many years had she thus been thinking of the brutality of her

husband, whom she had married long ago because he was a handsome officer, decorated quite young, and full

She murmured: "Let us stop a while, my poor Alexandre, and you rest on that bench:

It was a little wormeaten bench, placed at a turn in the alley. Every time they came in this direction

He sat down and with a proud and familiar gesture he took his beautiful white beard in his hand, and, closing

his, fingers over it, ran them down to the point, which he held for a minute at the pit of his stomach, as if once

Madame Maramballe continued: "I married him; it is only just and natural that I should bear his injustice; but

what I do not understand is why you also should have supported it, my good Alexandre!"

She added: "Really. I have often wondered. When I married him you were his orderly and you could hardly

do otherwise than endure him. But why did you remain with us, who pay you so little and who treat you so

badly, when you could have done as every one else does, settle down, marry, have a family?"

Then he was silent; but he kept pulling his beard as if he were ringing a bell within him, as if he were trying

Madame Maramballe was following her own train of thought: "You are not a peasant. You have an

She began to laugh: "You are not going to try to tell me that Maramballe's sweet disposition caused you to

He was fidgeting about on his bench visibly embarrassed, and he muttered behind his long beard:

The old lady, who had a sweet face, with a snowy line of curly white hair between her forehead and her

bonnet, turned around in her chair and observed her servant with a surprised look, exclaiming: "I, my poor

He began to look up in the air, then to one side, then toward the distance, turning his head as do timid people

when forced to admit shameful secrets. At last he exclaimed, with the courage of a trooper who is ordered to

the line of fire: "You see, it's this waythe first time I brought a letter to mademoiselle from the lieutenant,

Then he cried out, like a malefactor who is admitting a fatal crime: "I had a sentiment for madame! There!"

She answered nothing, stopped looking at him, hung her head, and thought. She was good, full of justice,

gentleness, reason, and tenderness. In a second she saw the immense devotion of this poor creature, who had

given up everything in order to live beside her, without saying anything. And she felt as if she could cry.

As they approached the village they saw Captain Maramballe coming toward them. As soon as he joined

them he asked his wife, with a visible desire of getting angry: "What have we for dinner?"

He lost his temper: "Chicken! chicken! always chicken! By all that's holy, I've had enough chicken! Have you

She answered, in a resigned tone: "But, my dear, you know that the doctor has ordered it for you. It's the best

thing for your stomach. If your stomach were well, I could give you many things which I do not dare set

Then, exasperated, he planted himself in front of Alexandre, exclaiming: "Well, if my stomach is out of order

it's the fault of that brute. For thirtyfive years he has been poisoning me with his abominable cooking."

Madame Maramballe suddenly turned about completely, in order to see the old domestic. Their eyes met, and

The drawingroom was small, full of heavy draperies and discreetly fragrant. A large fire burned in the grate

and a solitary lamp at one end of the mantelpiece threw a soft light on the two persons who were talking.

She, the mistress of the house, was an old lady with white hair, but one of those old ladies whose unwrinkled

skin is as smooth as the finest paper, and scented, impregnated with perfume, with the delicate essences

He was a very old friend, who had never married, a constant friend, a companion in the journey of life, but

They had not spoken for about a minute, and were both looking at the fire, dreaming of no matter what, in

one of those moments of friendly silence between people who have no need to be constantly talking in order

to be happy together, when suddenly a large log, a stump covered with burning roots, fell out. It fell over the

firedogs into the drawingroom and rolled on to the carpet, scattering great sparks around it. The old lady,

with a little scream, sprang to her feet to run away, while he kicked the log back on to the hearth and stamped

When the disaster was remedied, there was a strong smell of burning, and, sitting down opposite to his friend,

She looked at him in astonishment, with the inquisitive gaze of women who wish to know everything, that

eye which women have who are no longer very young,in which a complex, and often roguish, curiosity is

"My old friends were often surprised at the coldness which suddenly sprang up between one of my best

friends whose Christian name was Julien, and myself. They could not understand how two such intimate and

inseparable friends, as we had been, could suddenly become almost strangers to one another, and I will tell

"He and I used to live together at one time. We were never apart, and the friendship that united us seemed so

"One evening when he came home, he told me that he was going to get married, and it gave me a shock as if

he had robbed me or betrayed me. When a man's friend marries, it is all over between them. The jealous

affection of a woman, that suspicious, uneasy and carnal affection, will not tolerate the sturdy and frank

attachment, that attachment of the mind, of the heart, and that mutual confidence which exists between two

"You see, however great the love may be that unites them a man and a woman are always strangers in mind

and intellect; they remain belligerents, they belong to different races. There must always be a conqueror and a

conquered, a master and a slave; now the one, now the otherthey are never two equals. They press each

other's hands, those hands trembling with amorous passion; but they never press them with a long, strong,

loyal pressure, with that pressure which seems to open hearts and to lay them bare in a burst of sincere,

strong, manly affection. Philosophers of old, instead of marrying, and procreating as a consolation for their

old age children, who would abandon them, sought for a good, reliable friend, and grew old with him in that

"Well, my friend Julien married. His wife was pretty, charming, a little, curlyhaired blonde, plump and

lively, who seemed to worship him. At first I went but rarely to their house, feeling myself de trop. But,

somehow, they attracted me to their home; they were constantly inviting me, and seemed very fond of me.

Consequently, by degrees, I allowed myself to be allured by the charm of their life. I often dined with them,

and frequently, when I returned home at night, thought that I would do as he had done, and get married, as

"Well, one evening Julien wrote and asked me to go to dinner, and I naturally went.

"'My dear fellow,' he said, 'I must go out directly afterward on business, and I shall not be back until eleven

o'clock; but I shall be back at eleven precisely, and I reckon on you to keep Bertha company.'

"'You are as nice as ever, I said, and I felt a long, friendly pressure of my fingers, but I paid no attention to it;

"As soon as he had gone, a kind of strange embarrassment immediately seemed to arise between his wife and

me. We had never been alone together yet, and in spite of our daily increasing intimacy, this tete atete

placed us in a new position. At first I spoke vaguely of those indifferent matters with which one fills up an

embarrassing silence, but she did not reply, and remained opposite to me with her head down in an undecided

manner, as if she were thinking over some difficult subject, and as I was at a loss for small talk, I held my

"And then also I felt something in the air, something I could not express, one of those mysterious

premonitions that warn one of another person's secret intentions in regard to yourself, whether they be good

"So I opened the box where the wood was kept, which was placed just where yours is, took out the largest log

and put it on top of the others, which were three parts burned, and then silence again reigned in the room.

"In a few minutes the log was burning so brightly that it scorched our faces, and the young woman raised her

"So we went and sat on the sofa, and then she said suddenly, looking me full in the face:

"'Upon my word,' I replied, very much at a loss for an answer, 'I cannot foresee such a case; but it would

"She gave a hard, nervous, vibrating laugh; one of those false laughs which seem as if they must break thin

glass, and then she added: 'Men are never either venturesome or spiteful.' And, after a moment's silence, she

continued: 'Have you ever been in love, Monsieur Paul?' I was obliged to acknowledge that I certainly had,

and she asked me to tell her all about it. Whereupon I made up some story or other. She listened to me

attentively, with frequent signs of disapproval and contempt, and then suddenly she said:

"'No, you understand nothing about the subject. It seems to me that real love must unsettle the mind, upset the

nerves and distract the head; that it musthow shall I express it?be dangerous, even terrible, almost

criminal and sacrilegious; that it must be a kind of treason; I mean to say that it is bound to break laws,

fraternal bonds, sacred obligations; when love is tranquil, easy, lawful and without dangers, is it really love?'

"I did not know what answer to give her, and I made this philosophical reflection to myself: 'Oh! female

"While speaking, she had assumed a demure saintly air; and, resting on the cushions, she stretched herself out

at full length, with her head on my shoulder, and her dress pulled up a little so as to show her red stockings,

"'I suppose I have frightened you?' I protested against such a notion, and she leaned against my breast

altogether, and without looking at me, she said: 'If I were to tell you that I love you, what would you do?'

"And before I could think of an answer, she had thrown her arms around my neck, had quickly drawn my

"Oh! My dear friend, I can tell you that I did not feel at all happy! What! deceive Julien? become the lover of

this little, silly, wrong headed, deceitful woman, who was, no doubt, terribly sensual, and whom her

To betray him continually, to deceive him, to play at being in love merely because I was attracted by

forbidden fruit, by the danger incurred and the friendship betrayed! No, that did not suit me, but what was I to

do? To imitate Joseph would be acting a very stupid and, moreover, difficult part, for this woman was

enchanting in her perfidy, inflamed by audacity, palpitating and excited. Let the man who has never felt on

his lips the warm kiss of a woman who is ready to give herself to him throw the first stone at me.

"Well, a minute moreyou understand what I mean? A minute more, andI should have beenno, she

would have been!I beg your pardon, he would have beenwhen a loud noise made us both jump up. The

log had fallen into the room, knocking over the fire irons and the fender, and on to the carpet, which it had

scorched, and had rolled under an armchair, which it would certainly set alight.

"I jumped up like a madman, and, as I was replacing on the fire that log which had saved me, the door opened

"'I am free,' he said, with evident pleasure. 'The business was over two hours sooner than I expected!'

"Yes, my dear friend, without that log, I should have been caught in the very act, and you know what the

"You may be sure that I took good care never to be found in a similar situation again, never, never. Soon

afterward I saw that Julien was giving me the 'cold shoulder,' as they say. His wife was evidently

undermining our friendship. By degrees he got rid of me, and we have altogether ceased to meet.

Two years ago this spring I was making a walking tour along the shore of the Mediterranean. Is there

anything more pleasant than to meditate while walking at a good pace along a highway? One walks in the

sunlight, through the caressing breeze, at the foot of the mountains, along the coast of the sea. And one

dreams! What a flood of illusions, loves, adventures pass through a pedestrian's mind during a two hours'

march! What a crowd of confused and joyous hopes enter into you with the mild, light air! You drink them in

with the breeze, and they awaken in your heart a longing for happiness which increases with the hun ger

I was following that long road which goes from Saint Raphael to Italy, or, rather, that long, splendid

panoramic highway which seems made for the representation of all the lovepoems of earth. And I thought

that from Cannes, where one poses, to Monaco, where one gambles, people come to this spot of the earth for

hardly any other purpose than to get embroiled or to throw away money on chance games, displaying under

this delicious sky and in this garden of roses and oranges all base vanities and foolish pretensions and vile

lusts, showing up the human mind such as it is, servile, ignorant, arrogant and full of cupidity.

Suddenly I saw some villas in one of those ravishing bays that one meets at every turn of the mountain; there

were only four or five fronting the sea at the foot of the mountains, and behind them a wild fir wood slopes

into two great valleys, that were untraversed by roads. I stopped short before one of these chalets, it was so

pretty: a small white house with brown trimmings, overrun with rambler roses up to the top.

The garden was a mass of flowers, of all colors and all kinds, mixed in a coquettish, wellplanned disorder.

The lawn was full of them, big pots flanked each side of every step of the porch, pink or yellow clusters

framed each window, and the terrace with the stone balustrade, which enclosed this pretty little dwelling, had

a garland of enormous red bells, like drops of blood. Behind the house I saw a long avenue of orange trees in

I asked myself what poet or what fairy was living there, what inspired, solitary being had discovered this spot

A workman was breaking stones up the street, and I went to him to ask the name of the proprietor of this

Julie Romain! In my childhood, long ago, I had heard them speak of this great actress, the rival of Rachel.

No woman ever was more applauded and more lovedespecially more loved! What duets and suicides on

her account and what sensational adventures! How old was this seductive woman now? Sixty, seventy,

seventyfive! Julie Romain here, in this house! The woman who had been adored by the greatest musician

and the most exquisite poet of our land! I still remember the sensation (I was then twelve years of age) which

her flight to Sicily with the latter, after her rupture with the former, caused throughout France.

She had left one evening, after a premiere, where the audience had applauded her for a whole half hour, and

had recalled her eleven times in succession. She had gone away with the poet, in a postchaise, as was the

fashion then; they had crossed the sea, to love each other in that antique island, the daughter of Greece, in that

immense orange wood which surrounds Palermo, and which is called the "Shell of Gold."

People told of their ascension of Mount Etna and how they had leaned over the immense crater, arm in arm,

Now he was dead, that maker of verses so touching and so profound that they turned, the heads of a whole

generation, so subtle and so mysterious that they opened a new world to the younger poets.

The other one also was deadthe deserted one, who had attained through her musical periods that are alive

in the memories of all, periods of triumph and of despair, intoxicating triumph and heartrending despair.

A small servant answered, a boy of eighteen with awkward mien and clumsy hands. I wrote in pencil on my

card a gallant compliment to the actress, begging her to receive me. Perhaps, if she knew my name, she

The little valet took it in, and then came back, asking me to follow him. He led me to a neat and decorous

salon, furnished in the LouisPhilippe style, with stiff and heavy furniture, from which a little maid of

On the walls hung three portraits, that of the actress in one of her roles, that of the poet in his closefitting

greatcoat and the ruffled shirt then in style, and that of the musician seated at a piano.

She, blond, charming, but affected, according to the fashion of her day, was smiling, with her pretty mouth

The whole place had the air of a bygone time, of days that were done and men who had vanished.

A door opened and a little woman entered, old, very old, very small, with white hair and white eyebrows, a

She held out her hand to me, saying in a voice still fresh, sonorous and vibrant:

"Thank you, monsieur. How kind it is of the men of today to remember the women of yesterday! Sit down."

I told her that her house had attracted me, that I had inquired for the proprietor's name, and that, on learning

"This gives me all the more pleasure, monsieur," she replied, "as it is the first time that such a thing has

happened. When I received your card, with the gracious note, I trembled as if an old friend who had

disappeared for twenty years had been announced to me. I am like a dead body, whom no one remembers, of

whom no one will think until the day when I shall actually die; then the newspapers will mention Julie

Romain for three days, relating anecdotes and details of my life, reviving memories, and praising me greatly.

"And this will not be so very long now. In a few months, in a few days, nothing will remain but a little

She raised her eyes toward her portrait, which smiled down upon this caricature of herself; then she looked at

those of the two men, the disdainful poet and the inspired musician, who seemed to say: "What does this ruin

An indefinable, poignant, irresistible sadness overwhelmed my heart, the sadness of existences that have had

their day, but who are still debating with their memories, like a person drowning in deep water.

From my seat I could see on the highroad the handsome carriages that were whirling from Nice to Monaco;

inside them I saw young, pretty, rich and happy women and smiling, satisfied men. Following my eye, she

I saw that she was disposed to talk of herself, so I began to question her, gently and discreetly, as one might

She spoke of her successes, her intoxications and her friends, of her whole triumphant existence.

"Was it on the stage that you found your most intense joys, your true happiness?" I asked.

I smiled; then, raising her eyes to the two portraits, she said, with a sad glance:

"Both. I even confuse them up a little now in my old woman's memory, and then I feel remorse."

"Then, madame, your acknowledgment is not to them, but to Love itself. They were merely its interpreters."

"Are you sure that you have not been, or that you might not have been, loved as well or better by a simple

man, but not a great man, who would have offered to you his whole life and heart, all his thoughts, all his

days, his whole being, while these gave you two redoubtable rivals, Music and Poetry?"

"No, monsieur, no!" she exclaimed emphatically, with that still youthful voice, which caused the soul to

vibrate. "Another one might perhaps have loved me more, but he would not have loved me as these did. Ah!

those two sang to me of the music of love as no one else in the world could have sung of it. How they

intoxicated me! Could any other man express what they knew so well how to express in tones and in words?

Is it enough merely to love if one cannot put all the poetry and all the music of heaven and earth into love?

And they knew how to make a woman delirious with songs and with words. Yes, perhaps there was more of

illusion than of reality in our passion; but these illusions lift you into the clouds, while realities always leave

you trailing in the dust. If others have loved me more, through these two I have understood, felt and

I pretended not to see, looking off into the distance. She resumed, after a few minutes:

"You see, monsieur, with nearly every one the heart ages with the body. But this has not happened with me.

My body is sixtynine years old, while my poor heart is only twenty. And that is the reason why I live all

"How you would laugh at me, if you knew, if you knew how I pass my evenings, when the weather is fine. I

I accepted at once. She rang, delighted, and after giving some orders to the little maid she took me over her

A kind of glassenclosed veranda, filled with shrubs, opened into the diningroom, revealing at the farther

end the long avenue of orange trees extending to the foot of the mountain. A low seat, hidden by plants,

Then we went into the garden, to look at the flowers. Evening fell softly, one of those calm, moist evenings

when the earth breathes forth all her perfumes. Daylight was almost gone when we sat down at table. The

dinner was good and it lasted a long time, and we became intimate friends, she and I, when she understood

what a profound sympathy she had aroused in my heart. She had taken two thimblefuls of wine, as the phrase

"Come, let us look at the moon," she said. "I adore the good moon. She has been the witness of my most

intense joys. It seems to me that all my memories are there, and that I need only look at her to bring them all

back to me. And evensome timesin the eveningI offer to myself a pretty playyes, prettyif you

"Come, now! come, tell me; I promise you that I will not laugh. I swear it to youcome, now!"

She hesitated. I took her handsthose poor little hands, so thin and so cold!and I kissed them one after the

other, several times, as her lovers had once kissed them. She was moved and hesitated.

She rose, and as the little domestic, awkward in his green livery, removed the chair behind her, she whispered

The avenue of oranges was really splendid to see. The full moon made a narrow path of silver, a long bright

line, which fell on the yellow sand, between the round, opaque crowns of the dark trees.

As these trees were in bloom, their strong, sweet perfume filled the night, and swarming among their dark

foliage I saw thousands of fireflies, which looked like seeds fallen from the stars.

"This is what makes one long for more life. But you hardly think of these things, you men of today. You are

You no longer even know how to talk to us. When I say 'you,' I mean young men in general. Love has been

turned into a liaison which very often begins with an unpaid dressmaker's bill. If you think the bill is dearer

than the woman, you disappear; but if you hold the woman more highly, you pay it. Nice moralsand a nice

I looked, astonished and delighted. Down there at the end of the avenue, in the moonlight, were two young

people, with their arms around each other's waist. They were walking along, interlaced, charming, with short,

little steps, crossing the flakes of light; which illuminated them momentarily, and then sinking back into the

shadow. The youth was dressed in a suit of white satin, such as men wore in the eighteenth century, and had

on a hat with an ostrich plume. The girl was arrayed in a gown with panniers, and the high, powdered coiffure

They stopped a hundred paces from us, and standing in the middle of the avenue, they kissed each other with

Suddenly I recognized the two little servants. Then one of those dreadful fits of laughter that convulse you

made me writhe in my chair. But I did not laugh aloud. I resisted, convulsed and feeling almost ill, as a man

As the young pair turned toward the farther end of the avenue they again became delightful. They went

farther and farther away, finally disappearing as a dream disappears. I no longer saw them. The avenue

I took my leave at once, so as not to see them again, for I guessed that this little play would last a long time,

awakening, as it did, a whole past of love and of stage scenery; the artificial past, deceitful and seductive,

false but charming, which still stirred the heart of this amorous old comedienne.

I set out to see Italy thoroughly on two occasions, and each time I was stopped at the frontier and could not

get any further. So I do not know Italy, said my friend, Charles Jouvent. And yet my two attempts gave me a

charming idea of the manners of that beautiful country. Some time, however, I must visit its cities, as well as

the museums and works of art with which it abounds. I will make another attempt to penetrate into the

You don't understand me, so I will explain: In the spring of 1874 I was seized with an irresistible desire to see

Venice, Florence, Rome and Naples. I am, as you know, not a great traveller; it appears to me a useless and

fatiguing business. Nights spent in a train, the disturbed slumbers of the railway carriage, with the attendant

headache, and stiffness in every limb, the sudden waking in that rolling box, the unwashed feeling, with your

eyes and hair full of dust, the smell of the coal on which one's lungs feed, those bad dinners in the draughty

refreshment rooms are, according to my ideas, a horrible way of beginning a pleasure trip.

After this introduction, we have the miseries of the hotel; of some great hotel full of people, and yet so

I am most particular about my bed; it is the sanctuary of life. We entrust our almost naked and fatigued

bodies to it so that they may be reanimated by reposing between soft sheets and feathers.

There we find the most delightful hours of our existence, the hours of love and of sleep. The bed is sacred,

and should be respected, venerated and loved by us as the best and most delightful of our earthly possessions.

I cannot lift up the sheets of a hotel bed without a shudder of disgust. Who has occupied it the night before?

Perhaps dirty, revolting people have slept in it. I begin, then, to think of all the horrible people with whom

one rubs shoulders every day, people with suspiciouslooking skin which makes one think of the feet and all

the rest! I call to mind those who carry about with them the sickening smell of garlic or of humanity. I think

of those who are deformed and unhealthy, of the perspiration emanating from the sick, of everything that is

And all this, perhaps, in the bed in which I am about to sleep! The mere idea of it makes me feel ill as I get

And then the hotel dinnersthose dreary table d'hote dinners in the midst of all sorts of extraordinary

people, or else those terrible solitary dinners at a small table in a restaurant, feebly lighted by a wretched

Again, those terribly dull evenings in some un known town! Do you know anything more wretched than the

approach of. dusk on such an occasion? One goes about as if almost in a dream, looking at faces that one

never has seen before and never will see again; listening to people talking about matters which are quite

indifferent to you in a language that perhaps you do not understand. You have a terrible feeling, almost as if

you were lost, and you continue to walk on so as not to be obliged to return to the hotel, where you would

feel more lost still because you are at home, in a home which belongs to anyone who can pay for it; and at

last you sink into a chair of some welllighted cafe, whose gilding and lights oppress you a thousand times

more than the shadows in the streets. Then you feel so abominably lonely sitting in front of the glass of flat

bock beer that a kind of madness seizes you, the longing to go somewhere or other, no matter where, as long

as you need not remain in front of that marble table amid those dazzling lights.

And then, suddenly, you are aware that you are really alone in the world, always and everywhere, and that in

places which we know, the familiar jostlings give us the illusion only of human fraternity. At such moments

of selfabandonment and sombre isolation in distant cities one thinks broadly, clearly and profoundly. Then

one suddenly sees the whole of life outside the vision of eternal hope, apart from the deceptions of our innate

habits, and of our expectations of happiness, which we indulge in dreams never to be realized.

It is only by going a long distance from home that we can fully understand how shortlived and empty

everything near at hand is; by searching for the unknown, we perceive how commonplace and evanescent

everything is; only by wandering over the face of the earth can we understand how small the world is, and

How well I know, and how I hate and almost fear, those haphazard walks through unknown streets; and this

was the reason why, as nothing would induce me to undertake a tour in Italy by myself, I made up my mind

You know Paul, and how he idealizes women. To him the earth is habitable only because they are there; the

sun gives light and is warm because it shines upon them; the air is soft and balmy because it blows upon their

skin and ruffles the soft hair on their temples; and the moon is charming because it makes them dream and

imparts a languorous charm to love. Every act and action of Paul's has woman for its motive; all his thoughts,

When I mentioned Italy to Paul he at first absolutely refused to leave Paris. I, however, began to tell him of

the adventures I had on my travels. I assured him that all Italian women are charming, and I made him hope

for the most refined pleasures at Naples, thanks to certain letters of introduction which I had; and so at last he

We took the express one Thursday evening, Paul and I. Hardly anyone goes south at that time of the year, so

that we had the carriages to ourselves, and both of us were in a bad temper on leaving Paris, sorry for having

yielded to the temptation of this journey, and regretting Marly, the Seine, and our lazy boating excursions,

and all those pleasures in and near Paris which are so dear to every true Parisian.

As soon as the train started Paul stuck himself in his corner, and said, "It is most idiotic to go all that

distance," and as it was too late for him to change his mind then, I said, "Well, you should not have come."

He made no answer, and I felt very much inclined to laugh when I saw how furious he looked. He is certainly

always rather like a squirrel, but then every one of us has retained the type of some animal or other as the

mark of his primitive origin. How many people have jaws like a bulldog, or heads like goats, rabbits, foxes,

horses, or oxen. Paul is a squirrel turned into a man. He has its bright, quick eyes, its hair, its pointed nose, its

small, fine, supple, active body, and a certain mysterious resemblance in his general bearing; in fact, a

similarity of movement, of gesture, and of bearing which might almost be taken for a recollection.

At last we both went to sleep with that uncomfortable slumber of the railway carriage, which is interrupted by

We woke up as we were passing along the Rhone. Soon the continued noise of crickets came in through the

windows, that cry which seems to be the voice of the warm earth, the song of Provence; and seemed to instill

into our looks, our breasts, and our souls the light and happy feeling of the south, that odor of the parched

When the train stopped again a railway guard ran along the train calling out "Valence" in a sonorous voice,

with an accent that again gave us a taste of that Provence which the shrill note of the crickets had already

Nothing fresh happened till we got to Marseilles, where we alighted for breakfast, but when we returned to

Paul, with a delighted glance at me, gave his short mustache a mechanical twirl, and passed his fingers

through his, hair, which. had become slightly out of order with the night's journey. Then he sat down opposite

Whenever I happen to see a striking new face, either in travelling or in society, I always have the strongest

inclination to find out what character, mind, and intellectual capacities are hidden beneath those features.

She was a young and pretty woman, certainly a native of the south of France, with splendid eyes, beautiful

wavy black hair, which was so thick and long that it seemed almost too heavy for her head. She was dressed

with a certain southern bad taste which made her look a little vulgar. Her regular features had none of the

grace and finish of the refined races, of that slight delicacy which members of the aristocracy inherit from

Her bracelets were too big to be of gold; she wore earrings with large white stones that were certainly not

diamonds, and she belonged unmistakably to the People. One surmised that she would talk too loud, and

When the train started she remained motionless in her place, in the attitude of a woman who was indignant,

Paul began to talk to me, evidently with an eye to effect, trying to attract her attention, as shopkeepers expose

"She is an uncommonly fresh and pretty girl. What eyes she has, and how cross she looks. She must have

"I am not taking any trouble, my dear fellow. I think her an extremely pretty woman, that is all. If one could

only speak to her! But I don't know how to begin. Cannot you give me an idea? Can't you guess who she is?"

"Upon my word, I cannot. However, I should rather think she is some strolling actress who is going to rejoin

"What makes you think that? On the contrary, I think she looks most respectable."

"Just look at her bracelets," I said, "her earrings and her whole dress. I should not be the least surprised if she

were a dancer or a circus rider, but most likely a dancer. Her whole style smacks very much of the theatre."

"Well," I replied, "there are many things which one can do before one is twenty; dancing and elocution are

We got in; our fellow passenger was eating an orange, and certainly she did not do it elegantly. She had

spread her pockethandkerchief on her knees, and the way in which she tore off the peel and opened her

mouth to put in the pieces, and then spat the pips out of the window, showed that her training had been

She seemed, also, more put out than ever, and swallowed the fruit with an exceedingly comic air of rage.

Paul devoured her with his eyes, and tried to attract her attention and excite her curiosity; but in spite of his

talk, and of the manner in which he brought in wellknown names, she did not pay the least attention to him.

After passing Frejus and St. Raphael, the train passed through a veritable garden, a paradise of roses, and

groves of oranges and lemons covered with fruits and flowers at the same time. That delightful coast from

June is the time to see it in all its beauty, when in every narrow valley and on every slope, the most exquisite

flowers are growing luxuriantly. And the roses! fields, hedges, groves of roses. They climb up the walls,

blossom on the roofs, hang from the trees, peep out from among the bushes; they are white, red, yellow, large

and small, single, with a simple selfcolored dress, or full and heavy in brilliant toilettes.

Their breath makes the air heavy and relaxing, and the still more penetrating odor of the orange blossoms

The shore, with its brown rocks, was bathed by the motionless Mediterranean. The hot summer sun stretched

like a fiery cloth over the mountains, over the long expanses of sand, and over the motionless, apparently

solid blue sea. The train went on through the tunnels, along the slopes, above the water, on straight, walllike

viaducts, and a soft, vague, saltish smell, a smell of drying seaweed, mingled at times with the strong, heavy

But Paul neither saw, looked at, nor smelled anything, for our fellow traveller engrossed all his attention.

When we reached Cannes, as he wished to speak to me he signed to me to get out, and as soon as I did so, he

"Do you know, she is really charming. Just look at her eyes; and I never saw anything like her hair."

"Don't excite yourself," I replied, "or else address her, if you have any intentions that way. She does not look

"I don't know what to say, for I am always terribly stupid at first; I can never make advances to a woman in

the street. I follow them, go round and round them, and quite close to them, but never know what to say at

first. I only once tried to enter into conversation with a woman in that way. As I clearly saw that she was

waiting for me to make overtures, and as I felt bound to say something, I stammered out, 'I hope you are quite

I promised Paul to do all I could to bring about a conversation, and when we had taken our places again, I

So she was an Italian! I felt an absurd inclination to laugh. As Paul did not understand a word of that

She had neither turned her head nor looked at me, and I really did not know whether to take this "What do I

care" for an authorization, a refusal, a real sign of indifference, or for a mere "Let me alone."

She again said, "Mica," in a tone which seemed to mean, "I wish to goodness you would leave me alone!" It

He looked at me in that curious sort of way that people have when they try to understand others who are

"If you had counted her words you would have noticed that she used exactly six, two of which gave me to

understand that she knew no French, so four remained, and much can be said in four words."

But suddenly the Italian asked me, in that tone of discontent which seemed habitual to her, "Do you know at

"My friend and I are also going to Genoa, and if we can be of any service to you, we shall be very happy, as

you are quite alone." But she interrupted with such a "Mica!" that I did not venture on another word.

But he was in no humor for joking, and begged me dryly not to make fun of him; so I translated her question

"If we only knew," he said, "what hotel she was going to, we would go to the same. Try to find out so as to

It was not particularly easy, and I did not know what pretext to invent, desirous as I was to make the

We passed Nice, Monaco, Mentone, and the train stopped at the frontier for the examination of luggage.

Although I hate those illbred people who breakfast and dine in railway carriages, I went and bought a

quantity of good things to make one last attack on her by their means. I felt sure that this girl must, ordinarily,

be by no means inaccessible. Something had put her out and made her irritable, but very little would suffice,

We started again, and we three were still alone. I spread my eatables on the seat. I cut up the fowl, put the

slices of ham neatly on a piece of paper, and then carefully laid out our dessert, strawberries, plums, cherries

When she saw that we were about to eat she took a piece of chocolate and two little crisp cakes out of her

As she, however, glanced from time to time at our provisions, I felt sure that she would still be hungry when

she had finished what she had with her; so, as soon as her frugal meal was over, I said to her:

"Well, then," I said, "may I offer you a little wine? I see you have not drunk anything. It is Italian wine, and

as we are now in your own country, we should be very pleased to see such a pretty Italian mouth accept the

She shook her head slightly, evidently wishing to refuse, but very desirous of accepting, and her mica this

time was almost polite. I took the flask, which was covered with straw in the Italian fashion, and filling the

She took the glass with her usual look, and emptied it at a draught, like a woman consumed with thirst, and

I then offered her the cherries. "Please take some," I said; "we shall be so glad if you will."

Out of her corner she looked at all the fruit spread out beside her, and said so rapidly that I could scarcely

follow her: "A me non piacciono ne le ciriegie ne le susine; amo soltano le fragole."

I put a newspaper full of wild strawberries on her lap, and she ate them quickly, tossing them into her mouth

When she had finished the little red heap, which soon disappeared under the rapid action of her hands, I asked

She certainly devoured half of it, tearing it to pieces with the rapid movements of her jaws like some

carnivorous animal. Then she made up her mind to have some cherries, which she "did not like," and then

some plums, then some little cakes. Then she said, "I have had enough," and sat back in her corner.

I was much amused, and tried to make her eat more, insisting, in fact, till she suddenly flew into a rage, and

flung such a furious mica at me, that I would no longer run the risk of spoiling her digestion.

I turned to my friend. "My poor Paul," I said, "I am afraid we have had our trouble for nothing."

The night came on, one of those hot summer nights which extend their warm shade over the burning and

exhausted earth. Here and there, in the distance, by the sea, on capes and promontories, bright stars, which I

was, at times, almost inclined to confound with lighthouses, began to shine on the dark horizon:

The scent of the orange trees became more penetrating, and we breathed with delight, distending our lungs to

Suddenly I noticed something like a shower of stars under the dense shade of the trees along the line, where it

was quite dark. It might have been taken for drops of light, leaping, flying, playing and running among the

leaves, or for small stars fallen from the skies in order to have an excursion on the earth; but they were only

One of them happened to come into our carriage, and shed its intermittent light, which seemed to be

extinguished one moment and to be burning the next. I covered the carriagelamp with its blue shade and

watched the strange fly careering about in its fiery flight. Suddenly it settled on the dark hair of our neighbor,

who was half dozing after dinner. Paul seemed delighted, with his eyes fixed on the bright, sparkling spot,

The Italian woke up about eleven o'clock, with the bright insect still in her hair. When I saw her move, I said:

"We are just getting to Genoa, madame," and she murmured, without answering me, as if possessed by some

"Wherever you like; what does it matter to me?" She repeated her "Che mi fa" twice.

"I don't know, but she made this strange proposal to me in a most irritated voice. I told her that we were

going to the hotel, and she said: 'Very well, let us all go there!' I suppose she is without a penny. She certainly

"I am quite agreeable. Tell her that we will go wherever she likes." Then, after a moment's hesitation, he said

"We shall be very happy to have you with us, but my friend wishes to know whether you will take my arm or

I was obliged to explain myself. "In Italy, I believe, when a man looks after a woman, fulfils all her wishes,

and satisfies all her caprices, he is called a patito. Which of us two will you take for your patito?"

"All the better for you," he replied in a rage. Then, after thinking for a few moments, he went on:

"Do you really care about taking this creature with you? She will spoil our journey. What are we to do with

this woman, who looks like I don't know what? They will not take us in at any decent hotel."

I, however, just began to find the Italian much nicer than I had thought her at first, and I was now very

I replied, "My dear fellow, we have accepted, and it is too late to recede. You were the first to advise me to

I got out of the carriage, and offered my new companion my hand. She jumped out lightly, and I gave her my

arm, which she took with an air of seeming repugnance. As soon as we had claimed our luggage we set off

"To what hotel shall we go?" I asked him. "It may be difficult to get into the City of Paris with a woman,

Paul interrupted me. "Yes, with an Italian who looks more like a dancer than a duchess. However, that is no

I was in a state of perplexity. I had written to the City of Paris to retain our rooms, and now I did not know

Two commissionaires followed us with our luggage. I continued: "You might as well go on first, and say that

we are coming; and give the landlord to understand that I have aa friend with me and that we should like

rooms quite by themselves for us three, so as not to be brought in contact with other travellers. He will

But Paul growled, "Thank you, such commissions and such parts do not suit me, by any means. I did not

But I was urgent: "Look here, don't be angry. It is surely far better to go to a good hotel than to a bad one, and

it is not difficult to ask the landlord for three separate bedrooms and a diningroom."

He went on first, and I saw him go into a large hotel while I remained on the other side of the street, with my

fair Italian, who did not say a word, and followed the porters with the luggage.

"That is settled," he said, "and they will take us in; but here are only two bedrooms. You must settle it as you

There were two bedrooms separated by a small sittingroom. I ordered a cold supper, and then I turned to the

She replied with her eternal "Che mi fa!" I thereupon took up her little black wooden trunk, such as servants

use, and took it into the room on the right, which I had chosen for her. A bit of paper was fastened to the box,

"We shall have supper directly," I continued. "Meanwhile, I dare say you would like to arrange your toilette a

She answered with a 'mica', a word which she employed just as frequently as 'Che me fa', but I went on: "It is

Then I suddenly remembered that she had not, perhaps, the necessary requisites, for she appeared to me in a

very singular position, as if she had just escaped from some disagreeable adventure, and I brought her my

I put out all the little instruments for cleanliness and comfort which it contained: a nailbrush, a new

toothbrushI always carry a selection of them about with memy nailscissors, a nailfile, and sponges. I

uncorked a bottle of eau de cologne, one of lavenderwater, and a little bottle of newmown hay, so that she

might have a choice. Then I opened my powderbox, and put out the powderpuff, placed my fine towels

She watched my movements with a look of annoyance in her wideopen eyes, without appearing either

"Here is all that you require," I then said; "I will tell you when supper is ready."

When I returned to the sittingroom I found that Paul had shut himself in the other room, so I sat down to

A waiter went to and fro, bringing plates and glasses. He laid the table slowly, then put a cold chicken on it,

I knocked gently at Mademoiselle Rondoli's door. "Come in," she said, and when I did so I was struck by a

The Italian was sitting on her trunk in an attitude either of thoughtful discontent or absentmindedness. The

towel was still folded over the waterjug that was full of water, and the soap, untouched and dry, was lying

beside the empty basin; but one would have thought that the young woman had used half the contents of the

bottles of perfume. The eau de cologne, however, had been spared, as only about a third of it had gone; but to

make up for that she had used a surprising amount of lavender water and newmown hay. A cloud of violet

powder, a vague white mist, seemed still to be floating in the air, from the effects of her over powdering her

face and neck. It seemed to cover her eyelashes, eyebrows, and the hair on her temples like snow, while her

cheeks were plastered with it, and layers of it covered her nostrils, the corners of her eyes, and her chin.

When she got up she exhaled such a strong odor of perfume that it almost made me feel faint.

When we sat down to supper, I found that Paul was in a most execrable temper, and I could get nothing out of

Mademoiselle Francesca ate like an ogre, and as soon as she had finished her meal she threw herself upon the

sofa in the sittingroom. Sitting down beside her, I said gallantly, kissing her hand:

She got up, yawned, gave her hand to Paul, who took it with a furious look, and I lighted her into the

bedroom. A disquieting feeling haunted me. "Here is all you want," I said again.

The next morning she got up early, like a woman who is accustomed to work. She woke me by doing so, and

She came and went without hurrying herself, as if she were astonished at having nothing to do. At length she

went to the dressingtable, and in a moment emptied all my bottles of perfume. She certainly also used some

When she was quite dressed, she sat down on her trunk again, and clasping one knee between her hands, she

Without seeming in at all a better temper than the previous night, she murmured, "Goodmorning!"

When I asked her whether she had slept well, she nodded her head, and jumping out of bed, I went and kissed

She turned her face toward me like a child who is being kissed against its will; but I took her tenderly in my

arms, and gently pressed my lips on her eyelids, which she closed with evident distaste under my kisses on

I sat down on the trunk by her side, and passing my arm through hers, I said: "Mica! mica! mica! in reply to

For the first time I fancied that I saw the shadow of a smile on her lips, but it passed by so quickly that I may

"But if you never say anything but Mica, I shall not know what to do to please you. Let me see; what shall we

She hesitated a moment, as if some fancy had flitted through her head, and then she said carelessly: "It is all

Paul was waiting for us in the diningroom, looking as bored as third parties usually do in love affairs. I

"First of all, we will go and see a little of the town, and then we might get a carriage and take a drive in the

We breakfasted almost in silence, and then set out. I dragged Francesca from palace to palace, and she either

looked at nothing or merely glanced carelessly at the various masterpieces. Paul followed us, growling all

sorts of disagreeable things. Then we all three took a drive in silence into the country and returned to dinner.

The next day it was the same thing and the next day again; and on the third Paul said to me: "Look here, I am

going to leave you; I am not going to stop here for three weeks watching you make love to this creature."

I was perplexed and annoyed, for to my great surprise I had become singularly attached to Francesca. A man

is but weak and foolish, carried away by the merest trifle, and a coward every time that his senses are excited

or mastered. I clung to this unknown girl, silent and dissatisfied as she always was. I liked her somewhat

illtempered face, the dissatisfied droop of her mouth, the weariness of her look; I liked her fatigued

movements, the contemptuous way in which she let me kiss her, the very indifference of her caresses. A

secret bond, that mysterious bond of physical love, which does not satisfy, bound me to her. I told Paul so,

But she obstinately refused to leave Genoa, without giving any reason. I besought, I reasoned, I promised, but

Paul declared that he would go by himself, and went so far as to pack up his portmanteau; but he remained all

Thus a fortnight passed. Francesca was always silent and irritable, lived beside me rather than with me,

responded to all my requirements and all my propositions with her perpetual Che mi fa, or with her no less

My friend became more and more furious, but my only answer was, "You can go if you are tired of staying. I

Then he called me names, overwhelmed me with reproaches, and exclaimed: "Where do you think I can go

now? We had three weeks at our disposal, and here is a fortnight gone! I cannot continue my journey now;

and, in any case, I am not going to Venice, Florence and Rome all by myself. But you will pay for it, and

more dearly than you think, most likely. You are not going to bring a man all the way from Paris in order to

When I told him, very calmly, to return to Paris, he exclaimed that he intended to do so the very next day; but

By this time we began to be known in the streets through which we wandered from morning till night.

Sometimes French people would turn round astonished at meeting their fellowcountrymen in the company

of this girl with her striking costume, who looked singularly out of place, not to say compromising, beside us.

She used to walk along, leaning on my arm, without looking at anything. Why did she remain with me, with

us, who seemed to do so little to amuse her? Who was she? Where did she come from? What was she doing?

Had she any plan or idea? Where did she live? As an adventuress, or by chance meetings? I tried in vain to

find out and to explain it. The better I knew her the more enigmatical she became. She seemed to be a girl of

poor family who had been taken away, and then cast aside and lost. What did she think would become of her,

or whom was she waiting for? She certainly did not appear to be trying to make a conquest of me, or to make

I tried to question her, to speak to her of her childhood and family; but she never gave me an answer. I stayed

with her, my heart unfettered and my senses enchained, never wearied of holding her in my arms, that proud

and quarrelsome woman, captivated by my senses, or rather carried away, overcome by a youthful, healthy,

powerful charm, which emanated from her fragrant person and from the wellmolded lines of her body.

Another week passed, and the term of my journey was drawing on, for I had to be back in Paris by the

eleventh of July. By this time Paul had come to take his part in the adventure, though still grumbling at me,

while I invented pleasures, distractions and excursions to amuse Francesca and my friend; and in order to do

One day I proposed an excursion to Sta Margarita, that charming little town in the midst of gardens, hidden at

the foot of a slope which stretches far into the sea up to the village of Portofino. We three walked along the

excellent road which goes along the foot of the mountain. Suddenly Francesca said to me: "I shall not be able

That was all; I did not ask her any questions, as I was quite sure she would not answer me.

The next morning she got up very early. When she spoke to me it was in a constrained and hesitating voice:

Then she explained: "You must go into the Street VictorEmmanuel, down the Falcone road and the side

street SanRafael and into the furniture shop in the building at the right at the end of a court, and there you

When Paul saw that I was alone, he stammered out: "Where; is Francesca?" And when I told him what had

"My dear fellow, let us make use of our opportunity, and bolt; as it is, our time is up. Two days, more or less,

But I refused. I could not, as I told him, leave the girl in that manner after such companionship for nearly

three weeks. At any rate, I ought to say goodby to her, and make her accept a present; I certainly had no

I remained indoors for several hours, expecting Francesca's return, but she did not come, and at last, at

I must acknowledge that I was surprised and rather vexed. He laughed in my face, and made fun of me.

"It is not exactly a bad way of getting rid of you, though rather primitive. 'Just wait for me, I shall be back in

a moment,' they often say. How long are you going to wait? I should not wonder if you were foolish enough

to go and look for her at the address she gave you. 'Does Madame Rondoli live here, please?' 'No, monsieur.'

"Not in the least," I protested, "and I assure you that if she does not come back tomorrow morning I shall

leave by the express at eight o'clock. I shall have waited twentyfour hours, and that is enough; my

I spent an uneasy and unpleasant evening, for I really had at heart a very tender feeling for her. I went to bed

at twelve o'clock, and hardly slept at all. I got up at six, called Paul, packed up my things, and two hours later

The next year, at just about the same period, I was seized as one is with a periodical fever, with a new desire

to go to Italy, and I immediately made up my mind to carry it into effect. There is no doubt that every really

welleducated man ought to see Florence, Venice and Rome. This travel has, also, the additional advantage

of providing many subjects of conversation in society, and of giving one an opportunity for bringing forward

This time I went alone, and I arrived at Genoa at the same time as the year before, but without any adventure

on the road. I went to the same hotel, and actually happened to have the same room.

I was hardly in bed when the recollection of Francesca which, since the evening before, had been floating

vaguely through my mind, haunted me with strange persistency. I thought of her nearly the whole night, and

by degrees the wish to see her again seized me, a confused desire at first, which gradually grew stronger and

more intense. At last I made up my mind to spend the next day in Genoa to try to find her, and if I should not

Early in the morning I set out on my search. I remembered the directions she had given me when she left me,

perfectlyVictorEmmanuel Street, house of the furnituredealer, at the bottom of the yard on the right.

I found it without the least difficulty, and I knocked at the door of a somewhat dilapidatedlooking dwelling.

It was opened by a stout woman, who must have been very handsome, but who actually was only very dirty.

Although she had too much embonpoint, she still bore the lines of majestic beauty; her untidy hair fell over

her forehead and shoulders, and one fancied one could see her floating about in an enormous dressing gown

covered with spots of dirt and grease. Round her neck she wore a great gilt necklace, and on her wrists were

In rather a hostile manner she asked me what I wanted, and I replied by requesting her to tell me whether

"I had the pleasure of meeting her last year, and I should like to see her again."

I hesitated a moment, and then I told her. I had hardly done so when the Italian put out her arms as if to

embrace me. "Oh! you are the Frenchman how glad I am to see you! But what grief you caused the poor

child! She waited for you a month; yes, a whole month. At first she thought you would come to fetch her. She

wanted to see whether you loved her. If you only knew how she cried when she saw that you were not

coming! She cried till she seemed to have no tears left. Then she went to the hotel, but you had gone. She

thought that most likely you were travelling in Italy, and that you would return by Genoa to fetch her, as she

would not go with you. And she waited more than a month, monsieur; and she was so unhappy; so unhappy. I

I really felt a little disconcerted, but I regained my selfpossession, and asked:

"She has gone to Paris with a painter, a delightful man, who loves her very much, and who gives her

everything that she wants. Just look at what she sent me; they are very pretty, are they not?"

And she showed me, with quite southern animation, her heavy bracelets and necklace. "I have also," she

continued, "earrings with stones in them, a silk dress, and some rings; but I only wear them on grand

occasions. Oh! she is very happy, monsieur, very happy. She will be so pleased when I tell her you have been

But I refused, as I now wished to get away by the first train; but she took me by the arm and pulled me in,

I found myself in a small, rather dark room, furnished with only a table and a few chairs.

She continued: "Oh, she is very happy now, very happy. When you met her in the train she was very

miserable; she had had an unfortunate love affair in Marseilles, and she was coming home, poor child. But

she liked you at once, though she was still rather sad, you understand. Now she has all she wants, and she

writes and tells me everything that she does. His name is Bellemin, and they say he is a great painter in your

country. He fell in love with her at first sight. But you will take a glass of sirup?it is very good. Are you

I felt an increasing inclination to laugh, as my first disappointment was dispelled by what Mother Rondoli

"So you are quite alone?" she continued. "How sorry I am that Francesca is not here now; she would have

been company for you all the time you stayed. It is not very amusing to go about all by oneself, and she will

"But would you not like Carlotta to go with you? She knows all the walks very well. She is my second

No doubt she took my look of surprise for consent, for she opened the inner door and called out up the dark

"No; she will be very glad to go with you; she is very nice, and much more cheerful than her sister, and she is

In a few moments a tall, slender, dark girl appeared, her hair hanging down, and her youthful figure showing

"This is Francesca's Frenchman, you know, the one whom she knew last year. He is quite alone, and has

come to look for her, poor fellow; so I told him that you would go with him to keep him company."

Her mother pushed her out. "Go and get dressed directly; put on your blue dress and your hat with the

As soon as she had left the room the old woman explained herself: "I have two others, but they are much

younger. It costs a lot of money to bring up four children. Luckily the eldest is off my hands at present."

Then she told all about herself, about her husband, who had been an employee on the railway, but who was

dead, and she expatiated on the good qualities of Carlotta, her second girl, who soon returned, dressed, as her

Her mother examined her from head to foot, and, after finding everything right, she said:

"Now, my children, you can go." Then turning to the girl, she said: "Be sure you are back by ten o'clock

She took my arm and we went wandering about the streets, just as I had wandered the previous year with her

We returned to the hotel for lunch, and then I took my new friend to Santa Margarita, just as I had taken her

During the whole fortnight which I had at my disposal, I took Carlotta to all the places of interest in and

She cried when I left her, and the morning of my departure I gave her four bracelets for her mother, besides a

One of these days I intend to return to Italy, and I cannot help remembering with a certain amount of