A LOVE CRIME. Paul Bourget
I can catch the coquetry, the glances, the premonition of the
woman in the presence of the man; and it will end as it did with her
mother, in a marriage of convenience, first acts of thoughtlessness, a
first lover, then a series of lovers down to some young Baron de Querne,
whom there will be an attempt to persuade that none was ever loved but
he; and, more foolish or more intelligent than myself, he will perhaps
believe it.
"Yes, more intelligent; for in love the great thing is to have as much
emotion as possible; and the real deception is to paralyse one's heart
by clear-sightedness. Whether was it Valmont in the 'Liaisons'--dear
Valmont--or the President's wife that was deceived? She who felt or he
who calculated? Whether was it Elvire or Don Juan, who does not
understand that Elvire, seeing that she has been able to intoxicate
herself with love, is alone to be envied, while he himself is not? I
know all this, but the inward demon is the stronger, and as soon as I
begin to pay my addresses to a woman I am at pains to procure all such
information concerning her as can render me incapable of loving her.
"At my age, ought I not to write in this book: 'O divine fate! that has
caused me so speedily to light upon the unique, the ideal woman, the
sister-soul,' &c. (It would call for some of Gounod's music). Not
exactly, Monsieur de Querne, but rather a lady of experience, who has
had five or six lovers, who has retained sufficient taste to give the
title of 'sentiment' to what belongs to fair and fitting and the most
brutal sensation; a lady of tact, who has given herself a good deal of
trouble to persuade you that you have seduced her. And the deuce take me
if I am angry with her for such charming hypocrisy! Besides, what is the
good of being angry with anyone for anything? Every human being is a
pretentious little watch, which, seeing its hands go round, fancies that
it is itself the cause of the motion. Foolishness and vanity! There is a
delicate mechanism inside, and this mechanism has it that Madame ----
shall be a sentimental prostitute, her daughter a future quean, and I a
mirthless debauchee, who parch my soul by setting forth all this instead
of enjoying what is granted to me."
"PARIS, _22nd May_ 1877.
"An evening of folly yesterday and debauchery, but debauchery that was
gay and healthy which is undoubtedly the truth. Nothing but this remains
to me that does not leave disgust behind.
"I went to see Duret, the painter, with that sad dog René W----, who
first stopped in the Rue de la Tour-Auvergne to ask for Marie, a tall
brunette.
"I have a Marie here," said the doorkeeper, "but she is a tall blonde,
red even," and in fact at a window in the first floor I saw a head of
warm, golden hair, a dress of clear, bright blue, and a made complexion
as extravagantly pink as a doll's. In my dark hours I have had
sufficient knowledge of the degrading and consolatory fascination of
these painted charms, of these slain bodies, of these ringed eyes, of
all this lying!
"At Duret's found Léonie, the model who stood to him for his _Delilah_
in the last Salon: a somewhat wearied face, with a refined and arched
nose, eyes of gleaming blackness, a strongly marked chin, with a
slightly masculine appearance in the profile--the masculine appearance
of theatrical women who act in burlesque--and a long countenance. But
that is but the skeleton of the face. The slight moustache was tinged
with black, the patch on the cheek underlined with black, the eyes made
still larger with black, the complexion covered with powder, and the
powder blending with the pale pink of the blood gave the woman an
extravagant and sophisticated look which was completed by the
brilliantly nacreous teeth that twinkled with the splendour of moist
imitation pearls.
"The toilet completed the woman. She had some black, gauzy material
round her neck, a hat trimmed with gauze and flowers, a dress of
variegated and friezed material, with a huge, red rose blooming on her
left breast.
"'She's a luxurious woman,' said René ironically, and, indeed, with the
material of her dress, her gauze and her flower, she looked like a
creature that lived on nothing but superfluity. I paid my addresses to
her, pleased her, and did not leave her house until this morning.
"O enchantment of the senses when the surcharge of thought comes not to
mar physical intoxication! O enchantment of prostitutes, seen thus as
dispensers of pleasure free from disquiet of heart! No asking whether or
how one loves or is loved, no measuring of sensation with an ideal type
of feeling that is perceived, and striven after, and that never can be
felt! I write these lines, and see! already my enjoyment has evaporated.
I write these lines and yet would that on a solitary terrace fronting a
landscape of trees and waters a woman might appear having the eyes of
which I long have dreamed--eyes which I know without having ever met
them--and might swear to me that this life has been nothing but an evil
dream! And she should tell me _all_, and by that all be made the dearer
to me;--and then I should love!"
"PARIS, _June_ 1879.
"Luncheons and dinners; dinners and luncheons. Assignations and evening
parties. Ah! how empty my life is! I do nothing that I like; nothing;
for I like nothing.
"In presence of the living creature, nothing at heart but pity for him
who suffers, if he does suffer--who will suffer since he endures the
evil of existence.
"If death, inevitable death, were neither physically painful in the
passage thither from life, nor terrible in its sequel to our imagining,
ah! how I would seek that which has prompted thoughts to mar my life!
"We live on--and why? We think--and why? Why between