Mario Uchard

“ With our habits and customs no secret, no mystery, is possible; for however loving or beloved a woman may be, her beauty is exposed to every eye. It is like the enjoyment of communal property. In my harem, on the contrary, the charms of Zouhra, Nazli, and Kondjé-Gul, concealed from all other eyes, have never excited any passions but mine; my tranquil possession is undisturbed by the anxious jealousies which recollections of a former rival always awaken. ”

“ So my aunt got to know all about it! My uncle, whom I had taken into my confidence, put them at once completely off the scent, by replying that I had started for Spain.
We are safe! Everything has been accomplished, as if by enchantment. For fifteen days past my Kondjé-Gul has been settled in a charming cottage at Ermont, in the middle of the forest, hidden away like a daisy in a field of standing corn. She has disappeared from view, leaving no more traces behind her than a bird in its flight through the air; and I am back in Paris, as if I had just returned from a journey. ”

“ Notwithstanding my fine array of principles and the strict vows I made to myself to distribute my affections equally between my cadines, it certainly looks very much as if I have selected a favourite. Have I fallen to this extent? I don't know. What is the good, moreover, of arguing about it? Is it true that undisturbed possession is the rock upon which love splits, and that constraint, on the contrary, acts as a spur to it? Instead of arguing aimlessly about such inconsistencies in human nature, it seems to me much simpler to recognise in them, as Kondjé-Gul does, a decree of Fate. ”

“ I said, wishing to begin by soothing her fears; "if, as so often happens in your own country, I were obliged, if only in order to assure our own happiness, to make another marriage, would not you understand that this was only a sacrifice which I owed to my uncle if he required it of me—a family arrangement, in fact, which could not separate us from each other? What have you to fear so long as I only love you? Did you trouble yourself about Hadidjé or Zouhra?"
"Oh, but they were not Christians! Anna Campbell would be your real wife; and your religion and laws would enjoin you to love her." ”

“ Picture to yourself, hidden in a great park whose umbrageous foliage concealed it from view, a delightful palace of the purest Oriental architecture, surrounded by gardens, with flowering shrubs covered with a wealth of blossoms, standing in the midst of green lawns, a sort of Vale of Tempé transplanted, one might imagine, from the East. My uncle Barbassou, conscientious architect that he was, had copied the plan from one of the residences of the King of Kashmir. In the interior of the Kasre you might fancy yourself in the house of some grandee of Stamboul or of Bagdad. ”

“ Did I ever tell you that the consequence of indulgence in the pleasures of harem loves would be to drown the heart, the soul, and the aspirations towards the ideal for the sole advantage of the senses? Where you seem to see the defeat of one vanquished, I find the triumph of my happiness and the enchantment of a dream which I am realizing during my waking hours. ”

“ Can't you understand, you silly boy, that I am speaking to you about Kondjé-Gul because I can see how the land lies? It is quite clear to me that between you two there is some sort of secret understanding; now what is it? I know nothing about it, but however innocent this mystery may be, I see too much danger about it not to caution you. Mademoiselle Murrah is not one of those drawing-room dolls with whom it is safe for a man to risk a little of his heart in the game of flirtation; no, the man who once falls in love with her will love her for ever, body and soul, he will be bewitched. ”

“ There is a delightful garden, at the bottom of which stands the temple of Love; the figures, handsome young men and handsome young women, are always found reclining. Well, if you exclude from such a picture details somewhat too academic for Férouzat, you may see me on the grass, enjoying the fresh air with my houris lying down around me, in the charming abandoned attitudes of young nymphs who have never heard of such a thing as stays, but display in bold relief the well-rounded forms of their beautiful and lissom figures. ”

“ Yes, if it were only in order to inquire whether the human soul freed from all constraint, is capable of infinite expansion, like a liberated gas. To mix positive and materialist science with etherialised sensualism, such is my object. A simple passion, we all know what that is; but to adore four women at a time—while so many honest folk are well content to love one only—this seems to me a praiseworthy aspiration, fit to inspire the soul of a poet who prides himself upon his gallantry, no less than the brain of a philosopher in search of the vital elixir and the sources of sensation. ”

“ Zouhra and Nazli followed us. As I went out by the verandah, I passed close to Kondjé-Gul; she drew back with a superb air of dignity, as if she feared lest her dress should be ruffled by me. Then darting a look of withering scorn at Hadidjé, she wrapped herself up in her veil and leant against the balustrade, watching us go off. It was a delicious autumn evening, the air was soft and the sky clear and starry. Under our feet the dry leaves crackled. Hadidjé wanted to have a row in the boat, so we went towards the lake. ”

“ Some day I will tell you all about it, as I have just been doing to my uncle, who finds it all very curious, although he professes only to understand me "very approximately."
Getting up at sunrise, Kondjé and I take a run through the coppices, her little feet all wet with the dew. We feel free, merry, and careless, dismissing the commissary to oblivion, and trusting to each other's love, the full charms of which this solitary companionship has revealed to us. I do not risk more than two excursions to Paris each week, one to my aunt Eudoxia's, and one to my aunt Van Cloth's. ”

“ My harem in the Faubourg St. Germain retains its Oriental aspect; it is a corner of the world described in the "Arabian Nights," where I indulge from time to time, in the midst of Paris, in the distractions of a vizier of Samarcand or Bagdad. There, when the shutters are closed, in my gynæceum (or women's apartment) , illuminated by lamps which shed a soft lustre upon us, while the bluish-grey smoke from my narguilé perfumes the atmosphere, my houris lull me to sleep to the music of their taraboucks. ”

“ Ah, my dear fellow, our pleasure in life is only made up of such trifles, which our imagination generally provides for us. In those secret interviews I discovered in Kondjé-Gul, who was certainly endowed with a frank and straightforward mind, a number of graces which I had never been able to detect before during our intercourse in the harem. Nothing could be stranger or more fascinating than the love of this poor slave-sweetheart, still so humble and timid, and dazzled as it were by the brilliancy of her dream. ”

“ Compare with this secret and charming bond of union which attaches me to Kondjé-Gul, the prosaic and vulgar character of those common intrigues which one cynically permits the whole world to observe, or of those illicit connections which the hypocritical remnant of virtue with us constrains us to conceal, like crimes, in the darkness. Deceptive frenzies they are, the enjoyment of which always involves of necessity the degradation of the woman and the contempt of the lover! ”

“ Those hussies are mistresses, you will say to me! I know it: that is to say, they are females who belong to everybody. The question is settled: my uncle is a virtuous man by the side of our friends. As he is incapable of such vulgar and promiscuous intrigues he has a supplementary household, that is all! Like the prudent traveller who is acquainted with the length of the journey he judiciously prepares relays.
Compare that family gathering at my aunt Van Cloth's with those unhealthy stolen pleasures of debauched husbands who feel ashamed and tremble with the fear of being surprised. ”

“ They are not like some of those feminine taskmasters who take entire possession of you, forcing you to follow the adored object to the theatre, or take it to the ball, in order to have the pleasure of watching it flirting bare-shouldered with some intimate friend, who will perhaps be its next lover. No, in my rôle of sultan my amours are modestly hidden from profane eyes in the recesses of my harem, and there I am always welcome whenever I choose to come. ”

“ Slave of our civilized conventions, what bliss to run away unfettered into the shady paths of the pagan world, peopled with its merry, enchanting nymphs! Or again to wander, like a happy child of Asiatic climes in gardens of sycamores, where young sultanas bathe and disport themselves in basins of porphyry. The Bois de Boulogne is a charming place, no doubt, madam; but you will admit that it is inferior to the Valley of Roses, and that the painted and bedizened young women you see there will bear no comparison with my houris. ”

“ Reared with a view to the harem, the young girl aims no higher in her ambitious fancy than to become the favourite and outshine her rivals; but never, never in the world, does she conceive the outlandish notion of becoming the sole object of the affections of lover, master, or husband. The ideal of girls like Zouhra, Nazli, Hadidjé, and Kondjé-Gul, is the life which I am now giving them; they abandon themselves to it, as to the realisation of their hopes. ”

“ There is a much more persuasive eloquence in the heart than in the vain deductions of logic. During this extraordinary scene, in which my poor Kondjé-Gul's mind was alarmed by the conflict going on between her own beliefs and what she knew of our society, I was quite sincere in my illusions concerning the moral compromise which, I fancied, was imposed upon me as an absolute duty. Singular as it may all appear to you, I had already been subjected too long to the influence of the harem not to have become gradually permeated by the Oriental ideas. ”

“ My aunt Gretchen is just reaching her thirty-fourth birthday. She confesses to her age. If she did not come from Amsterdam she ought to have been born there. She has blossomed like a flower among the tulips, and she looks like a Rubens, in that painter's more sober style, as in the portrait of the Friesland woman, with the prim pink and white flesh of the healthful natures of the North. You realise that good blood flows quietly and temperately beneath the pleasantly plump charms of this worthy Dutchwoman, who claims only her due, but is desirous of getting it. ”

“ The fact is that this necessity for dissimulation, these deceptions, and these clandestine interviews, have produced between Kondjé-Gul and me a sort of spring-tide of delightful expansion of the affections. You should see us in the daytime, both of us as stiff as starch in the presence of the others. You should see the manoeuvres we perform in order to exchange a sly smile or a shake of the hands out of sight. You should see also what pretty little airs of disdain she puts on for her rivals, who are slumbering in their paradise of illusion! ”

“ The choice of instruments was a matter of small importance to a man of his nature, the incompleteness of whose education had left him scarcely half-civilized. Accustomed to have all his own way, he made straight for his object, rushing like a bull at every obstacle. The suppleness of his Slavonic character displayed itself in this desperate game, in which, the happiness of his life was at stake. He loved Kondjé-Gul, as I knew full well, with that blind love which admitted no compromise with reason. ”

“ My aunt Van Cloth, who is distracted with anxiety, thinks that she sees before her some lady of my family, and in order to excuse herself for disturbing her, begins by saying that she has come to see Captain Barbassou, her husband.
Imagine the stupefaction of my aunt Eudoxia! But being too astute to betray herself, she lets the other speak, questions her and learns the whole story. Then, like the good soul that she is, and feeling sorry for poor Ernest and his swollen stomach, she rings and orders the carriage to be ready, so that she may go as soon as possible to her own doctor ”