Paul Bourget

“ It was as though she felt the time slipping away, bearing her happiness with it. In spite of a sky, daily warmer and of a softer azure; in spite of the blue sea, of the odors permeating the soft, balmy air; in spite of the fascination of the flowers, blooming all around, as she strolled down the alleys, still bordered with cinerarias, anemones, and pansies, she felt that her heart was not as light as when she had flown to the last rendezvous. She perceived Hautefeuille, in profile, awaiting her under the branches of the big pine, at the foot of which they had rested. ”

“ If a few hours before, in some house at Monte Carlo, the slightest word had been said against the honor of Madame de Carlsberg, what indignation would Madame Brion have not felt, and what pain! Pain she indeed had, agonizing pain, as Ely pronounced these unforgetable words; but of indignation there was not a trace in the heart which replied with these words, whose very reproach was a proof of tenderness, blind and indulgent to complicity:—
"Just God! How you must have suffered! But why did you not tell me before? Why did you not confide in me? Did you think that I would love you less? ”

“ She had felt, as she listened to Pierre's confidences on the subject of his friend, that a reflux of loathing sensuality still seethed in her former lover's heart. She saw it now. And she also saw that a deep, true passion had always lived, palpitated, germinated under his sensuality, under his hate. His passion had never developed, grown, put forth its blossom, because she had never been the woman he sought, the woman he yearned for, the woman he felt was in her. Thanks to the miracle worked by love for another, she had now become the woman he desired. ”

“ It is so hard for a young wife, it is so opposed to her instincts of sentimental pride, to beg for a sentiment, to provoke it, to conquer. It is so hard to be loved because she loves, and not because she is loved.
Olivier had too much delicacy not to feel this shade of sentiment. He gave himself up to the peculiar impression which a man feels who suffers through a woman, when he receives from another the caresses of which his unhappy love has taught him the value. He smiled at Berthe as he had never previously smiled, and Pierre was even deceived by this semi-cheerfulness of his friend. ”

“ Wherever they were, in the silent patio strewn with camellia leaves, under the murmuring pines of the Villa Ellenrock, on the field at La Napoule, where the golf players moved amid the freshest and softest of landscapes, all the marvellous scenery of the South would vanish, disappear—the palms and orange trees, the ravines, the blue sky and the luminous sea, and the man she loved. She would see nothing before her but the cruel eyes and evil smile of her old lover at Rome. In a sudden half hallucination she would hear him speaking to Pierre. ”

“ Thus in the first flush of her dawning passion for Hautefeuille, as her confession to Madame Brion proved, she had foreseen with a clearness that was almost a certainty the struggle that would take place between her love and Olivier's friendship for Pierre.
But this power of courageous realization allows such natures to measure the danger once they are face to face with it. They lay bare, with the greatest clearness, the facts of the crisis through which they pass. They have the strength that comes from daring to hope, from having an exact idea of the danger in moments that appear desperate. ”

“ Ah, what a strange soul, incomplete and yet superior, so noble and so degraded, so sensitive and so arid, in whom there seemed to be nothing but lassitude, failure, stain, and disillusionment—excepting one sentiment. This man who despised his family, who never spoke of his country without bitterness, who attributed the worst motive to every action, even his own, who denied the existence of God, of virtue, of love, this moral nihilist, in short, in so many ways like the Archduke, had one faith, one cult, one religion. ”

“ Again he had experienced, in the presence of the Archduke, the pain that is one of the frightful penalties of adultery; to see the beloved one ill-treated by the man who has the right because he is the husband, see it, and to be unable to defend her. He watched her going away now with the bearing of a beautiful, graceful queen, so proudly regal in her costume of pink moiré shot with silver. Upon the beloved visage which he saw in profile as she crossed the room, he discerned traces of profound melancholy, and again he pitied her with all his heart for the bitterness of her married life. ”

“ Madame Olivier du Prat was a mere child of about twenty years of age, very pretty, very refined, and with a delicacy in her beauty that was almost doll-like and pretty. Her hair was of a golden color that was cold through its very lightness. In her blue eyes there was, at this moment, that indefinable impenetrable expression that can be seen on the faces of most young wives before the friends of their husband's youth. Did she feel sympathy or antipathy, confidence or suspicion, for Olivier's dearest friend, who had been her husband's groomsman at their marriage? ”

“ Pierre had, in fact, expected him before. In order to put a bar to any tentative at reconciliation, the young man had given strict orders that he was at home to no one. But Corancez was one of those people who have the gift of triumphing over the most difficult obstacles. And on the morning of the sixth day, a morning as bright and radiant as the one upon which they had visited the Jenny together, Hautefeuille saw him again enter his room, the everlasting bunch of pinks in his buttonhole, a smile on his lips, a healthy color in his face, and his eyes bright with happiness. ”

“ Knowing as you did the friendship that bound him to me, if there had been a spark of—I will not say nobility—a spark of humanity in your heart, you must have recoiled from this crime, from the loathsome infamy of soiling, of ravishing him from his noble, beautiful affection, to give him in exchange a frivolous liaison of a few days, just long enough for you to find amusement in the vileness of your caprice!—He had done nothing to you! ”

“ Ely was remarkable by her need of truth and energy in the middle of a society that is refined to excess and composite to the verge of falsity. As she said to her confidante in the alleys of the Brions' garden, on that night that was so recent and seemed so distant, it was the truth in Hautefeuille's soul that had first of all attracted her, charmed her, seduced her. It was in order to live a true life, to feel true emotions, that she had entered the paths of this love, whose dangers she had foreseen. ”

“ We are the slaves of custom without even knowing it. We ask why so-and-so has not married like every one else. But we never think of asking why so-and-so has married like every one else when he is not every one else.—Besides, you did not know, you could not know, what bitter experiences had brought me to that point.—We have always respected each other in our confidences, my dear Pierre. That is why our friendship has remained so noble, so rare, something so different from the loathsome companionship that most men designate by the name. ”

“ What a contrast between this cloudy sky and the azure dome that smiled down upon their departure, between this keen north wind and the perfumed sighing of the breeze yesterday!—But who thought of this? Certainly not Florence Marsh, completely happy in the possession of the archaic scalp she was taking on board. Certainly not Andryana, to whom the prospect of a night spent on shore was full of such happy promise; she was to meet her husband, and the idea of this clandestine and at the same time legitimate rendezvous after her romantic marriage had filled the loving woman with happiness. ”

“ This contrast itself had made her friend dearer to her. Ely de Carlsberg had served her as her own rebellion, her own independence, her own romance—a romance in which she was ignorant of many chapters. For the confidences of two friends who see each other only at long intervals are always somewhat uncandid. Instinctively a woman who confesses to a friend guards against troubling the image which the friend forms of her; and that image gradually acquires a more striking resemblance to her past than to her present.
So the Baroness had concealed from her confidante all of one side of her life. ”

“ He was a remarkable type of the manly beauty peculiar to our Provence, which attests that for centuries it was the land where the Roman race left its deepest imprint. His short, black hair, over the straight, white forehead; his pointed, slightly curling beard, the firm line if his nose, and the deep curve of his brows, gave him a profile like that of a medal, which would have been severe, if all the energy of a born lover had not burned in his soft eyes, and all the gayety of the South sparkled in his smile. ”

“ Filling our soul to the exclusion of all else, they bear it incessantly to one or the other of the two poles, ecstasy and despair, without resting for a moment between them. Having come to this stage of her passion, it followed of necessity, as Louise Brion had clearly seen, that the Baroness Ely should either become the young man's mistress, or that she should put between herself and him the insurmountable barrier of a separation before the liaison—secret romance of so many women, both virtuous and otherwise. ”

“ You see, Pierre, that I speak of myself in the past as one speaks of the dead. Do not be afraid. I have not any idea of ending my life. I have caused you too much sorrow to increase your suffering by remorse. I live, and I shall live, if that can be called living in a being who has known you, who has loved and been beloved by you, and who has lost you. I know that you are leaving Cannes, that you are going away to-morrow. ”

“ From the minute when, upon the quay of the old port at Genoa, Hautefeuille had held out to her the despatch announcing Olivier's return, she had traversed so many horrible hours that it appeared as though in her thoughts she must have become accustomed to the danger, that she must have admitted the possibility of this event. But, when in love, the heart possesses such stores of confidence, united to a keen power of self-deception, that she came face to face with the actuality as unprepared, unresigned, as unwittingly as we all meet death.—Ah! if she could only see Pierre at once. ”

“ The conversation continued without any further mention of the Baroness Ely's name. The two friends spoke of their travels, of Italy, of Egypt. But when the spirit of observation is once aroused, it is not soothed to slumber by a mere act of the will. It is like an instinctive and uncontrollable force working within us and around us, in spite of us, until the moment that it has satisfied its desire to know. During the long promenade, upon their return, during and after dinner, all Olivier's powers of attention were involuntarily, unceasingly, painfully concentrated upon Pierre. ”

“ Ely did not try to struggle any longer. She lay down on her bed like some one in death agony, at one o'clock, after having sent off a despatch to the one woman whose presence she felt she could support, the one woman upon whom she could rely—to Louise Brion, whose devotion she had almost forgotten during the past weeks.
"She is my friend," she thought, "and our friendship is better than theirs, for the friendship of those men is made up of hate!" ”

“ It seems, in fact, that there are two distinct types of men, and their eternal coexistence proves the legitimacy of the two standpoints taken since the world began by the painters of human nature—comedy and tragedy. Every man partakes of one or the other, and rare is the destiny in which both are mingled. For a whole group of persons—of whom Corancez was one—the most romantic affairs end in a vaudeville; while for the other class, to which, alas, Pierre Hautefeuille belonged, the simplest adventures result in tragedy. If the first love sincerely, never does the loved woman do them wrong. ”

“ It appears incredible to us that a man could do that. But look at those muscles—that makes such a leap a possibility. Art is seen at its perfection there; magnificent limbs capable of magnificent efforts. 'I moti divini,' as Leonardo said. If you put that energy at the service of the city and represent that city by gods, by its gods, you have Greece before you."
"And you have Venice, you have Florence, you have Sienna, you have Genoa, all Italy, in fact!" interrupted Don Fortunato.
"Italy is the humble pupil of Greece," replied Fregoso, solemnly. ”

“ She was certain that Pierre would not betray their dear secret. But he was so young, so innocent, so transparent to the observer, while the other was so penetrating, so keen!—She was going to learn if their love had been suspected by Olivier, if this man had warned his friend against her in revenge.—When she heard Pierre's slow, furtive footsteps upon the pathway, her heart beat so strongly that she seemed to hear it echo through the deathly silence of the hothouse!—He is here. She takes his hand. She feels that the beloved fingers reply with their old confident pressure. ”

“ The story of Miss Marsh and Verdier gives us an indication of what we have to do. We must announce our marriage, no matter what happens. I should have liked to keep the secret a little longer. Our romance is so delightful. You know that I am romantic before everything, that I am a man of the old school, a troubadour. To see her, to worship her," he indicated Andryana, who blushed with pleasure at his protestations, "and without any witnesses of our happiness other than such friends as you"—he turned toward Ely—"such as Pierre, as Miss Marsh, was to realize an ideal. ”

“ If you only knew how the life I lead wearies and oppresses me! How tired I am of hearing about nothing but the breakfasts that Dickie Marsh gives on his yacht to the grand dukes, of Navagero's bezique with the Prince of Wales, of Chésy's speculations at the Bourse, and the half-dozen titled fools that follow his advice! If you only knew how even the best of this artificial society tires me! What does it matter to me whether Andryana Bonnacorsi decides to marry the Sire de Corancez, or any of the countless subjects of gossip at the five o'clock teas in Cannes? ”

“ Can you understand such madness in a friend whom I love so sincerely, who loves me so tenderly?"
"That is the very reason why you must not feel angry," replied Ely. "When one suffers, one is unjust. And he is unhappy in his married life. It is so hard to have made a mistake in that way."
She spoke in this way, prompted by a natural jealousy. Her passionate, ungovernable nature was too proud, too noble to employ the method of secretly poisoning the mind of husband or lover against friendships that are disliked, a method that wives and mistresses exercise with a sure and criminal knowledge. ”