Vicente Blasco Ibáñez

“ Michael recalls with ironical sadness all the illusions, all the desires, he had in the past, concentrated on this nothingness. He begins to feel the need of forgetting the corpse. His eyes, looking within, see the diminutive foliage, the gaudy butterfly, and all that nature has placed on a nameless tomb. This is what a life which considered itself superior to all others has left as the only trace of its existence. Perhaps in the corolla of one of the little flowers there is something of Alicia's soul, the butterflies sip it, and continue in an intoxicated flight above the tombs. ”

“ I need sweet falsehoods to sing my mind to sleep until the hour of my death. Illusions are a lie, but I want them near me; hope is another lie, but I want it to walk before me. I don't believe in love, since I don't believe in anything. Everything you say against it I have known for years; but should I give it a kick if it comes my way, and wants to go with me? Do you know any dream that fills the emptiness of our lives better—even though it lasts only a short time?"
Michael greeted his friend's enthusiasm with a sardonic gesture. ”

“ The Monaco plateau was simply the lowest step in the great stairway which the Alps let fall to the sea. Above, clouds were caught amid the peaks, covering them momentarily with a shadow ominous of storm. Below, amid the rose-colored walls and the white towers of the Grimaldi, rose the tropical palms, the cocoanut and plantain trees, giving this Ligurian castle the luxurious aspect of Brazilian farm.
Lubimoff was seated between the cannon, on the parapet that overlooks the open sea, when he saw Novoa strolling along the bulwarks that rise above the harbor. ”

“ A silent approbation greeted these words of the master of Villa Sirena.
"The one thing I insist on," continued the Prince after a long pause, "is that we live alone, as men among men. No women! Women must be excluded from our life in common."
The pianist opened his eyes in astonishment; Castro stirred in his chair; Novoa removed his glasses with a mechanical gesture of surprise, immediately adjusting them once more to his nose.
There was another silence.
"What you propose," said Atilio, at last, with a smile, "reminds me of a comedy of Shakespeare. No women! ”

“ Behind him, like a retinue, came his friends, his brilliant parasites, and various women guests, his entire court. They had entered the Casino. He was not a gambler; it bored him to sit motionless at a table; he considered it childish to get interested in the whirling of a little ball of bone, or the combinations of little colored cards. There were so many more interesting pleasures in life! But that night, proud of his power, he felt a desire to fight a battle with fortune. Fortune is a woman, and he was determined to conquer it by the power of wealth, as he had conquered many another woman. ”

“ And the native has grown rich selling, so much per yard, the sunlight, the azure of the Mediterranean, the orange color of the mountains and the dazzling glory of the clouds at sunset, the shelter of the distant rock which, like a screen, turns aside the icy breeze of the mistral.
"If you only knew how inexplicably obstinate some of these people are!"
As Don Marcos spoke he turned and pointed out to Novoa the miserable strip of land that seemed fastened like a curse to the gardens of Villa Sirena. The Princess Lubimoff with all her millions, had not been able to buy the tip of that promontory. ”

“ Another train advanced in the opposite direction, an endless train that kept coming from the depths of the ocean. Hurrahs, whistling, dark blouses, blue collars, little caps that looked as though made of paper. "Good afternoon, Prince!" The luminous smile of a pale Virgin: Lady Lewis with her two blind men, handsome and tragic....
His pistol fell. Above it he could see the entire body of his adversary, that obscure soldier, condemned to die before long no doubt, from wounds received in a land that was not his own, for a cause which was that of all men. ”

“ Several years of her life had passed away since then, and yet she seemed fresher, and younger. Her eyes had lost the veiled disturbing fire, that made them look larger, and gave them a fixed, unnatural stare. The dull, sickly whiteness of her skin had taken on color from the sun and the open air. Her airy, undulating litheness had become less willowy, giving her person the calm tranquillity of bodies that are beginning to crystallize in their definitive form.
The Prince, interrupted by Alicia's smiling glance, was unable to continue his scrutiny. ”

“ And what better way than that of gambling? When we put our hope in some far-off future time, it is not worth much. If we are to win, let it be soon and once for all. Our life is nothing more than a game of chance. We are gamblers all, even those of us who have never touched a card. Professions, business, and love itself are pure gambles, pure luck, a matter of chance. Cleverness and intelligence may cause our life games to turn out favorably, but chance still retains its hold on us, and the luck of an individual is what is most important. ”

“ A lady who is anxious for work can find no occupation in a world controlled and monopolized by men. She had nothing to fall back on except gambling. It was an exciting pleasure which made her forget her worries, and at the same time gave her hope. Each day with gambling she opened a window to fortune, in case it should deign to remember her. Who knows but what some time it might fold its golden wings and alight on a Casino table, and allow Alicia's slender hands to caress it, like a tame eagle! ”

“ It was impossible for Alicia to end her days save in some extraordinary manner, in harmony with her previous career. He, too, has lived as most men do not live, and he will die a different death from them.
He feels neither grief nor resentment. He is surprised that he could have hated Martinez and desired this woman with such vehemence. At present he feels only melancholy and a deep sadness at the memory of those dreams that no longer exist and which are beginning to die a second death, in being forgotten by those who knew of them. ”

“ Luxury is the one thought, luxury at whatever cost. Luxury has been democratized. It is within reach of all, obtainable through money, which has no taint, no odor, no sign of its origin."
"You are the great provider of the expensive motor car of fashionable make and of the rope of pearls," continued Castro. "You are the great Sultan of magnificence. Your signature to a check is enough to sweep a woman off her feet in a torrent of gold. Make the most of your opportunity! The period in which you were born has left you an open field for your talents." ”

“ On various occasions in talking with the Prince, the truth had come to her lips, and at the last moment the reticence of a woman still desirous of pleasing through her beauty had caused her to conceal the facts. But to whom could she reveal her secret better than to Michael? She considered him one of the family: he had received her in friendly fashion in her hour of need, when so many men had turned their backs on her. Besides, between a man and a woman, love is not the only feeling that can exist, as she had thought in the days of her mad youth. ”

“ Lubimoff's features became dark and gloomy with an earthly cast, as on the afternoon of the duel. He was beginning to understand.
"What did you do, Michael!" she continued in a tearful voice. "You aroused the poor boy by your madness. On fighting you, he imagined he was fighting for me, and that I was simply a woman. He saw me suddenly in a new light, as though he had been asleep until then. I might almost be his mother; for women of my class prolong their youth, preserve it artificially, and we are still desirable when women of the lower classes are already coming to old age. ”

“ Michael was sure that many artists must have left their imprint on that woman's life. It was evident in the words and imagery with which she endeavored to express her enthusiasm for her own body. Her pride in her beauty was boundless. What were the ambitions of men, compared to the satisfaction of being lovely and desired? Only the glory of warriors, of blood-stained conquerors, whose names are known even in the remotest wilds of the earth, equals the glory that a woman feels in the sense of universal power over men. ”

“ Down below, projecting into the sea, the promontory of Villa Sirena meets his eye. It now belongs to another man, and he turns his glance away to keep certain memories from welling up. In doing so his eyes chance to meet the eyes of Mado, Toledo's señora; eyes which doubtless consider Prince Lubimoff more interesting, with his mustache, his elderly appearance, and his uniform, than when he was the elegant master of her parents. Poor Colonel! And Michael flees the tempting glance, and the full scarlet lips, which seem to challenge him to smile. ”

“ Now they could say they knew all about Monte Carlo!
The employees in their black frock coats opened one of the curtains, greeting the Prince as though he were an old acquaintance. It was the first time Michael had entered the gaming rooms since his return. It seemed to him as though he had awakened miraculously into the world of things before the war. Everything that was afflicting humanity remained on the other side of the door, as the action of a drama, unreal but exciting, remains on the stage of a theater which we leave behind us. ”

“ All the women of the day had turned up there sooner or later: famous actresses from Paris, London, and Vienna; beauties of the smart cliques of two hemispheres, women of high society, smiling the smile of slaves before the potentate who could banish their debts with the stroke of a pen. Oh, the Pompeian nights of Villa Sirena!...
Spadoni saw, rather, the Gaviotta II, a palace with propellers, which, when anchored in the small harbor of La Condamine, seemed to fill it completely and to make the yachts of the American millionaires and the Prince of Monaco look like tiny things indeed. ”

“ I am only a woman now; I am an old woman, centuries old, as old as sorrow itself. You need a sweetheart, and I am simply a bad mother, a mother tormented with remorse."
Her renunciation of the past, and the feeling that she was only a despairing mother caused her voice to break with a groan, and at the same time her eyes filled with tears. With a timid hand Michael drew away the handkerchief that she had raised to her face to hide her weeping. He murmured incoherent phrases, with the intention of consoling her; but immediately he was mastered once more by anger. ”

“ Already people may come and dream between the walls which just now shook with cries of pain, or the rattle of death agonies. Music is beginning sweetly to moan along the happy coast, amid the murmur of the waves and the rustling of the orange trees, of epithalamial perfume. The old shepherd of the Alps, who, after sixty years, has not yet recovered from his amazement at the Monte Carlo which has arisen there below on the once deserted tableland, will see it grow with new palaces and new towers, further expanding its opulence like a city of dreams. ”

“ Don Marcos started. No, indeed! His eyes were open to the truth. He forgot about airing his frock coat; it might remain in its odorous tomb. And since the Professor was less to be feared than the other man, he let loose all his wrath on Novoa. Imagine fighting over mere nonsense, when millions of men were giving their blood for great ideals! and he, who had referred so frequently to his many experiences as a second as heroic actions, made a gesture of disgust, as though something offensive to his honor were being proposed to him. ”

“ At present Michael had a feeling of being attracted to her, for a reason that was absolutely novel. Since his youth he had hated the daughter of Doña Mercedes, for her pride, and for the air of overwhelming superiority which she maintained even in those moments of love when nearly every woman freely humbles herself to take shelter in a man's arms like a happy slave. She could give herself only with a manner of haughty condescension, as a haughty alms, much as a goddess might come to a poor mortal. ”

“ DON MARCOS is descending the slopes of the public gardens toward the Casino Square, in conversation with a soldier.
He is no longer the ceremonious Colonel who used to kiss the hands of the elderly and noble ladies in the gambling rooms, and was present as the inevitable guest at the luncheons of all the titled families stopping at the Hôtel de Paris. There is nothing about his person to recall the long velvet lined frock coats, the high white silk hats, and the other splendors of his eccentric elegance. ”

“ The farandole was trying to enter the antechamber, and the gambling rooms, to wrap its coils about the crowd, the croupiers, and the tables. Every selfish activity should cease in that hour of generous joy.
"Alas, the gamblers! What a malady gambling is, Your Highness! On reaching the Square they took off their hats to the flags, and almost wept, as they sang a verse of the Marseillaise. 'Long live France! Long live the Allies!' And immediately they entered the Casino to bet their money on the same number as the celebrated date, or on other combinations suggested by peace." ”

“ The great thing is that it play all the time, that the music rack never be empty; once one piece is played, another must take its place. At times it is a symphony of love. Mine have been beautiful but brief. For that reason I have replaced them with another which is endless—that of ambition and the desire for gain, whose orbits are infinite like those of the stars in the heavens, and like the possible combinations of cards. I gamble. In the whirl of the roulette wheel I see a castle that may be mine, a more sumptuous castle than any in existence; a finer yacht than the one you used to have ”