She hung on my neck, caressed me.
“Well now,” she resumed, “since you are so rich, I should like to have a little traveling dressing case that I saw at the Rue de Paix. You will buy it for me, won’t you, dearie?”
I felt a tug at my heart so painful that I nearly fell to the floor, and a well of tears blinded me. Still I had the courage to ask:
“How much does your dressing case cost?”
“Two thousand francs, my dear.”
“All right! Take two thousand francs out of that. You’ll buy it yourself.”
Juliette kissed my forehead, took the two bills which she quickly hid in her coat pocket, and her gaze fixed on the two bills which still remained and for which she no doubt regretted she had not asked, she said:
“Really? Do you want me to? Ah! that’s nice! That will give me a chance to come to see you with my new dressing case, if you should return to Ploch.”
When she was gone, I abandoned myself to an outburst of anger against her, above all against myself, and when the anger subsided I suddenly realized to my astonishment that I no longer suffered. Yes, I breathed more freely, I was able to stretch out my arms with greater vigor, I felt a new buoyancy in my limbs; at last, one might say, someone had removed the crushing weight which for so long a time I had borne on my shoulders. I experienced a keen joy in moving my limbs, in exercising my muscles and joints, in setting my nerves into vibration, when it thus came upon me one morning, in a leap from my bed. Was I not really awakening from a slumber as deep as death? Was I not recovering from a sort of catalepsy, in which my whole being, sunk in torpor, had known the horrible nightmare of nonexistence? I was like one buried who finds the light of day again, like one famished who is given a piece of bread, like one sentenced to death who receives his pardon. … I went to the window and looked out into the street. The slanting rays of the sun were flooding the houses in front of me with a golden mist; on the sidewalk people were hurriedly passing, preoccupied, with a happy gait; carriages joyously crossed each other’s path. The hustle and bustle and noise of life intoxicated, stirred, carried me away, and I cried out:
“I don’t love you anymore! I don’t love you anymore!”
In the space of a second I had a very clear vision of a new life of work and happiness. I was to cleanse myself of this filth, to seize my interrupted dreams; not only did I want to redeem my honor, but I wanted also to achieve a glory so great, so undisputed, so universal, that Juliette would burst with spite for having lost a man like me. I already saw myself perpetuated in bronze and marble by posterity, placed upon columns and symbolic pedestals, filling the centuries to come with my immortalized image. And what gave me particular pleasure was the thought that Juliette would not share a particle of this glory, and that I pitilessly pushed her off my lofty plane entirely.
I went down, and for the first time in two years felt a delicious pleasure in being on the street. I walked fast, with supple movements, a victorious gait, interested in the simplest things about me which seemed so new. And I asked myself with amazement how in the world I could have been unhappy so long, why my eyes had not opened to the truth much sooner than they did. … Ah, that despicable Juliette! How she must have laughed at my submission, my blindness, my pitifulness, my inconceivable folly! No doubt, she told her casual lovers of my idiotic grief. But I was going to have my revenge and it would be terrible! Juliette would soon lie prostrate at my feet begging my pardon.
“No, no, you miserable creature, never! … When I cried, did you comfort me? … Did you spare me a single suffering, a single one? Did you ever for a moment consent to share my misery, to live my life with me? You don’t deserve to share my glory. No … go!”
And to show my absolute contempt for her, I would throw millions in her face.
“Here are your millions! You said you wanted millions? Here are some more!”
Juliette would wring her arms in despair.
“Have mercy, Jean! Have pity on me! I don’t want your money! What I want is to live in obscurity and humbly in your shadow, happy if a single ray of light surrounding you will some day come to rest upon your poor Juliette. Have pity on me!”
“Did you have pity on me when I asked for it! No! Women like you should be killed with blows of gold. Here! Have some more! Here! Some more still!”
I was walking with long strides, talking aloud, moving my hands as if throwing millions into space. “Here, wretch, here!”
Nevertheless, my insusceptibility to everything else when preoccupied with the thought of Juliette was not so complete as to preclude my getting uneasy at the sight of any woman, and scrutinizing with an impatient glance the inside of the carriages which endlessly passed by on the street. On the boulevard my assurance left me, and anguish again seized my whole being. I felt an unbearable burden upon my shoulders, and the devouring beast driven off but a moment ago, rushed on me more ferociously than ever, sinking its fangs into my flesh deeper than ever. It was enough for me to see the theatres, the restaurants, those evil places full of the mystery of Juliette’s life, to make me feel this. The theatres were saying to me: “She was here that night; while you were moaning, calling her, waiting for her—she was promenading in her stage box, with flowers on her bosom, happy, without the slightest thought of you.” The
