“Let us grant that they are sometimes almost driven to it. Man is always giving way to idiotic fits of obstinacy and tyrannical desires. In the home a husband is always insisting upon his own ridiculous way. He is full of crazes which his wife encourages while she turns them to account. She makes him believe that a thing costs so much because he would make a fuss if it were worth more. She always manages to extricate herself cleverly by methods so simple and wily that we cannot believe our senses when we do happen to notice what is happening. We say to ourselves, spellbound: ‘Why did we not notice this before?’ ”
The man who spoke was an ex-minister of the Empire, the Count of L⸺, a real rake, and very intelligent. A group of young men were listening to him.
He continued: “I was victimised by an ordinary little bourgeoise in a most brazen and amusing manner. I will tell you about it that you may profit thereby.
“I was then at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and I used to go for a long walk in the Champs Élysées every morning. It was May, and as I walked I inhaled greedily the sweet odour of the budding leaves.
“I soon noticed that I met an adorable little woman every day, one of those surprising, graceful creatures with the stamp of Paris upon them. Pretty? Yes and no. A good figure? No, better than that. I admit that her waist was too small, her shoulders too straight, her chest too curved, but I prefer these exquisite human dolls with their graceful curves to the big carcass of the Venus de Milo.
“Besides, they trip along in a way peculiar to themselves; the mere sight of their fluttering movements fills the very marrow of your bones with desire. She seemed to look at me as we passed each other. But these women are apparently capable of anything; one never knows. … One morning I saw her sitting on a bench holding an open book. I promptly sat down beside her, and five minutes later we were friends. Then, every day, after the smiling greeting: ‘Good morning, Madame’—‘Good morning, Monsieur,’ we chatted. She told me she was the wife of a clerk, that her life was sad, that her pleasures were few and that cares were numerous, and a thousand other things. I told her who I was, partly through thoughtlessness and partly perhaps through vanity: she made a very good pretence at being surprised. The following day she came to the Ministry to see me, and returned so often that the ushers soon got to know her and whispered to each other ‘Madame Léon’ (the name they had given her) whenever they saw her; Léon happens to be my Christian name.
“For three months I saw her every morning without growing tired of her for a second, so thoroughly skilled was she in the art of varying and intensifying her demonstrations of affection. But one day I noticed that her eyes were haggard and shining with suppressed tears, that she could scarcely speak, she was so preoccupied.
“I begged, I implored her to tell me the cause of her distress, and she ended by stammering: ‘I am—I am enceinte,’ with a shiver of apprehension. And she burst out sobbing. Oh! I made a horrible face, and I doubtless turned pale as men do at news of that kind. You cannot conceive what a shock it is to hear you are to be a father when you don’t expect it. But you will all know in time. All I could say was: ‘But—but—you are married, aren’t you?’ She answered: ‘Yes, but my husband has been in Italy for two months and will not return for some time.’
“I was determined at any cost to get out of my responsibility, and said: ‘You must join him immediately.’
“She blushed to her eyebrows and, looking down, replied: ‘Yes—but—,’ not daring or not wishing to finish the sentence.
“I had understood, and discreetly handed her an envelope containing the expenses of the journey.
“A week later she wrote to me from Genoa, the following week I received a letter from Florence, then from Leghorn, Rome, Naples. She said: ‘I am quite well, my dear love, but I am hideous. I am not going to let you see me till it is all over; you would cease to love me. My husband suspects nothing. As his business will keep him in this country for a long time still, I will only come back to France after my confinement.’ And after about eight months I received from Venice these few words: ‘It is a boy.’
“Some time after, she suddenly entered my study one morning, fresher and prettier than ever, and threw herself into my arms.
“And our old relations of intimacy were resumed.
“I left the Ministry and she came to my house in the Rue de Grenelle. She often talked to me about the child, but I paid very little attention: it did not concern me. Occasionally I gave her a considerable sum of money, saying: ‘Invest that for him.’
“Two more years passed by and she became more and more determined to give me news of the youngster, ‘of Léon.’ Sometimes she would say with tears in her eyes: ‘You don’t care about him; you won’t even see him; if you knew how miserable you make me!’
“Finally she worried me to such an extent that I promised to go the next morning to the Champs Élysées when she was taking him for his walk.
“But as I was leaving the house I was stopped by a feeling of dread. Man is weak and
