trying to understand why, to know why, never even asking himself if she could be his daughter.
Occasionally, when he noticed the discomfort in which the woman lived, whom he adored with this double passion, which he, himself, could not understand, he felt terribly about it.
What could he do? Could he offer money? How could he do it? What right had he? Could he play the role of guardian? He seemed scarcely older than she; everyone would take him for her lover. Should he get a husband for her? This thought suddenly surged up in his soul and frightened him. Then he became calmer. Who would ask her hand in marriage? She had nothing, not a cent.
Her aunt noticed how often he came; and saw quite plainly that he was in love with this child. And what was he waiting for? Did he know?
One evening they were alone. They were talking softly side by side on the sofa in the little sitting-room. Suddenly he took her hand in a paternal manner. He held it, and his heart and senses were awakened against his will, he did not dare to reject the hand which she had given him, and yet he felt himself growing weaker as he held it. Suddenly she threw herself in his arms. For she loved him ardently as her mother had done, just as though she had inherited this fatal passion.
Completely beside himself, he put his lips to her blonde hair and, as she raised her head to escape, their mouths met.
People become mad at times. They were so now.
When he reached the street he walked straight ahead, not knowing what he would do.
I recollect, madam, your indignant exclamation: “He had no choice but to commit suicide!”
I answered you: “And as for her? Should he have killed her also?”
The child loved him to distraction, madly, with the fatal and hereditary passion which had thrown her, a virgin, ignorant and distracted, on the breast of this man. She had acted in this manner owing to the irresistible intoxication of her entire being, which made her lose control of herself, which made her give herself, carried away by tumultuous instinct, and throw herself into the arms of her lover.
If he were to kill himself what would become of her? … She would die! … She would die dishonoured, in despair, suffering terrible tortures.
What should he do?
Leave her, give her a marriage portion, marry her to someone else? … In that case she would die; she would die from grief, without accepting his money or another husband, for she had given herself to him. He had ruined her life, destroyed every possibility of happiness for her; he had condemned her to everlasting misery, to everlasting despair, to everlasting fire, to everlasting solitude, or to death.
Besides he loved her himself also! He revolted at the thought that he loved her extravagantly. She was his own daughter, be it so. The hazard of impregnation, a contact of a second had made—of that being allied to him by no legal bond—his daughter, whom he cherished as he had her mother, and even more, as though he were possessed of two passions.
Besides was she really his daughter? What did that matter anyhow? Who would know it?
Ardent memories brought back the vow made to the dying woman. “He had promised to give his entire life to the child, to commit a crime if necessary to insure her happiness.”
And he loved her so that he plunged headlong into this abominable and pleasing crime, tortured by pain, and ravaged by desire.
Who will know about it? the other man, the father, being dead!
“So be it!” said he; “this secret sin may break my heart. As she does not suspect it, I alone will carry its weight.”
He asked for her hand, and he married her.
I don’t know if they were happy, but I should have done as he did, madam.
Beside a Dead Man
He was dying rapidly, as people die who have tuberculosis. Every day I saw him sit down, at about two o’clock, under the hotel windows, facing the calm sea, on a bench on the terrace. For some time he would remain motionless in the warmth of the sun, gazing at the Mediterranean with mournful eyes. Sometimes he would glance towards the lofty mountain, with its misty heights, that encloses Mentone; then, with a very deliberate movement, he would cross his long legs, so thin that they looked like two bones, about which the cloth of his trousers flapped loosely, and he would open a book, always the same one.
Then he would stir no more, but would read, read with all his eyes and mind; the whole of his poor expiring body looked to be reading; his whole soul would bury itself in the book, losing itself and disappearing in it, until the hour when the cooler air made him cough a little. Then he would rise and go indoors.
He was a tall German with a fair beard; he lunched and dined in his own room, and spoke to no one.
A vague feeling of curiosity drew me towards him. I sat down one day beside him, having brought with me, for the sake of appearances, a volume of de Musset’s poetry.
I began to glance through “Rolla.”
“Do you know German, monsieur?” said my neighbour, suddenly, in good French.
“Not a word of it, monsieur.”
“I am sorry. Since chance has placed us side by side, I would have lent you, I would have shown you a priceless treasure: the book I have here.”
“What is it?”
“It is a copy of my master Schopenhauer, annotated by his own hand. All the margins, as you see, are covered with his writing.”
I took the book with respect and contemplated these shapes, incomprehensible to me, but revealing the immortal mind of the greatest destroyer of dreams who has ever passed through the world.
And the lines of de Musset broke forth in my memory:
“Dors-tu content, Voltaire, et ton hideux sourire
Voltige-t-il encor sur tes
