Chapter XXV

Armand, tired by this long narrative, often interrupted by his tears,

put his two hands over his forehead and closed his eyes to think, or to

try to sleep, after giving me the pages written by the hand of

Marguerite. A few minutes after, a more rapid breathing told me that

Armand slept, but that light sleep which the least sound banishes.

This is what I read; I copy it without adding or omitting a syllable:

To-day is the 15th December. I have been ill three or four days. This

morning I stayed in bed. The weather is dark, I am sad; there is no one

by me. I think of you, Armand. And you, where are you, while I write

these lines? Far from Paris, far, far, they tell me, and perhaps you

have already forgotten Marguerite. Well, be happy; I owe you the only

happy moments in my life.

I can not help wanting to explain all my conduct to you, and I have

written you a letter; but, written by a girl like me, such a letter

might seem to be a lie, unless death had sanctified it by its

authority, and, instead of a letter, it were a confession.

To-day I am ill; I may die of this illness, for I have always had the

presentiment that I shall die young. My mother died of consumption, and

the way I have always lived could but increase the only heritage she

ever left me. But I do not want to die without clearing up for you

everything about me; that is, if, when you come back, you will still

trouble yourself about the poor girl whom you loved before you went

away.

This is what the letter contained; I shall like writing it over again,

so as to give myself another proof of my own justification.

You remember, Armand, how the arrival of your father surprised us at

Bougival; you remember the involuntary fright that his arrival caused

me, and the scene which took place between you and him, which you told

me of in the evening.

Next day, when you were at Paris, waiting for your father, and he did

not return, a man came to the door and handed in a letter from M.

Duval.

His letter, which I inclose with this, begged me, in the most serious

terms, to keep you away on the following day, on some excuse or other,

and to see your father, who wished to speak to me, and asked me

particularly not to say anything to you about it.

You know how I insisted on your returning to Paris next day.

You had only been gone an hour when your father presented himself. I

won’t say what impression his severe face made upon me. Your father had

the old theory that a courtesan is a being without heart or reason, a

sort of machine for coining gold, always ready, like the machine, to

bruise the hand that gives her everything, and to tear in pieces,

without pity or discernment, those who set her in motion.

Your father had written me a very polite letter, in order that I might

consent to see him; he did not present himself quite as he had written.

His manner at first was so stiff, insolent, and even threatening, that

I had to make him understand that I was in my own house, and that I had

no need to render him an account of my life, except because of the

sincere affection which I had for his son.

M. Duval calmed down a little, but still went on to say that he could

not any longer allow his son to ruin himself over me; that I was

beautiful, it was true, but, however beautiful I might be, I ought not

to make use of my beauty to spoil the future of a young man by such

expenditure as I was causing.

At that there was only one thing to do, to show him the proof that

since I was your mistress I had spared no sacrifice to be faithful to

you without asking for more money than you had to give me. I showed him

the pawn tickets, the receipts of the people to whom I had sold what I

could not pawn; I told him of my resolve to part with my furniture in

order to pay my debts, and live with you without being a too heavy

expense. I told him of our happiness, of how you had shown me the

possibility of a quieter and happier life, and he ended by giving in to

the evidence, offering me his hand, and asking pardon for the way in

which he had at first approached me.

Then he said to me:

“So, madame, it is not by remonstrances or by threats, but by

entreaties, that I must endeavour to obtain from you a greater

sacrifice than you have yet made for my son.”

I trembled at this beginning.

Your father came over to me, took both my hands, and continued in an

affectionate voice:

“My child, do not take what I have to say to you amiss; only remember

that there are sometimes in life cruel necessities for the heart, but

that they must be submitted to. You are good, your soul has generosity

unknown to many women who perhaps despise you, and are less worthy than

you. But remember that there is not only the mistress, but the family;

that besides love there are duties; that to the age of passion succeeds

the age when man, if he is to be respected, must plant himself solidly

in a serious position. My son has no fortune, and yet he is ready to

abandon to you the legacy of his mother. If he accepted from you the

sacrifice which you are on the point of making, his honour and dignity

would require him to give you, in exchange for it, this income, which

would always put you out of danger of adversity. But he can not accept

this sacrifice, because the world, which does not know you, would give

a wrong interpretation to this acceptance, and such an interpretation

must not tarnish the name which we bear. No one would consider whether

Armand loves you, whether you love him, whether this mutual love means

happiness to him and redemption to you; they would see only one thing,

that Armand Duval allowed a kept woman (forgive me, my child, for what

I am forced to say to you) to sell all she had for him. Then the day of

reproaches and regrets would arrive, be sure, for you or for others,

and you would both bear a chain that you could not sever. What would

you do then? Your youth would be lost, my son’s future destroyed; and

I, his father, should receive from only one of my children the

recompense that I look for from both.

“You are young, beautiful, life will console you; you are noble, and

the memory of a good deed will redeem you from many past deeds. During

the six months that he has known you Armand has forgotten me. I wrote

to him four times, and he has never once replied. I might have died and

he not known it!

“Whatever may be your resolution of living otherwise than as you have

lived, Armand, who loves you, will never consent to the seclusion to

which his modest fortune would condemn you, and to which your beauty

does not entitle you. Who knows what he would do then! He has gambled,

I know; without telling you of it, I know also, but, in a moment of

madness, he might have lost part of what I have saved, during many

years, for my daughter’s portion, for him, and for the repose of my old

age. What might have happened may yet happen.

“Are you sure, besides, that the life which you are giving up for him

will never again come to attract you? Are you sure, you who have loved

him, that you will never love another? Would you not suffer on seeing

the hindrances set by your love to your lover’s life, hindrances for

which you would be powerless to console him, if, with age, thoughts of

ambition should succeed to dreams of love? Think over all that, madame.

You love Armand; prove it to him by the sole means which remains to you

of yet proving it to him, by sacrificing your love to his future. No

misfortune has yet arrived, but one will arrive, and perhaps a greater

one than those which I foresee. Armand might become jealous of a man

who has loved you; he might provoke him, fight, be killed. Think, then,

what you would suffer in the presence of a father who should call on

you to render an account for the life of his son!

“Finally, my dear child, let me tell you all, for I have not yet told

you all, let me tell you what has brought me to Paris. I have a

daughter, as I have told you, young, beautiful, pure as an angel. She

loves, and she, too, has made this love the dream of her life. I wrote

all that to Armand, but, absorbed in you, he made no reply. Well, my

daughter is about to marry. She is to marry the man whom she loves; she

enters an honourable family, which requires that mine has to be no less

honourable. The family of the man who is to become my son-in-law has

learned what manner of life Armand is leading in Paris, and has

declared to me that the marriage must be broken off if Armand continues

this life. The future of a child who has done nothing against you, and

who has the right of looking forward to a happy future, is in your

hands. Have you the right, have you the strength, to shatter it? In the

name of your love and of your repentance, Marguerite, grant me the

happiness of my child.”

I wept silently, my friend, at all these reflections which I had so

often made, and which, in the mouth of your father, took a yet more

serious reality. I said to myself all that your father dared not say to

me, though it had come to his lips twenty times: that I was, after all,

only a kept woman, and that whatever excuse I gave for our liaison, it

would always look like calculation on my part; that my past life left

me no right to dream of such a future, and that I was accepting

responsibilities for which my habits and reputation were far from

giving any guarantee. In short, I loved you, Armand.

The paternal way in which M. Duval had spoken to me; the pure memories

that he awakened in me; the respect of this old man, which I would

gain; yours, which I was sure of gaining later on: all that called up

in my heart thoughts which raised me in my own eyes with a sort of holy

pride, unknown till then. When I thought that one day this old man, who

was now imploring me for the future of his son, would bid his daughter

mingle my name with her prayers, as the name of a mysterious friend, I

seemed to become transformed, and I felt a pride in myself.

The exaltation of the moment perhaps exaggerated the truth of these

impressions, but that was what I felt, friend, and these new feelings

silenced the memory of the happy days I had spent with you.

“Tell me, sir,” I said to your father, wiping away my tears, “do you

believe that I love your son?”

“Yes,” said M. Duval.

“With a disinterested love?”

“Yes.”

“Do you believe that I had made this love the hope, the dream, the

forgiveness of my life?”

“Implicitly.”

“Well, sir, embrace me once, as you would embrace your daughter, and I

swear to you that that kiss, the only chaste kiss I have ever had, will

make me strong against my love, and that within a week your son will be

once more at your side, perhaps unhappy for a time, but cured forever.”

“You are a noble child,” replied your father, kissing me on the

forehead, “and you are making an attempt for which God will reward you;

but I greatly fear that you will have no influence upon my son.”

“Oh, be at rest, sir; he will hate me.”

I had to set up between us, as much for me as for you, an

insurmountable barrier.

I wrote to Prudence to say that I accepted the proposition of the Comte

de N., and that she was to tell him that I would sup with her and him.

I sealed the letter, and, without telling him what it contained, asked

your father to have it forwarded to its address on reaching Paris.

He inquired of me what it contained.

“Your son’s welfare,” I answered.

Your father embraced me once more. I felt two grateful tears on my

forehead, like the baptism of my past faults, and at the moment when I

consented to give myself up to another man I glowed with pride at the

thought of what I was redeeming by this new fault.

It was quite natural, Armand. You told me that your father was the most

honest man in the world.

M. Duval returned to his carriage, and set out for Paris.

I was only a woman, and when I saw you again I could not help weeping,

but I did not give way.

Did I do right? That is what I ask myself to-day, as I lie ill in my

bed, that I shall never leave, perhaps, until I am dead.

You are witness of what I felt as the hour of our separation

approached; your father was no longer there to support me, and there

was a moment when I was on the point of confessing everything to you,

so terrified was I at the idea that you were going to hate and despise

me.

One thing which you will not believe, perhaps, Armand, is that I prayed

God to give me strength; and what proves that he accepted my sacrifice

is that he gave me the strength for which I prayed.

At supper I still had need of aid, for I could not think of what I was

going to do, so much did I fear that my courage would fail me. Who

would ever have said that I, Marguerite Gautier, would have suffered so

at the mere thought of a new lover? I drank for forgetfulness, and when

I woke next day I was beside the count.

That is the whole truth, friend. Judge me and pardon me, as I have

pardoned you for all the wrong that you have done me since that day.