V
In the commencement of the new year a general crisis shook the credit of the old country, and the Bank which had issued the shares lent to me by Marie failed. I received notice that the loan would be called in. I was forced to pay cash for the sum I had been compelled to guarantee. It was a heavy blow, but after endless difficulties I came to terms with the creditors, who agreed to a year’s respite. It was a terrible year, the worst period of my life.
As soon as things were a little more settled I began to make every effort to extricate myself.
In addition to my work at the library I started a novel on modern morals and customs; filled newspapers and periodicals with essays, and completed my scientific treatise. Marie, at the expiration of her contract with the theatre, was re-engaged for another year, but her pay was reduced to fourteen hundred crowns.... Now I was better off than she, for she had lost her capital in the general smash.
She was in a vile temper, and made me suffer for it. To re-establish the equilibrium, and thinking of nothing but her independence, she attempted to raise a loan, but these attempts proved abortive and only led to unpleasantness. Acting thoughtlessly, despite her good intentions, she did me harm with her efforts to save herself and render my task more easy. I appreciated her good intentions, but I could not help remonstrating.
Always capricious and wayward, she showed unmistakable signs of malice and fresh events disclosed a state of mind which filled me with apprehension.
A fancy-dress ball, for instance, was given at the theatre, and I had her promise not to attend the ball in male attire. She had bound herself by a solemn oath, for I had been very emphatic on the subject. On the morning after the ball I was told that she had not only broken her promise, but that she had gone to supper later on with some of her male friends.
I was angry because she had lied to me, and the thought of the subsequent supper made me feel uneasy.
“Well,” she replied, when I expostulated with her, “am I not free to please myself?”
“No, you are a married woman! You bear my name, and we are responsible to each other. Whenever you compromise yourself, you compromise me, and, in fact, you do me a greater injury than you do yourself.”
“That means that I am not free?”
“Nobody can be absolutely free in a community where every individual is inextricably mixed up with the fate of others. Supposing I had invited some women friends to supper, what would you have said?”
She insisted that she was free to do as she liked; that she was at liberty, if she felt so inclined, to ruin my reputation; that her freedom was, in fact, absolute. She was a savage; freedom, as she interpreted it, was the rule of an autocrat who trampled the honour and happiness of her fellow creatures into the dust.
This scene, which began with a quarrel, led to floods of tears and ended with hysterics, was followed by another which made me feel even more uneasy, more especially as I was not sufficiently initiated into the secrets of sexual life to deal with its anomalies, which terrified me, like all anomalies which are difficult of explanation.
One evening, when the maid was busy making up Marie’s bed for the night, I heard a half-suppressed scream and smothered laughter, as if some one were being tickled. I felt a sudden fear; an inexplicable terror and a wave of passionate anger swept over me; I opened the door quickly and caught Marie, with her hands on the girl’s shoulders, in the act of pressing her lips upon her white throat.
“What are you doing,” I exclaimed furiously, “are you mad?”
“I am only teasing her,” answered Marie cynically. “What has that to do with you?”
“It has everything to do with me! Come here!”
And under four eyes I explained to her the nature of her offence.
But she accused me of a vicious imagination, told me that I was perverted and saw vice everywhere.
It is a fatal thing to catch a woman red-handed. She deluged me with abuse.
In the course of the discussion I reminded her of the love she had confessed to have felt for her cousin, pretty Matilda. With an expression of angelic innocence she replied that she herself had been amazed at the strength of her feelings, as she had never thought it possible for one woman to be so deeply in love with another.
This naïve confession reassured me. I remembered that one evening, at my brother-in-law’s, Marie had quite openly spoken of her passionate love for her cousin, without blushing, without being conscious that there was anything at all unusual in her conduct.
But I was angry. I recommended her to beware of fancies which, though harmless to begin with, degenerated only too often into vice and led to disastrous results.
She made some inane reply, treated me like a fool—she loved treating me as if I were the most ignorant of ignoramuses—and finished off by saying that I had been telling her a pack of lies.
What was the use of explaining to her that offences of that sort were legal offences? What was the use of trying to convince her that medical books termed caresses calculated to arouse amorous feelings in others “vicious”?
I, I was the debauchee, steeped in vice. Nothing could persuade her to stop her innocent gambols.
She belonged to that class of unconscious criminals who should be confined in a house of correction and not allowed to be at large.
Towards the end of the spring she introduced a new friend, one of her colleagues, a woman of about thirty, a fellow sufferer, threatened, like Marie herself, with the lapse of her contract, and therefore, in my opinion, worthy of compassion. I was sorry to see this woman, once a celebrated beauty, reduced to such straits. No one knew why her contract was not to be renewed, unless it was because of the engagement of the daughter of a famous actress; one triumph always demands hecatombs of victims.
Nevertheless, I did not like her; she was self-assertive and always gave me the impression of a woman on the look-out for prey. She flattered me, tried to fascinate me, in order, no doubt, to take advantage of me.
Jealous scenes took place occasionally between the old friend and the new one, one abused the other, but I refused to take sides....
Before the summer was over Marie was expecting another baby. Her confinement would take place in February. It came upon us like a bolt from the blue. It was now necessary to strain every effort to make port before the fatal day dawned.
My novel appeared in November. It was an enormous success. Money was plentiful, we were saved!
I had reached the goal. I breathed freely. I had made my way; I was appreciated at last and hailed with acclamations as a master. The years of trouble and black care were over; we were looking forward to the birth of this child with great joy. We christened it in anticipation and bought Christmas presents for it. My wife was happy and proud of her condition, and our intimate friends fell into the habit of asking how “the little chap” was, just as if he had already arrived.
Famous now and content with my success, I determined to rehabilitate Marie and save her ruined career. To achieve this I planned a play in four acts, and offered it to the Royal Theatre. It contained a sympathetic part in which she had every chance of reconquering the public.
On the very day of her confinement I heard that the play was accepted and that she had been cast for the principal part.
Everything was well in the best of all worlds; the broken tie between me and my family was firmly reknitted by the birth of the baby. The good time, the spring-time of my life had arrived. There was bread in the house, and even wine. The mother, the beloved, the adored, was taking new pleasure in life, and had regained all her former beauty. The indifference and neglect with which she had treated her first baby were transformed into the tenderest care for the newborn infant.