“Yes, monsieur.”
“Please ask her to come down at once.”
They dropped into two armchairs and waited. Both
were filled with the same longing to escape before
the appearance of the much-feared person.
A well-known, heavy tread could be heard descending
the stairs. A hand moved the knob, and both men
watched the brass handle turn. Then the door
opened wide, and Madame Bondel stopped and looked to
see who was there before she entered. She looked,
blushed, trembled, retreated a step, then stood motionless,
her cheeks aflame and her hands resting against the
sides of the door frame.
Tancret, as pale as if about to faint, had arisen,
letting fall his hat, which rolled along the floor.
He stammered out: “Mon Dieu—madame—it
is I—I thought—I ventured—I
was so sorry—”
As she did not answer, he continued: “Will
you forgive me?”
Then, quickly, carried away by some impulse, she walked
toward him with her hands outstretched; and when he
had taken, pressed, and held these two hands, she
said, in a trembling, weak little voice, which was
new to her husband:
“Ah! my dear friend—how happy I am!”
And Bondel, who was watching them, felt an icy chill
run over him, as if he had been dipped in a cold bath.
Madame, you ask me whether I am laughing at you?
You cannot believe that a man has never been in love.
Well, then, no, no, I have never loved, never!
Why is this? I really cannot tell. I have
never experienced that intoxication of the heart which
we call love! Never have I lived in that dream,
in that exaltation, in that state of madness into which
the image of a woman casts us. I have never been
pursued, haunted, roused to fever heat, lifted up
to Paradise by the thought of meeting, or by the possession
of, a being who had suddenly become for me more desirable
than any good fortune, more beautiful than any other
creature, of more consequence than the whole world!
I have never wept, I have never suffered on account
of any of you. I have not passed my nights sleepless,
while thinking of her. I have no experience of
waking thoughts bright with thought and memories of
her. I have never known the wild rapture of hope
before her arrival, or the divine sadness of regret
when she went from me, leaving behind her a delicate
odor of violet powder.
I have never been in love.
I have also often asked myself why this is. And
truly I can scarcely tell. Nevertheless I have
found some reasons for it; but they are of a metaphysical
character, and perhaps you will not be able to appreciate
them.
I suppose I am too critical of women to submit to
their fascination. I ask you to forgive me for
this remark. I will explain what I mean.
In every creature there is a moral being and a physical
being. In order to love, it would be necessary
for me to find a harmony between these two beings
which I have never found. One always predominates;
sometimes the moral, sometimes the physical.
