Buch lesen: «Comedy of Marriage and Other Tales»
LA PAIX DU MÉNAGE
DRAMATIS PERSONAE
MONSIEUR DE SALLUS
JACQUES DE RANDOL
MADAME DE SALLUS
Time: Paris, 1890
ACT I
SCENE I
Mme. de Sallus in her drawing-room, seated in a corner by the fireplace. Enter Jacques de RANDOL noiselessly; glances to see that no one is looking, and kisses Mme. de Sallus quickly upon her hair. She starts; utters a faint cry, and turns upon him.
MME. DE SALLUS
Oh! How imprudent you are!
JACQUES DE RANDOL
Don’t be afraid; no one saw me.
MME. DE SALLUS
But the servants!
JACQUES DE RANDOL
Oh, they are in the outer hall.
MME. DE SALLUS
How is that? No one announced you
JACQUES DE RANDOL
No, they simply opened the door for me.
MME. DE SALLUS
But what will they think?
JACQUES DE RANDOL
Well, they will doubtless think that I don’t count.
MME. DE SALLUS
But I will not permit it. I must have you announced in future. It does not look well.
JACQUES DE RANDOL [laughs]
Perhaps they will even go so far as to announce your husband —
MME. DE SALLUS
Jacques, this jesting is out of place.
JACQUES DE RANDOL
Forgive me. [Sits.] Are you waiting for anybody?
MME. DE SALLUS
Yes – probably. You know that I always receive when I am at home.
JACQUES DE RANDOL
I know that I always have the pleasure of seeing you for about five minutes – just enough time to ask you how you feel, and then some one else comes in – some one in love with you, of course, – who impatiently awaits my departure.
MME. DE SALLUS [smiles]
Well, what can I do? I am not your wife, so how can it be otherwise?
JACQUES DE RANDOL
Ah! If you only were my wife!
MME. DE SALLUS
If I were your wife?
JACQUES DE RANDOL
I would snatch you away for five or six months, far from this horrible town, and keep you all to myself.
MME. DE SALLUS
You would soon have enough of me.
JACQUES DE RANDOL
No, no!
MME. DE SALLUS
Yes, yes!
JACQUES DE RANDOL
Do you know that it is absolute torture to love a woman like you?
MME. DE SALLUS [bridles]
And why?
JACQUES DE RANDOL
Because I covet you as the starving covet the food they see behind the glassy barriers of a restaurant.
MME. DE SALLUS
Oh, Jacques!
JACQUES DE RANDOL
I tell you it is true! A woman of the world belongs to the world; that is to say, to everyone except the man to whom she gives herself. He can see her with open doors for a quarter of an hour every three days – not oftener, because of servants. In exceptional cases, with a thousand precautions, with a thousand fears, with a thousand subterfuges, she visits him once or twice a month, perhaps, in a furnished room. Then she has just a quarter of an hour to give him, because she has just left Madame X in order to visit Madame Z, where she has told her coachman to take her. If he complains, she will not come again, because it is impossible for her to get rid of her coachman. So, you see, the coachman, and the footman, and Madame Z, and Madame X, and all the others, who visit her house as they would a museum, – a museum that never closes, – all the he’s and all the she’s who eat up her leisure minute by minute and second by second, to whom she owes her time as an employee owes his time to the State, simply because she belongs to the world – all these persons are like the transparent and impassable glass: they keep you from my love.
MME. DE SALLUS
[dryly]
You seem upset to-day.
JACQUES DE RANDOL
No, no, but I hunger to be alone with you. You are mine, are you not? Or, I should say, I am yours. Isn’t it true? I spend my life in looking for opportunities to meet you. Our love is made up of chance meetings, of casual bows, of stolen looks, of slight touches – nothing more. We meet on the avenue in the morning – a bow; we meet at your house, or at that of some other acquaintance – twenty words; we dine somewhere at the same table, too far from each other to talk, and I dare not even look at you because of hostile eyes. Is that love? We are simply acquaintances.
MME. DE SALLUS
Then you would like to carry me off?
JACQUES DE RANDOL
Unhappily, I cannot.
MME. DE SALLUS
Then what?
JACQUES DE RANDOL
I do not know. I only know this life is wearing me out.
MME. DE SALLUS
It is just because there are so many obstacles in the way of your love that it does not fade.
JACQUES DE RANDOL
Oh! Madeline, can you say that?
MME. DE SALLUS [softening]
Believe me, dear, if your love has to endure these hardships, it is because it is not lawful love.
JACQUES DE RANDOL
Well, I never met a woman as positive as you. Then you think that if chance made me your husband, I should cease to love you?
MME. DE SALLUS
Not all at once, perhaps, but – eventually.
JACQUES DE RANDOL
What you say is revolting to me.
MME. DE SALLUS
Nevertheless, it is quite true. You know that when a confectioner hires a greedy saleswoman he says to her, “Eat all the sweets you wish, my dear.” She stuffs herself for eight days, and then she is satisfied for the rest of her life.
JACQUES DE RANDOL
Ah! Indeed! But why do you include me in that class?
MME. DE SALLUS
Really, I do not know – perhaps as a joke!
JACQUES DE RANDOL
Please do not mock me.
MME. DE SALLUS
I say to myself, here is a man who is very much in love with me. So far as I am concerned, I am perfectly free, morally, since for two years past I have altogether ceased to please my husband. Now, since this man loves me, why should I not love him?
JACQUES DE RANDOL
You are philosophic – and cruel.
MME. DE SALLUS
On the contrary, I have not been cruel. Of what do you complain?
JACQUES DE RANDOL
Stop! you anger me with this continual raillery. Ever since I began to love you, you have tortured me in this manner, and now I do not even know whether you have the slightest affection for me.
MME. DE SALLUS
Well, you must admit that I have always been – good-natured.
JACQUES DE RANDOL
Oh, you have played a queer little game! From the day I first met you I felt that you were coquetting with me, coquetting mysteriously, obscurely, coquetting as only you can without showing it to others. Little by little you conquered me with looks, with smiles, with pressures of the hand, without compromising yourself, without pledging yourself, without revealing yourself. You have been horribly upright – and seductive. I have loved you with all my soul, yes, sincerely and loyally, and to-day I do not know what feeling you have in the depths of your heart, what thoughts you have hidden in your brain; in fact, I know-I know nothing. I look at you, and I see a woman who seems to have chosen me, and seems also to have forgotten that she has chosen me. Does she love me, or is she tired of me? Has she simply made an experiment – taken a lover in order to see, to know, to taste, – without desire, hunger, or thirst? There are days when I ask myself if among those who love you and who tell you so unceasingly there is not one whom you really love.
MME. DE SALLUS
Good heavens! Really, there are some things into which it is not necessary to inquire.
JACQUES DE RANDOL
Oh, how hard you are! Your tone tells me that you do not love me.
MME. DE SALLUS
Now, what are you complaining about? Of things I do not say? – because – I do not think you have anything else to reproach me with.
JACQUES DE RANDOL
Forgive me, I am jealous.
MME. DE SALLUS
Of whom?
JACQUES DE RANDOL
I do not know. I am jealous of everything that I do not know about you.
MME. DE SALLUS
Yes, and without my knowing anything about these things, too.
JACQUES DE RANDOL
Forgive me, I love you too much – so much that everything disturbs me.
MME. DE SALLUS
Everything?
JACQUES DE RANDOL
Yes, everything.
MME. DE SALLUS
Are you jealous of my husband?
JACQUES DE RANDOL [amazed]
What an idea!
MME. DE SALLUS [dryly]
Well, you are wrong.
JACQUES DE RANDOL
Always this raillery!
MME. DE SALLUS No, I want to speak to you seriously about him, and to ask your advice.
JACQUES DE RANDOL
About your husband?
MME. DE SALLUS [seriously]
Yes, I am not laughing, or rather I do not laugh any more. [In lighter tone.] Then you are not jealous of my husband? And yet you know he is the only man who has authority over me.
JACQUES DE RANDOL
It is just because he has authority that I am not jealous. A woman’s heart gives nothing to the man who has authority.
MME. DE SALLUS
My dear, a husband’s right is a positive thing; it is a title-deed that he can lock up – just as my husband has for more than two years – but it is also one that he can use at any given moment, as lately he has seemed inclined to do.
JACQUES DE RANDOL [astonished]
You tell me that your husband —
MME. DE SALLUS
Yes.
JACQUES DE RANDOL
Impossible!
MME. DE SALLUS [bridles]
And why impossible?
JACQUES DE RANDOL
Because your husband has – has – other occupations.
MME. DE SALLUS
Well, it pleases him to vary them, it seems.
JACQUES DE RANDOL
Jesting apart, Madeline, what has happened?
MME. DE SALLUS
Ah! Ah! Then you are becoming jealous of him.
JACQUES DE RANDOL
Madeline, I implore you; tell me, are you mocking me, or are you speaking seriously?
MME. DE SALLUS
I am speaking seriously, indeed, very seriously.
JACQUES DE RANDOL
Then what has happened?
MME. DE SALLUS
Well, you know my position, although I have never told you all my past life. It is all very simple and very brief. At the age of nineteen I married the Count de Sallus, who fell in love with me after he had seen me at the Opéra-Comique. He already knew my father’s lawyer. He was very nice to me in those early days; yes, very nice, and I really believed he loved me. As for myself, I was very circumspect in my behavior toward him, very circumspect indeed, so that he could never cast a shadow of reproach on my name.
JACQUES DE RANDOL
Well, did you love him?
MME. DE SALLUS
Good gracious! Why ask such questions?
JACQUES DE RANDOL
Then you did love him?
MME. DE SALLUS
Yes and no. If I loved him, it was the love of a little fool; but I certainly never told him, for positively I do not know how to show love.
JACQUES DE RANDOL
I can vouch for that!
MME. DE SALLUS
Well, it is possible that I cared for him sometimes, idiotically, like a timid, restless, trembling, awkward, little girl, always in fear of that disturbing thing – the love of a man – that disturbing thing that is sometimes so sweet! As for him, – you know him. He was a sweetheart, a society sweetheart, who are always the worst of all. Such men really have a lasting affection only for those girls who are fitting companions for clubmen – girls who have a habit of telling doubtful stories and bestowing depraved kisses. It seems to me that to attract and to hold such people, the nude and obscene are necessary both in word and in body – unless – unless – it is true that men are incapable of loving any woman for a length of time.
However, I soon became aware that he was indifferent to me, for he used to kiss me as a matter of course and look at me without realizing my presence; and in his manners, in his actions, in his conversation, he showed that I attracted him no longer. As soon as he came into the room he would throw himself upon the sofa, take up the newspaper, read it, shrug his shoulders, and when he read anything he did not agree with, he would express his annoyance audibly. Finally, one day, he yawned and stretched his arms in my face. On that day I understood that I was no longer loved. Keenly mortified I certainly was. But it hurt me so much that I did not realize it was necessary to coquet with him in order to retain his affection. I soon learned that he had a mistress, a woman of the world. Since then we have lived separate lives – after a very stormy explanation.
JACQUES DE RANDOL
What do you mean? What sort of explanation?
MME. DE SALLUS
Well —
JACQUES DE RANDOL
About – his mistress?
MME. DE SALLUS
Yes and no. I find it difficult to express myself. To avoid my suspicions he found himself obliged, doubtless, to dissimulate from time to time, although rarely, and to feign a certain affection for his legitimate wife, the woman who had the right to his affection. I told him that he might abstain in future from such a mockery of love.
JACQUES DE RANDOL
How did you tell him that?
MME. DE SALLUS
I don’t remember.
JACQUES DE RANDOL
It must have been amusing.
MME. DE SALLUS
No, he appeared very much surprised at first. Then I formulated a nice little speech and learned it by heart, in which I asked him to carry such intermittent fancies elsewhere. He understood me, saluted me very courteously, and – did as I asked him.
JACQUES DE RANDOL
Did he never come back?
MME. DE SALLUS
Never, until —
JACQUES DE RANDOL [interrupts]
Has he never again tried to tell you of his love?
MME. DE SALLUS
No, never, until —
JACQUES DE RANDOL [interrupts]
Have you regretted it?
MME. DE SALLUS
That is of small importance. What is of importance, though, is that he has had innumerable mistresses whom he entertains, whom he supports, whom he takes out. It is this that has irritated and humiliated me – in fact, cut me to the quick. But then I took heart of grace, and too late, two years too late, I took a lover – you!
JACQUES DE RANDOL [kisses her hand]
And I, Madeline, I love you with my whole soul.
MME. DE SALLUS
Well, all this is not at all proper.
JACQUES DE RANDOL
What do you mean by “all this”?
MME. DE SALLUS
Life in general – my husband – his mistresses – myself – and you.
JACQUES DE RANDOL
Your words – prove beyond a doubt that you do not love me.
MME. DE SALLUS
Why?
JACQUES DE RANDOL
You dare to say of love that it is not proper? If you loved me, it might be divine, but a loving woman would abhor a phrase which should contain such an idea. What! True love not proper?
MME. DE SALLUS
Possibly. It all depends upon the point of view. For myself, I see too much.
JACQUES DE RANDOL
What do you see?
MME. DE SALLUS
I see too well, too far, too clearly.
JACQUES DE RANDOL
You do not love me?
MME. DE SALLUS
If I did not love you – a little – I should have had no excuse for giving myself to you.
JACQUES DE RANDOL
A little – just sufficient to warrant that excuse!
MME. DE SALLUS
But I do not excuse myself: I accuse myself.
JACQUES DE RANDOL
Then you did love me a little – and then – now – you love me no more!
MME. DE SALLUS
Do not let us argue.
JACQUES DE RANDOL
You do nothing else.
MME. DE SALLUS
No, I only judge the present by the past; the only just ideas and sane notions of life one can form are those concerning that which is past.
JACQUES DE RANDOL
And do you regret —
MME. DE SALLUS
Perhaps!
JACQUES DE RANDOL
And what about to-morrow?
MME. DE SALLUS
I do not know.
JACQUES DE RANDOL
Is it nothing to you to have one who is yours, body and soul? MME. DE SALLUS [shrugs her shoulders]
Yes, mine to-day.
JACQUES DE RANDOL [vehemently]
And to-morrow!
MME. DE SALLUS [shrugs her shoulders again]
Yes, the to-morrow that follows to-night, but not the to-morrow of a year hence.
JACQUES DE RANDOL [emphatically]
You shall see. But how about your husband?
MME. DE SALLUS
Does he annoy you?
JACQUES DE RANDOL By heaven —
MME. DE SALLUS
Hush! [Archly.] My husband has fallen in love with me again.
JACQUES DE RANDOL
Is it possible?
MME. DE SALLUS [indignantly]
What do you mean by such an insolent question, and why should it not be possible?
JACQUES DE RANDOL
A man falls in love with his wife before he marries her, but after marriage he never commits the same mistake.
MME. DE SALLUS
But perhaps he has never really been in love with me until now.
JACQUES DE RANDOL
It is absolutely impossible that he could have lived with you – even in his curt, cavalier fashion – without loving you.
MME. DE SALLUS [indifferently]
It is of little importance. He has either loved me in the past, or is now beginning to love me.
JACQUES DE RANDOL
Truly, I do not understand you. Tell me all about it.
MME. DE SALLUS
But I have nothing to tell. He declares his love for me, takes me in his arms, and threatens me with his conjugal rights. This upsets me, torments me, and annoys me.
JACQUES DE RANDOL
Madeline you torture me.
MME. DE SALLUS [quickly]
And what about me? Do you think that I do not suffer? I know that I am not exactly a faithful woman since I received your addresses, but I have, and shall retain, a single heart. It is either you or he. It will never be you and he. For me that would be infamy – the greatest infamy of a guilty woman, the sharing of her heart – a thing that debases her. One may fall, perhaps, because there are ditches along the wayside and it is not always easy to follow the right path. But if one falls, that is no reason to throw oneself in the abyss.
JACQUES DE RANDOL [takes her in his arms and kisses her]
I simply adore you!
MME. DE SALLUS [melts]
And I, too, love you dearly, Jacques, and that is the reason why I fear.
JACQUES DE RANDOL
But, tell me, Madeline how long has it been since your husband reformed?
MME. DE SALLUS
Possibly fifteen days or three weeks.
JACQUES DE RANDOL
Without relapse?
MME. DE SALLUS
Without relapse.
JACQUES DE RANDOL
I will explain the mystery. The fact of the matter is this, your husband has simply become a widower.
MME. DE SALLUS
What do you say?
JACQUES DE RANDOL
I mean that your husband is unattached just now, and seeks to spend his leisure time with his wife.
MME. DE SALLUS
But I tell you that he is in love with me.
JACQUES DE RANDOL
Yes – yes – and no. He is in love with you – and also with another. Tell me, his temper is usually bad, isn’t it?
MME. DE SALLUS
Execrable!
JACQUES DE RANDOL
Well, then, here is a man in love with you who shows his wonderful return of tenderness by moods that are simply unsupportable – for they are unsupportable, aren’t they?
MME. DE SALLUS
Absolutely.
JACQUES DE RANDOL
If he wooed you with tenderness you would not feel fear. You would say to yourself, “My turn has come at last,” and then he would inspire you with a little pity for him, for a woman has always a sneaking sort of compassion for the man who loves her, even though that man be her husband.
MME. DE SALLUS
Perhaps that is true.
JACQUES DE RANDOL
Is he nervous, preoccupied?
MME. DE SALLUS
Yes.
JACQUES DE RANDOL
And he is abrupt with you, not to say brutal? He demands his right without even praying for it?
MME. DE SALLUS
True.
JACQUES DE RANDOL
My darling, for the moment you are simply a substitute.
MME. DE SALLUS
Oh! no, no!
JACQUES DE RANDOL
My dearest girl, your husband’s latest mistress was Madame de Bardane, whom he left very abruptly about two months ago to run after the Santelli.
MME. DE SALLUS
What, the singer?
JACQUES DE RANDOL
Yes, a capricious, saucy, cunning, venal little woman. A woman not at all uncommon upon the stage, or in the world either, for that matter.
MME. DE SALLUS
Then that is why he haunts the Opéra.
JACQUES DE RANDOL [laughs]
Without a doubt.
MME. DE SALLUS [dreamily]
No, no, you are deceiving yourself.
JACQUES DE RANDOL [emphatically]
The Santelli resists him and repulses him; then, burdened with a heart full of longing that has no outlet, he deigns to offer you a portion.
MME. DE SALLUS
My dear, you are dreaming. If he were in love with the Santelli, he would not tell me that he loves me. If he were so entirely preoccupied with this creature, he would not woo me. If he coveted her, he would not desire me at the same time.
JACQUES DE RANDOL
How little you understand certain kinds of men! Men like your husband, once inoculated with the poison of love, – which in them is nothing but brutal desire, – men like him, I say, when a woman they desire escapes or resists them, become raging beasts. They behave like madmen, like men possessed, with arms outstretched and lips wide open. They must love some one, no matter whom just as a mad dog with open jaws bites anything and everybody. The Santelli has unchained this raging brute, and you find yourself face to face with his dripping jaws. Take care! You call that love! It is nothing but animal passion.
MME. DE SALLUS [sarcastically]
Really, you are very unfair to him. I am afraid jealousy is blinding you.
JACQUES DE RANDOL
Oh, no, I am not deceiving myself, you may be sure.
MME. DE SALLUS
Yes, I think you are. Formerly my husband neglected and abandoned me, doubtless finding me very insipid; but now he finds me much improved, and has returned to me. It is very easy to understand, and moreover, it is the worse for him, for he must believe that I have been a faithful wife to him all my life.
JACQUES DE RANDOL
Madeline!
MME. DE SALLUS
Well, what?
JACQUES DE RANDOL
Does a girl cease to be a faithful wife, if, when deserted by the man who has assumed charge of her existence, and her happiness, and her love, and her ideals, she refuses to resign herself – young, beautiful, and full of hope – to eternal isolation and everlasting solitude?
MME. DE SALLUS
I think I have already told you that there are certain things which it is not necessary to discuss, and this is one of them. [The front door bell sounds twice.] Here is my husband. Please be silent. He is in a gloomy mood just now.
JACQUES DE RANDOL [rises]
I think I shall go. I am not in love with your husband any more, for many reasons, and it is difficult for me to be polite to him when I despise him, and when I know that he ought to despise me, and would despise me when I shake hands with him, did he know all.
MME. DE SALLUS [annoyed]
How many times must I tell you that all this is entirely out of place?
