Part 40 (2/2)
”My dear Dorsan, your muscles keep contracting; let my arm alone, please.”
”Oh! these women! these women! But why do I feel this weight at my heart? for I do not love her.”
”Let me go, my friend, I entreat you!”
”Oh! it's because it is cruel to be constantly deceived in this way! to be fooled again and again! and for whom, I ask you?”
”I don't know what you ask me, but let me go; you hurt me; I shall be obliged to call for help.”
”But is it really she, after all? I must confound her.--Raymond!”
I turned toward my companion, and not until then did I notice his piteous expression and terrified eyes; I released his arm, and, becoming a little calmer, asked him what the matter was.
”The matter! Faith! you seem to have attacks of brain fever; you squeeze my arm so that you make me yell, and you utter exclamations that I don't understand.”
”I was thinking about something that I'll tell you of later. But let us go back to this intrigue of your friend: it interests me very much.
Monsieur de Grandmaison sups to-night with his new conquest?”
”Yes, to-night.”
”I am very curious to see this woman who you say is so pretty.”
”Faith! so am I, for I don't know her any more than you do, and I am looking forward to seeing her.”
”What! you are to see her?”
”Certainly; I am invited to the supper, with five or six agreeable roues, intimate friends of Grandmaison. As he is naturally a little stupid, when he has told a woman that he'd like--you understand--he can't think of anything else to say to her to amuse her; and as he desires to be sparing of his pleasures, because he's not so robust as you and I are, he reserves his ardor for the night; he always invites a number of friends to supper, in order to put his charmer in the right mood.”
”A most excellent device, and very pleasant for his guests!”
”You must understand that we always get something out of it. These women, when they have a large stock of susceptibility, are never satisfied with Grandmaison, who's an invalid!”
”I understand: you are his friend and deputy.”
”I am whatever anyone wants me to be! Oh! we have great sport at these little supper parties! we laugh like lunatics! The food is delicious and the wines exquisite! no constraint, no ceremony; we joke and sing and drink; and the jests, the puns, the remarks with a double meaning, the spicy anecdotes, the s.m.u.tty couplets! There's a rolling fire of them; everybody talks at once, and n.o.body hears what the others say; it's delicious!”
”You make me regret that I am not one of you.”
”Would you like to be, my dear fellow? Parbleu! if you would, I will venture to introduce you.”
”Really! could you do it?”
”I can do anything I choose! you know very well that everything succeeds that I undertake.”
”I had forgotten that. But this Monsieur de Grandmaison doesn't know me.”
”What difference does that make? I know you, and that's enough!
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