Volume II Part 6 (1/2)
”So you bought me, and as soon as I was in your power, as soon as I had becoet your coercive and threatening proceedings, in order that I ht to be a devoted wife and to love you as ht be possible for me to love you, you became jealous, you, as no noble jealousy of a spy, which was as degrading for you as it was for ht months, when you suspected me of every perfidiousness, and you even told race! And as you could not preventcalled in drawing-rooms, and also in the newspapers, one of theyou could think of to keep ad nancy, until the tiust every man Oh! do not deny it! I did not understand it for souessed it You even boasted about it to your sister, who told usted at your boorish coarseness
”Ah! Reles, doors smashed in, and locks forced! For eleven years you have condemned me to the existence of a brood rew disgusted withof you for months, and I was sent into the country, to the fa forth my child
And when I reappeared, fresh, pretty and indestructible, still seductive and constantly surrounded by ad that at last I should live a little like a young rich woain, and you recommenced to persecute me with that infa at thisme, for I should never have refused htly
”Besides this, that abominable andti your thoughts and actions): You attached yourself to your children with all the security which they gave you while I bore them in my womb You felt affection for thenoble fears, which were row stouter
”Oh! How often have I noticed that joy in you! I have seen it in your eyes and guessed it You loved your children as victories, and not because they were of your own blood They were victories over me, over my youth, over my beauty, over my charms, over the compliments which were paidthem to me And you are proud of them, you make a parade of them, you take thene, and you give them donkey rides at Montmorency You take them to theatrical matinees so that you may be seen in the midst of them, so that people may say: 'What a kind father,' and that it e brutality, and he squeezed it so violently that she was quiet, and nearly cried out with the pain, and he said to her in a whisper:
”I love raceful in ato me; I am masteryour masterI can exact from you what I like and when I likeand I have the lawon ers in the strong grip of his large, muscular hand, and she, livid with pain, tried in vain to free theony made her pant, and the tears came into her eyes ”You see that I aer,” he said And when he sorasp, she asked hiious woman?”
He was surprised and stammered: ”Yes” ”Do you think that I could lie if I swore to the truth of anything to you, before an altar on which Christ's body is?” ”No” ”Will you go with me to some church?” ”What for?” ”You shall see Will you?” ”If you absolutely wish it, yes”
She raised her voice and said: ”Philip!” And the coach his eyes from his horses, seemed to turn his ear alone towards his mistress, ent on: ”Drive to St
Philip-du-Roule's” And the victoria, which had got to the entrance of the Bois de Boulogne, returned to Paris
Husband and wife did not exchange a word during the drive, and when the carriage stopped before the church, Madame de Mascaret jumped out, and entered it, followed by the count, a few yards behind her She went, without stopping, as far as the choir-screen, and falling on her knees at a chair, she buried her face in her hands She prayed for a long ti She wept noiselessly, like worief There was a kind of undulation in her body, which ended in a little sob, which was hidden and stifled by her fingers
But Count de Mascaret thought that the situation was lasting too long, and he touched her on the shoulder That contact recalled her to herself, as if she had been burnt, and getting up, she looked straight into his eyes ”This is what I have to say to you I a, whatever you may do to me You may kill me if you like One of your children is not yours, and one only; that I swear to you before God, who hears e which was possible for me, in return for all your abominable tyrannies of theto which you have condemned me
Who was my lover? That you will never know! You ave myself up to him, without love and without pleasure, only for the sake of betraying you, and he also made me a mother Which is his child? That also you will never know I have seven; try and find out! I intended to tell you this later, for one has not avenged oneself on ahim, unless he knows it You have driven me to confess it to-day I now have finished”
She hurried through the church, towards the open door, expecting to hear behind her the quick steps of her husband whoround by a blow of his fist, but she heard nothing, and reached her carriage She juuish, and breathless with fear; so she called out to the coachman: ”Home!” and the horses set off at a quick trot
II
Countess de Mascaret aiting in her room for dinner time, like a criminal sentenced to death, awaits the hour of his execution What was he going to do? Had he come home? Despotic, passionate, ready for any violence as he as he , what had he made up his mind to do? There was no sound in the house, and every moment she looked at the clock Her lady's , and had then left the rooht o'clock struck and almost at the same moment there were two knocks at the door, and the butler came in and told her that dinner was ready
”Has the Count co-room”
For a little moment she felt inclined to arht so rehearsed in her heart But she remembered that all the children would be there, and she took nothing except a s bottle He rose soht bow, and sat down The three boys, with their tutor, Abbe Martin, were on her right, and the three girls, with Miss Sest child, as only three months old, rerace as usual, when there was no company, for the children did not couests present; then they began dinner The Countess, suffering from emotion, which she had not at all calculated upon, remained with her eyes cast dohile the Count scrutinized, now the three boys, and now the three girls, with uncertain, unhappy looks, which traveled frolass from him, it broke, and the as spilt on the tablecloth, and at the slight noise caused by this little accident, the Countess started up from her chair, and for the first time they looked at each other Then, almost every moment, in spite of themselves, in spite of the irritation of their nerves caused by every glance, they did not cease to exchange looks, rapid as pistol shots
The Abbe, who felt that there was some cause for eet up the conversation, and he started various subjects, but his useless efforts gave rise to no ideas and did not bring out a word The Countess, with fe her instincts of a woman of the world, tried to answer him two or three times, but in vain She could not find words, in the perplexity of her htened her in the silence of the large rooht sound of plates and knives and forks
Suddenly, her husband said to her, bending forward: ”Here, amidst your children, will you swear to me that what you toldin her veins, suddenly roused her, and replying to that question with the same firmness hich she had replied to his looks, she raised both her hands, the right pointing towards the boys and the left towards the girls, and said in a firm, resolute voice, and without any hesitation: ”On the head of my children, I swear that I have told you the truth”
He got up, and throwing his table napkin onto the table with an exasperated ainst the wall, and then went out without another word, while she, uttering a deep sigh, as if after a first victory, went on in a calm voice: ”You must not pay any attention to what your father has just said, o, but he will be all right again, in a few days”
Then she talked with the Abbe and with Miss Smith, and had tender, pretty words for all her children; those sweet spoiling mother's hich unfold little hearts
When dinner was over, she went into the drawing-roo She made the elder ones chatter, and when their bedti time, and then went alone into her room
She waited, for she had no doubt that he would come, and she made up her mind then, as her children were not with her, to defend her human skin, as she defended her life as a woman of the world; and in the pocket of her dress she put the little loaded revolver, which she had bought a few days previously The hours went by, the hours struck, and every sound was hushed in the house Only the cabs continued to ruuely through the shuttered and curtained s
She waited, energetic and nervous, without any fear of hi, and al hi every leae at the botto come into her room, and then she awoke to the fact,locked and bolted her door, for greater security, she went to bed at last, and re, and barely understanding it all, without being able to guess what he was going to do