Another Study of Woman | Page 8

was in me thenceforth for ever shrouded in crape.
Yes; I felt a cold and fleshless hand cast over me the winding- sheet of
experience, dooming me to the eternal mourning into which the first
betrayal plunges the soul. As I cast my eyes down that she might not
observe my dizziness, this proud thought somewhat restored my
strength: 'If she is deceiving you, she is unworthy of you!'
"I ascribed my sudden reddening and the tears which started to my eyes
to an attack of pain, and the sweet creature insisted on driving me home
with the blinds of the cab drawn. On the way she was full of a
solicitude and tenderness that might have deceived the Moor of Venice
whom I have taken as a standard of comparison. Indeed, if that great
child were to hesitate two seconds longer, every intelligent spectator
feels that he would ask Desdemona's forgiveness. Thus, killing the
woman is the act of a boy.--She wept as we parted, so much was she
distressed at being unable to nurse me herself. She wished she were my
valet, in whose happiness she found a cause of envy, and all this was as
elegantly expressed, oh! as Clarissa might have written in her
happiness. There is always a precious ape in the prettiest and most
angelic woman!"
At these words all the women looked down, as if hurt by this brutal
truth so brutally stated.
"I will say nothing of the night, nor of the week I spent," de Marsay
went on. "I discovered that I was a statesman."
It was so well said that we all uttered an admiring exclamation.
"As I thought over the really cruel vengeance to be taken on a woman,"
said de Marsay, continuing his story, "with infernal ingenuity--for, as
we had loved each other, some terrible and irreparable revenges were
possible--I despised myself, I felt how common I was, I insensibly
formulated a horrible code--that of Indulgence. In taking vengeance on
a woman, do we not in fact admit that there is but one for us, that we
cannot do without her? And, then, is revenge the way to win her back?
If she is not indispensable, if there are other women in the world, why
not grant her the right to change which we assume?
"This, of course, applies only to passion; in any other sense it would be
socially wrong. Nothing more clearly proves the necessity for

indissoluble marriage than the instability of passion. The two sexes
must be chained up, like wild beasts as they are, by inevitable law, deaf
and mute. Eliminate revenge, and infidelity in love is nothing. Those
who believe that for them there is but one woman in the world must be
in favor of vengeance, and then there is but one form of it-- that of
Othello.
"Mine was different."
The words produced in each of us the imperceptible movement which
newspaper writers represent in Parliamentary reports by the words:
/great sensation/.
"Cured of my cold, and of my pure, absolute, divine love, I flung
myself into an adventure, of which the heroine was charming, and of a
style of beauty utterly opposed to that of my deceiving angel. I took
care not to quarrel with this clever woman, who was so good an actress,
for I doubt whether true love can give such gracious delights as those
lavished by such a dexterous fraud. Such refined hypocrisy is as good
as virtue.--I am not speaking to you Englishwomen, my lady," said the
Minister, suavely, addressing Lady Barimore, Lord Dudley's daughter.
"I tried to be the same lover.
"I wished to have some of my hair worked up for my new angel, and I
went to a skilled artist who at that time dwelt in the Rue Boucher. The
man had a monopoly of capillary keepsakes, and I mention his address
for the benefit of those who have not much hair; he has plenty of every
kind and every color. After I had explained my order, he showed me his
work. I then saw achievements of patience surpassing those which the
story books ascribe to fairies, or which are executed by prisoners. He
brought me up to date as to the caprices and fashions governing the use
of hair. 'For the last year,' said he, 'there has been a rage for marking
linen with hair; happily I had a fine collection of hair and skilled
needlewomen,'--on hearing this a suspicion flashed upon me; I took out
my handkerchief and said, 'So this was done in your shop, with false
hair?'--He looked at the handkerchief, and said, 'Ay! that lady was very
particular, she insisted on verifying the tint of the hair. My wife herself
marked those handkerchiefs. You have there, sir, one of