Madame Aubin | Page 4

no longer time, I
know or rather I suspect, to go back on such an impulse, but after all,
what do you want? And I am in despair after all this bravura which
decided me, sustained me, swept me off my feet during this long
journey from Paris to this chancy place. Ah, I'm afraid.
PELTIER (overwhelmed by surprise rather than skeptical and resolved
as he had appeared up until now.) Afraid of whom and what? (he lets
Marie's hand fall and crosses his arms waiting to hear more)
MARIE Of the past, first of all. Fear! Remorse because of the past. And
certainly my husband doesn't deserve all this outrage. He's a man with
faults, surely, even vices, perhaps. But he's honorable and even
righteous. And now I think of it these quarrels between him and me
must rather proceed from me, spoiled child and over-free young girl
that I was before my marriage with this honest, with this gallant man.
PELTIER Let's leave Aubin out of this. In the end what do you mean

and what do you want me to do? Return to Paris and your abandoned
household?
MARIE I don't know yet. But don't interrupt me every minute and you
will be of my opinion. No. My husband ought not to have to endure
these things on his honor and his name. And it's true I am afraid of the
past. I'm afraid of the future, too. Or rather, no. It's the present which
frightens me, sir! For the future, I'll answer for it. And it will conform
to the vows of my finally reawakened conscience.
PELTIER (who has a mounting rage within him and feels himself
provoked to the last degree) Explain yourself? Are you joking or not? I
want to understand you.
MARIE Sir, you have no right to speak to me like this!
(Peltier advances like a man who has the right his interlocutor is
speaking of or believes he's going to have it.)
MARIE And I will never give it to you.
PELTIER Madame.
MARIE Do you hear, sir?
(The two stiffen and look each other in the face. A silence.)
PELTIER Then why did you come with me of your own free will, or
even on your own initiative?
MARIE (who's settled down) What do you want? I've changed my
mind.
PELTIER (very cold and speaking through his teeth) Fine. You've
tricked me! At this point I'm not a young man. No one makes a fool of
me! For, my darling, I don't think that a caprice of yours, such a sudden
turnabout, such a flash of virtue--
MARIE Don't use that word virtue any more. It is terrible to my ears. I
was telling you just now that I've something like fear of the present.
Yes, fear to remain here this way. But I was in the process of adding
that the present doesn't terrify me. It was then that you shrieked out at
the moment I was going to explain to you how I intended to confide
myself to your honor to allow me to decide in peace. And you got so
carried away that you irritated me, too. And you just said things to me!
A caprice? me, at my age; twenty-eight years old! A flash of
conscience. Yes, that's it. Believe it.
PELTIER But what role is it you wish me to play in all this? You, you
are at the same time reasonable, then illogical and me? as for me?

MARIE Your role? All sketched out. Let me do it all. That would be
chivalrous and fine.
PELTIER But I love you, why--
MARIE And me, too, I love you and I say to you: Can't we love each
other without all this? (scornful gesture) without all this? (disdainful
gesture)
PELTIER Ah! We are there. A virgin arises in you when through you a
satyr is rising in me. (grabbing her by the waist) And towards you--
MARIE (who soon gets free) Look, let's be serious.
(Peltier, who importunes a long explanation sits with bowed head; one
hand on the back of a chair, the other playing with his watch chain.)
MARIE What is it you risk? You, a man, a bachelor by this pleasant
voyage? Nothing. A duel perhaps on return! In this illogical world we
live in your reputation will be far from damaged; a world which
dislikes adultery in a woman and is passionately fond of all the gallant
sins of a fashionable man. Whereas I?!! And yet it's only quite natural
and especially on the brink of a final resolution, I hesitate and jump
back. Must you be angry about it? Look, are you angry? can you be?
ought you to be?
PELTIER (as if unexpectedly released and decided, peremptory, brief,
confident) Questions! Questions!