Sarrasine | Page 8

the gold ear-rings which hung at his ears, by the rings
containing stones of marvelous beauty which sparkled on his fingers,
like the brilliants in a river of gems around a woman's neck. Lastly, this
species of Japanese idol had constantly upon his blue lips, a fixed,
unchanging smile, the shadow of an implacable and sneering laugh,
like that of a death's head. As silent and motionless as a statue, he
exhaled the musk-like odor of the old dresses which a duchess' heirs
exhume from her wardrobe during the inventory. If the old man turned
his eyes toward the company, it seemed that the movements of those
globes, no longer capable of reflecting a gleam, were accomplished by
an almost imperceptible effort; and, when the eyes stopped, he who was
watching them was not certain finally that they had moved at all. As I
saw, beside that human ruin, a young woman whose bare neck and
arms and breast were white as snow; whose figure was well-rounded
and beautiful in its youthful grace; whose hair, charmingly arranged
above an alabaster forehead, inspired love; whose eyes did not receive
but gave forth light, who was sweet and fresh, and whose fluffy curls,

whose fragrant breath, seemed too heavy, too harsh, too overpowering
for that shadow, for that man of dust--ah! the thought that came into my
mind was of death and life, an imaginary arabesque, a half-hideous
chimera, divinely feminine from the waist up.
"And yet such marriages are often made in society!" I said to myself.
"He smells of the cemetery!" cried the terrified young woman, grasping
my arm as if to make sure of my protection, and moving about in a
restless, excited way, which convinced me that she was very much
frightened. "It's a horrible vision," she continued; "I cannot stay here
any longer. If I look at him again I shall believe that Death himself has
come in search of me. But is he alive?"
She placed her hand on the phenomenon, with the boldness which
women derive from the violence of their wishes, but a cold sweat burst
from her pores, for, the instant she touched the old man, she heard a cry
like the noise made by a rattle. That shrill voice, if indeed it were a
voice, escaped from a throat almost entirely dry. It was at once
succeeded by a convulsive little cough like a child's, of a peculiar
resonance. At that sound, Marianina, Filippo, and Madame de Lanty
looked toward us, and their glances were like lightning flashes. The
young woman wished that she were at the bottom of the Seine. She
took my arm and pulled me away toward a boudoir. Everybody, men
and women, made room for us to pass. Having reached the further end
of the suite of reception-rooms, we entered a small semi-circular
cabinet. My companion threw herself on a divan, breathing fast with
terror, not knowing where she was.
"You are mad, madame," I said to her.
"But," she rejoined, after a moment's silence, during which I gazed at
her in admiration, "is it my fault? Why does Madame de Lanty allow
ghosts to wander round her house?"
"Nonsense," I replied; "you are doing just what fools do. You mistake a
little old man for a spectre."
"Hush," she retorted, with the imposing, yet mocking, air which all
women are so well able to assume when they are determined to put
themselves in the right. "Oh! what a sweet boudoir!" she cried, looking
about her. "Blue satin hangings always produce an admirable effect.
How cool it is! Ah! the lovely picture!" she added, rising and standing
in front of a magnificently framed painting.

We stood for a moment gazing at that marvel of art, which seemed the
work of some supernatural brush. The picture represented Adonis
stretched out on a lion's skin. The lamp, in an alabaster vase, hanging in
the centre of the boudoir, cast upon the canvas a soft light which
enabled us to grasp all the beauties of the picture.
"Does such a perfect creature exist?" she asked me, after examining
attentively, and not without a sweet smile of satisfaction, the exquisite
grace of the outlines, the attitude, the color, the hair, in fact everything.
"He is too beautiful for a man," she added, after such a scrutiny as she
would have bestowed upon a rival.
Ah! how sharply I felt at that moment those pangs of jealousy in which
a poet had tried in vain to make me believe! the jealousy of engravings,
of pictures, of statues, wherein artists exaggerate human beauty, as a
result of the doctrine which leads them to idealize everything.
"It is a portrait," I replied. "It is a product of Vien's genius. But that
great painter never saw the original,