The Grip of Desire | Page 6

a kind of charm emanated front this girl. He remembered reading
that magnetic currents flow forth from certain women which inflame
the senses, and he took a step backwards; but the charm operated in
spite of himself, his eyes remained fixed on the seductive outlines of
the figure of the unknown. She enquired of him politely the way to the
Mairie. In pointing it out to her the Curé perhaps displayed more
earnestness than was necessary, he even took a few steps with her as far
as the entrance to the village, then he returned home, thinking of this
pretty girl.
During supper his servant told him that some mountebanks had arrived
in the village, and that they were going to give a performance the same
evening in the market-place. In fact a drum was heard beating the call,
and the hoarse voice of the clown announcing "a grand acrobatic
spectacle, accompanied with dances and followed by a pantomime."
Involuntarily the Curé's thought turned to the stranger; he went upstairs
into his study and behind his half-closed shutters he could take part in
the spectacle.
As he expected, the pretty girl was there, and seen from this distance in
the night, half-lighted by a few smoky lamps, with her little bodice of
velvet, her gauze skirt spangled with gold, her flesh-coloured tights,
she was really charming. At that moment she was dancing, with
wonderful lightness and grace, some lascivious fandango, while she
accompanied herself with the castanets.
She was smiling at the crowd, delighting in the effect which she knew
how to produce with her sparkling eye and her white teeth and her rosy
lips, and the Curé was intoxicated by that smile. Then he cast his eyes
over the rough crowd, and ha was grieved at so much cost for such an
audience: Margaritas ante porcos, he murmured, Margaritas ante
porcos.

In order to admire her better, he had taken a field-glass and lost none of
her gestures.
Her bosom was boldly bared, and he feasted his eyes upon the sweet
furrow of her breasts, he followed the delicious outline of her leg, and
found his heart melting before the undulating movements of her
graceful bust and her sturdy hips.
He abruptly left the window, took up a book at random and tried to
read.
But this was in vain; his eyes only were reading, his thoughts were
elsewhere; they were in the market-place which was in frolic with the
dancer.
He wished to stop this libertine thought; he read aloud: "The fall is
great after great efforts. The soul risen so high in heroism and holiness
falls very heavily to the earth.... Sick and embittered it plunges into evil
with a savage hunger, as though to avenge itself for having believed."
At another time, he would have said: "It is a warning." But he saw not
the warning, he only saw the dancer, and he murmured: "How beautiful
is she!"
He took the hundred paces round his table; but his body only was there,
his thoughts always were hovering on the market-place round the
spangled petticoat.
He returned to the window. All was over; the lamps were put out, the
crowd was slowly dispersing; five or six inquisitive ones were standing
round the heavy carriage of the company, from which some gleam of
light escaped.
He remained a long time leaning on his elbow at his window, looking
at the stars and listening mechanically to all the noises outside. The
market-place became empty. Only the stamping of the horses was to be
heard fastened near by, in the thick shade of the old lime-trees. A
slender thread of light again filtered up to hint.

VI.
THE LOOK.
"His pupils glowed in the dim twilight, like burning coals."
LÉON CLAUDEL (Les Va-nu-pieds).
It was like a lover attracting him, a magic thread which fastened yonder
was unwinding itself to his eye. He could not withdraw it thence, and
armed with his glass he tried to reach the bottom of the mysterious light.
Two or three times he saw a figure which he thought he recognized,
pass and repass in the lighted square.
Then the devil tempted him, like Jesus on the mountain. He did not
show him the kingdoms of the earth, but he gave him a glimpse of the
mountebank undressed. "Go not there," his good angel cried to him.
But the Curé turned a deaf ear; he went down noiselessly from his
room and ventured into the market-place.
In order to approach the carriage, he displayed all the strategy of a
skilful general; he first walked the length of the parsonage, then crossed
the market-place, then little by little, artfully, disappeared beneath the
lime-trees.
[PLATE I: THE LOOK. No one could have detected him plunging his
burning gaze into