登陆注册
5419100000031

第31章

We become bond-slaves when we give ourselves body and soul, but a man is bound to nothing by accepting the gift.Who will assure me that love will last? The very love that I might show for you at every moment, the better to keep your love, might serve you as a reason for deserting me.I have no wish to be a second edition of Mme de Beauseant.Who can ever know what it is that keeps you beside us? Our persistent coldness of heart is the cause of an unfailing passion in some of you; other men ask for an untiring devotion, to be idolised at every moment; some for gentleness, others for tyranny.No woman in this world as yet has really read the riddle of man's heart."There was a pause.When she spoke again it was in a different tone.

"After all, my friend, you cannot prevent a woman from trembling at the question, `Will this love last always?' Hard though my words may be, the dread of losing you puts them into my mouth.

Oh, me! it is not I who speaks, dear, it is reason; and how should anyone so mad as I be reasonable? In truth, I am nothing of the sort."The poignant irony of her answer had changed before the end into the most musical accents in which a woman could find utterance for ingenuous love.To listen to her words was to pass in a moment from martyrdom to heaven.Montriveau grew pale; and for the first time in his life, he fell on his knees before a woman.

He kissed the Duchess's skirt hem, her knees, her feet; but for the credit of the Faubourg Saint-Germain it is necessary to respect the mysteries of its boudoirs, where many are fain to take the utmost that Love can give without giving proof of love in return.

The Duchess thought herself generous when she suffered herself to be adored.But Montriveau was in a wild frenzy of joy over her complete surrender of the position.

"Dear Antoinette," he cried."Yes, you are right; I will not have you doubt any longer.I too am trembling at this moment--lest the angel of my life should leave me; I wish I could invent some tie that might bind us to each other irrevocably.""Ah!" she said, under her breath, "so I was right, you see.""Let me say all that I have to say; I will scatter all your fears with a word.Listen! if I deserted you, I should deserve to die a thousand deaths.Be wholly mine, and I will give you the right to kill me if I am false.I myself will write a letter explaining certain reasons for taking my own life; I will make my final arrangements, in short.You shall have the letter in your keeping; in the eye of the law it will be a sufficient explanation of my death.You can avenge yourself, and fear nothing from God or men.""What good would the letter be to me? What would life be if Ihad lost your love? If I wished to kill you, should I not be ready to follow? No; thank you for the thought, but I do not want the letter.Should I not begin to dread that you were faithful to me through fear? And if a man knows that he must risk his life for a stolen pleasure, might it not seem more tempting? Armand, the thing I ask of you is the one hard thing to do.""Then what is it that you wish?"

"Your obedience and my liberty."

"Ah, God!" cried he, "I am a child."

"A wayward, much spoilt child," she said, stroking the thick hair, for his head still lay on her knee."Ah! and loved far more than he believes, and yet he is very disobedient.Why not stay as we are? Why not sacrifice to me the desires that hurt me? Why not take what I can give, when it is all that I can honestly grant? Are you not happy?""Oh yes, I am happy when I have not a doubt left.Antoinette, doubt in love is a kind of death, is it not?"In a moment he showed himself as he was, as all men are under the influence of that hot fever; he grew eloquent, insinuating.And the Duchess tasted the pleasures which she reconciled with her conscience by some private, Jesuitical ukase of her own; Armand's love gave her a thrill of cerebral excitement which custom made as necessary to her as society, or the Opera.To feel that she was adored by this man, who rose above other men, whose character frightened her; to treat him like a child; to play with him as Poppaea played with Nero--many women, like the wives of King Henry VIII, have paid for such a perilous delight with all the blood in their veins.Grim presentiment! Even as she surrendered the delicate, pale, gold curls to his touch, and felt the close pressure of his hand, the little hand of a man whose greatness she could not mistake; even as she herself played with his dark, thick locks, in that boudoir where she reigned a queen, the Duchess would say to herself--"This man is capable of killing me if he once finds out that Iam playing with him."

Armand de Montriveau stayed with her till two o'clock in the morning.From that moment this woman, whom he loved, was neither a duchess nor a Navarreins; Antoinette, in her disguises, had gone so far as to appear to be a woman.On that most blissful evening, the sweetest prelude ever played by a Parisienne to what the world calls "a slip"; in spite of all her affectations of a coyness which she did not feel, the General saw all maidenly beauty in her.He had some excuse for believing that so many storms of caprice had been but clouds covering a heavenly soul;that these must be lifted one by one like the veils that hid her divine loveliness.The Duchess became, for him, the most simple and girlish mistress; she was the one woman in the world for him;and he went away quite happy in that at last he had brought her to give him such pledges of love, that it seemed to him impossible but that he should be but her husband henceforth in secret, her choice sanctioned by Heaven.

Armand went slowly home, turning this thought in his mind with the impartiality of a man who is conscious of all the responsibilities that love lays on him while he tastes the sweetness of its joys.He went along the Quais to see the widest possible space of sky; his heart had grown in him; he would fain have had the bounds of the firmament and of earth enlarged.It seemed to him that his lungs drew an ampler breath.

同类推荐
热门推荐
  • 1、2、3——死(长篇推理小说二)

    1、2、3——死(长篇推理小说二)

    翌日上午九时,我被谷口菊子的电话叫醒。“早上好,承蒙你们的安排,我高枕无忧地睡了一夜。最近我一直没有睡过这么好的觉。”“那太好了,您用过早餐了吗?”“刚才到餐厅吃过了,吃的烤面包、玉米饼、腊肉、桔子汁、咖啡……请问,我难道一步也不能离开房间吗?”我对她的食欲之大感到惊讶。看来她的情绪已恢复正常。我放心了。
  • 无品太子妃

    无品太子妃

    一生一世一双人,本是虚幻,是为悲剧。当他历经繁华,而她,早已不再。
  • 农女吉祥

    农女吉祥

    刘吉祥叉腰指天,怒目而视,老天你是要闹哪样啊!本来是个没钱、没工作、没男友的三没剩女也就算了,怎么一觉醒来就成了没异能、没空间、没权、没钱还没智商的五没倒霉女了?就算是个傻姑娘,我也要勤种田奔小康,吉祥挺起胸脯向前望,可是……吉祥挠挠头,嘿嘿一笑,我是农事小白……乌鸦嘎嘎嘎飞过,掉落一地鸟毛~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~新文《无忧田园》已经开更,欢迎小可爱们来看,欢迎养肥~新文冲榜中,票票神马的都投给新文吧~爱你们哦
  • 青鱼点灯

    青鱼点灯

    本书是《宁夏诗歌学会丛书》的其中一部,选取了作者长期以来创作的诗歌,其中多篇已在报刊发表。书稿作者西野,本名张树鹏,宁夏作家协会会员,宁夏诗歌学会会员。作品发表于《诗刊》《朔方》《星星》《飞天》《诗潮》等报刊。其作品表现出丰富的想象力,却又可从其中看到现实的影子。
  • 那些奋斗的岁月

    那些奋斗的岁月

    如果你有梦想,那么请相信,本书将对你的观念和思想进行良性冲击。当你失意茫然的时候,你可以随意地翻阅本书,静下心来,你会发现,其实这就是你想要的,那些奋斗的岁月,也是在写你自己。 这是一个平民的奋斗故事。他草根出生,却不甘放弃,一步一步编织着属于他的梦想,缔造了一个个值得我们深思的奋斗故事,他的感悟一次次触及我们的心灵深处,而当他命悬一线……他又能否继续未完的梦?
  • 暴走萌妃不好惹

    暴走萌妃不好惹

    相关番外在新文《恶女擒夫:邪帝请轻轻》的前面的作品相关,需登录网站才能看到好像,免费看,么么哒,另新文求支持!!穿越成私生女,被人欺负,凌辱,陷害怎么办?西陵蓝用行动告诉你:揍他,揍她,再揍他!现代超级财阀公主,携神秘能量石穿越,武力翻倍,揍人爽到爆!美男环绕,小弟成群,变态暗恋者,呆萌小和尚……西陵蓝杀马盟誓,“楚天幕,从此,你生是我的人,死是我的鬼,如有违背,当如此马……”楚天幕擦汗:这丫头太狠太暴烈,不过,本王喜欢!
  • 维度融合

    维度融合

    这是一个最好的时代:人皆百岁,而动作不衰,生而可得。灵气爆发,生物的进化加快,寿命都大幅延长,疾病和衰弱无力纷纷离人们远去,这是人类可以掌控自身到最大化的时代,似乎一切皆有可能。这是一个最坏的时代:岁月静好,似乎慢慢变成了传说。在绝大多数人为这渐渐展开,波澜壮阔的大世欢呼的时候,没几个人知道灵气复苏只是个开始,在前所未有的机遇后面,前所未有的灾难也即将到来。
  • 治安疏

    治安疏

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。汇聚授权电子版权。
  • 东阳夜怪录

    东阳夜怪录

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。汇聚授权电子版权。
  • 盗珠

    盗珠

    自古乱世出英雄,太平盛世又出什么,是时势造英雄还是英雄造势时?有心造乱世的天狐雪盼目的不是当英雄,却是为了“毁灭”二字,这背后的故事又是什么?云剑门掌门叶恒座下得意弟子秦玉,一心为师门奔波寻找天邪替换五彩石作为琉璃灯芯解决石塔破灭,妖魔祸世之灾,奈何命运弄人。