Juliette

by Marquis de Sade

  “Unless I am mistaken, my Lord, her name was Simon.”

  “Simon. Of course. I handled that affair four or five days ago. That’s it, Simon. I had the husband jailed and the infant removed to the poorhouse. My stars, Juliette, I remember the woman too: she was very pretty and very well-behaved. I was reserving her for your pimps; and she told you the truth, that family was once quite prosperous, bankruptcy altered all that. Well, you’ve simply added the finishing touches to my crime, and this conclusion makes the story delicious from beginning to end.”

  I said Saint-Fond’s standard was raised, my masculine dress was completing his delirium. He led me into the boudoir where he had received me the first time I had come to his house. A manservant appeared, and Saint-Fond, his fingers trembling from delight, unbuttoned my breeches and had his valet fondle my buttocks; he took charge of the fellow’s prick and prodded my asshole with its tip, then introduced his own thereinto; and the lecher embuggered me, hotly enjoining me to suck his valet’s prick the while, and when I’d got it stiff as a poker he packed it away in his ass. The operation over with, Saint-Fond told me that the excellence of his discharge was in large measure due to the knowledge that the ass he was fucking merited the scaffold.

  “That lad who fucked me,” the Minister assured me, “is a rascal of the first order: six times over I’ve had to save him from the wheel. Did you notice his prick? ’Tis a magnificent article, he plies it masterfully. Here, Juliette, before I forget: the sum I promised you for crimes of your personal commission. A carriage is waiting for you, go home now, tomorrow you will leave for the estate outside Sceaux which I bought for you last month; take only a few companions along, four of your female domestics should suffice—the prettiest of the lot, however—your cook too, your butler, and the three virgins listed for the next supper. Installed in the country, you’ll await further instructions from me; that’s all I’ll tell you for the time being.”

  I left very content with the success of my crime, full of pleasure at having committed it; and departed from Paris on the morrow.

  Scarcely was I established in that rural domain, completely isolated, as solitary as the Thebaïd hermits, when there came one of my servants to inform me a stranger had arrived, a person of condition who said he had been sent by the Minister and wished to speak with me.

  “Ask him to wait,” said I, and unsealed the message he had brought from Saint-Fond. It read as follows: “Have your domestics seize the bearer of this letter straightway, he is to be confined in one of the dungeons I have caused to be built in the cellars of your house. This individual is not to be allowed to escape; I hold you responsible for him. His wife and daughter will also appear: you will deal with them in the same manner. These are my orders. Execute them promptly, scrupulously, and do not hesitate to employ such treachery, such cruelty, as I know you to be capable of. Adieu.” I had the stranger ushered in.

  “Sir,” said I, maintaining the appearance of perfect equanimity and graciousness, “you are doubtless a friend of his Lordship?”

  “Both my family and I have for a long time been the beneficiaries of his generosities and kindness, Madame.”

  “’Tis plain from his letter, Monsieur…. But allow me to give my servants instructions so that you may be received in such wise as the Minister seems to desire.”

  Bidding him be seated, I went out of the room.

  My servants, and they were rather more slaves than domestics, provided themselves with rope and were at my side when I returned to the visitor.

  “Conduct this gentleman,” I told them, “to the quarters his Lordship would have him occupy,” and my retainers, powerful bucks they were, set upon our guest and dragged him off to a very abominable cell far under ground.

  “Madame! I protest! There is some mistake!” cried the unlucky dupe of Saint-Fond’s deceit and mine.

  Inflexible, deaf to his pleadings, I carried out the Minister’s instructions with zeal: the captive’s anguished questions were left all unanswered, I myself turned the key in the lock.

  No sooner was I back in the drawing room than I heard carriage wheels on the drive. Out stepped the stranger’s wife and daughter, and the letters of introduction they presented were exact replicas of his.

  Ah, Saint-Fond, I said to myself, casting a glance upon those two women, admiring the beauty of the mother who was a superb thirty-six, the sweet modesty and grace of the daughter, only then entering her sixteenth year, ah, Saint-Fond! your fell, accursed lust has much to do with these ministerial proceedings, that is but too certain. And in this, as in everything else you do, are you not guided far more by your vices than by the interests of your country?

  I would be hard pressed to give an adequate description of the moans and tears those two wretches let forth when they beheld themselves dragged infamously off to the dungeons readied for them; but no more moved by the weeping and wailing of the mother and daughter than I had been by the entreaties of the father, I was concerned only to take the greatest precautions for their safekeeping, and was not at ease until I had these important prisoners behind the stoutest bars and all the keys in my pocket.

  Meditating upon what the fate of these individuals might be, I did not imagine that it would involve more than detention, in as much as executions were my affair and I had received no instructions to slay; while I was in the middle of pondering these matters, the arrival of a fourth personage was announced to me. Heavens, what is my surprise upon recognizing the selfsame young man who, you will recall, the first time I held conversation with Saint-Fond, at the latter’s bidding struck me three blows of a cane upon the shoulders. He too came bearing a letter, I opened it at once.

  “Greet this man warmly and entertain him well,” I read; “you must surely remember him, for you carried his marks awhile, and they were his hands that gripped you at our first voluptuous rencounter in your house. He is to take the leading role in the drama that will be staged tomorrow; in him welcome the executioner of Nantes, who upon my orders has come to put to death the three persons now your prisoners: obliged under pain of losing my post to produce these three heads the day after tomorrow before the Queen, I would myself (needless to say) wield the ax, had not Her Majesty expressed the very keenest desire to receive the spoils out of none other than the hands of a public executioner. It is for that reason the latter, arriving in Paris, found his services not immediately required there, and has been dispatched posthaste to your residence, whither he comes in ignorance of the business he is to attend to. You may instruct him now; but refrain absolutely from permitting him a glimpse of his prey, this is essential; expect me tomorrow morning. Meanwhile treat the prisoners, and the women especially, very rigorously: bread only, a little water, and no day-light.”

  “Sir,” said I, turning to the most recent of my visitors, “the Minister mentions in his letter that we, you and I, are not unknown to each other. Tis true. Once upon a time you—”

  “Aye, Madame. Orders, alas, are orders.”

  “Indeed they are, and I harbor no grudge against you,” I went on, giving him my hand, which he kissed with ardor. “But it is dinner-time. First to table; we’ll discuss afterward.”

  Delcour was twenty-eight, a very pretty fellow, his air and calling pleased me mightily. I showered attentions upon him, and they were quite sincere; when we finished dinner, I mounted as skillful an attack as ever you’ve seen. Delcour soon exhibited evidence of the success of my advances. There was a wonderful bulge in his breeches, I was overpowered.

  “For God’s sake, my love,” said I, “have it out, I fain must see what you’re hiding there. That magnificent prick has me all aflutter, your profession sets my brain awhirl; you’ve absolutely got to fuck me.”

  He promptly fetches that marvelous device into view, and pursuant to my custom when dealing with a man, I catch hold of it with the intention of mouthing it to the balls; but that was a grandly proportioned tool, I tell you, and it was all I could do to accommodate half its length. As soon
as he was lodged, Delcour got his hands on my cunt, buried his face in it, and two seconds later we discharged in concert. Seeing me swallow his fuck, that handsome young man leapt excitedly upon me.

  “Ah, by Jesus,” said he, “I was in too great a hurry; but I’ll make amends for my mistake.”

  The rascal’s stave was still holding true, he stretches me out upon a broad couch, fastens his lips to mine which are yet sticky with his sperm, and encunts me as only rarely you will be encunted by a still leaking prick: in all my life I’d never been so stoutly fucked. Delcour cut and thrust for three-quarters of an hour and more, out of prudence he retreated on sensing another discharge impending; but when at last my cunt’s grip triumphed, he loosed a second dose of thick fuck, and this too I swallowed with as much delight as I had the first.

  “Delcour,” said I, once I had resumed possession of my wits and could essay a rational analysis of my late behavior, “you have been somewhat surprised, I fancy, by the informal reception I have given you; such frivolous conduct, such speedy advances—I venture to suppose you consider me a loose woman, nay, a thorough whore. Despite my supreme disdain for that which fools call reputation, I would have you understand that your good fortune is owing far less to my coquetry or to anything physical in me than to my mentality: I have an exceptionally odd one. You kill by trade … you are a murderer, a handsome one besides, one such prick as you boast isn’t come by every day. But your profession, it is that I wish to stress—thanks alone to it I flung myself into your arms; scorn me, detest me, I don’t give a damn. You fucked me; I’ve got all I wanted.”

  “Heavenly creature,” Delcour replied, “it isn’t scorn I feel for you, no, nor shall it be hatred, you inspire altogether different sentiments in me. You deserve to be worshiped and worship you I shall, regretting that your ecstasy had its origin solely in that which earns me the loathing of others.”

  “’Tis of no importance, that,” said I. “A mere matter of opinion, and opinion varies, as you observe, since the source of my fondness for you is precisely this very thing which puts you at a remove from the rest of mankind; however, this is but debauchery on my part, you shouldn’t interpret it as anything else. My attachment to the Minister, my manner of living with him bar me from intrigues and I’ll certainly never contemplate any. We’ll make the most of this evening, of the whole night if you like; and there’s an end to it.”

  “Ah, Madame,” the young man said with respectfulness, “of you I ask only your protection and your gracious kindness.”

  “You shall never want for either; but in return you must comply with all that results from my imagination. I must warn you, it is subject to all sorts of disorders, and they sometimes lead far.”

  Delcour had gone back to fondling my breasts with one hand and frigging my clitoris with the other, now and again darting his tongue down my gullet; after a few minutes of this I bade him refrain from wearying himself unduly, and to give truthful answers to certain questions I wished to pose him.

  “Tell me, to begin with, just why Saint-Fond had you strike me upon the shoulder that first time I saw you. It puzzled me then and still does.”

  “Libertinage, Madame, sheer libertinage. You know the Minister. He has his quirks.”

  “He has you take part in luxurious scenes then?”

  “Whenever I am in Paris.”

  “He has fucked you?”

  “He has, Madame.”

  “And you’ve fucked him back?”

  “Most certainly.”

  “You have beaten him? Flogged him?”

  “Frequently.”

  “Sweet Jesusfuck! how that excites me—frig, Delcour, frig away—and has he had you beat and flog other women?”

  “Upon several occasions.”

  “Have you ever gone farther?”

  “Allow me to respect the Minister’s secrets, Madame. In this connection your guesses are very apt to be correct since they would be based on a good acquaintance of his Lordship.”

  “Can you say whether he has at any time formulated projects against me?”

  “Madame, toward you his attitude has always been, to my knowledge, one of affection and trust; he is greatly attached to you, you may take my word for it.”

  “And so am I to him: I adore him, I hope he is fully aware of it. However, since you would not have me tempt you to indiscretion, we’ll talk of other things. Tell me, if you please, how are you able to take the life of some individual who has never wronged you in any way? How is it that from the depths of your soul pity does not speak out in behalf of the poor wretches the law enjoins you to assassinate in cold blood?”

  “Be very certain, Madame,” was Delcour’s answer, “that in my calling none of us attains this degree of rationalized and scientific ferocity save through principles that are largely unknown to folk in general.”

  “How so? Principles? I would have you tell me about them.”

  “They are rooted in a soil of total inhumanity; our training begins early, from childhood on we are taught a system of values wherein human life is nothing and the law everything; the result is that it gives us no more bother to cut the throats of our fellows than it does a butcher to cut the throat of a calf. Does the butcher have qualms? He doesn’t know what they are. Neither do we.”

  “But carrying out the law is your work; do you proceed in the same way when it is a question of pleasure?”

  “Certainly, Madame. Could it be otherwise? Should it be? The prejudice once overcome in us, we cease to behold any evil in murder.”

  “Must one not necessarily esteem it an evil to destroy one’s fellow beings?”

  “Madame, I might rather ask you how one can possibly impute any such thing to an act of destruction. If destruction of all human beings were not one of the fundamental laws of Nature, then, yes, I should be able to believe that you outrage this unintelligible Nature when you destroy; but in view of the fact there does not exist a single natural process which does not prove that destruction is a necessary element to the natural order and that Nature creates only by dint of destroying, ’tis most obvious that whoever destroys acts in tune with Nature. It is no less obvious that whoever refuses to destroy offends Nature very grievously: for, and of this there can be no doubt, it is only by destroying we furnish Nature the means for creating; and hence the more we destroy, the nicer the accord between ourselves and her workings; if murder is basic to Nature’s regenerative operations, certainly the murderer is the man who serves Nature best; and this truth grasped, we are moved to declare that the more numerous his murders, the better he fulfills his obligations toward a Nature whose sole need is of murders.”9

  “Such doctrines contain their element of peril.”

  “They are nonetheless true, Madame. More learned thinkers would be able to develop them much further than can I, but you will find that the point of departure of their arguments is constantly the same.”

  “My friend,” I said to Delcour, “you have already given me much food for thought, a single idea cast into a brain like mine produces the effect there of a spark upon saltpeter—yes, I sense it, we have similar minds. We have three victims here. To sacrifice them is why you were sent to this chateau. It will, believe me, give me great pleasure to behold you in action; but, my dear, you must possess a vast store of information and experience, be so kind as to dilate upon the mechanics of the thing. Am I correct in believing that it is only with the aid of libertinage you succeed in vanquishing unnatural prejudice? For you just gave me clear proof that Nature is much sooner served than outraged by murder….”

  “What do you wish to ask, Madame?”

  “This: if it is not very certain, as I have heard say, that only by transforming the whole affair into one of libertinage are you able to perform, and enjoy, the murders your trade obliges you to commit; in fine, I ask you if ’tis not so, that the act of executing infallibly puts your prick erect?”

  “It is no longer contested, Madame, that libertinage leads logically to m
urder; and all the world knows that the pleasure-worn individual must regain his strength in this manner of committing what fools are disposed to denominate a crime: we subject some person or other to the maximum agitation, its repercussion upon our nerves is the most potent stimulant imaginable, and to us are restored all the energies we have previously spent in excess. Murder thus qualifies as the most delicious of libertinage’s vehicles, and as the surest; but it is not true that in order to commit murder, one has got to be mentally in a libertine furor. By way of proof I cite to you the extreme calm wherewith the majority of my colleagues dispatch their business; they experience emotion, yes, but it is quite as different from the passion animating the libertine as this latter is from the passion in him who murders out of ambition, or out of vengeance, or out of greed, or, again, out of sheer cruelty. Which is simply to indicate that there are several classes of murder, the libertine variety being but one; however, this does not prevent us from concluding that none of these sorts of murder outrages Nature, and that it is in far greater conformance to her laws than in violation thereof.”

  “All you say is just, Delcour, but I maintain nonetheless that, precisely in the interest of these very murders, it would be desirable were their perpetrator to be inspired by lust alone, for that passion is never followed by remorseful aftermaths, one’s recollections of it are of joy and joyous; whereas with the others, once their fire has gone out one is often devoured by regrets, above all if one happens to be something less than a veteran philosopher; and therefore it seems to me there is much to be said in favor of never murdering save through libertinage. One would be free to kill for whatever the motive, but the erection would always be there as a safeguard and the better to consolidate the action, so as to avoid being troubled by serious remorse later on.”