From —, 25 August 17**
LETTER 42
The Vicomte de Valmont to the Présidente de Tourvel
However hard the conditions you impose upon me, Madame, I do not refuse to fulfil them. I feel quite unable to go against any of your wishes. That said, I venture to hope that you will allow me to make some requests in return; they are much easier to grant than yours, and yet I wish to obtain them only by an utter submission to your will.
One, which I hope will appeal to your sense of justice, is that you should name those who have been accusing me. It seems to me they are doing me so much wrong that I should have the right to know who they are. The other, which I might expect you to grant out of the kindness of your heart, is that you might allow me sometimes to renew the homage of my love which now, more than ever, will merit your compassion.
I hasten to do your will, Madame, as you see, even when I can do so only at the expense of my happiness; even though, I shall go so far as to say, I am convinced that you only desire my departure to spare yourself the painful spectacle you have always before you of the object of your injustice.
You must agree, Madame, that it is not so much that you are concerned about the opinion of a public so accustomed to respect you that it dare not hold you in low esteem, as that you are embarrassed by the presence of a man whom it is easier to punish than to blame. You distance me from you as one turns one’s eyes away from a poor man to whom one does not want to give alms.
But when absence from you redoubles my suffering, to whom, if not you, can I address my complaint? From whom, if not you, may I expect the consolation so essential to me? Will you refuse it, when it is you and only you who have caused me this suffering?
You will surely not be surprised either that, before leaving, I am anxious to give you an explanation for the feelings you have inspired in me; nor that I shall only find the strength to distance myself from you upon receiving the order from your very own lips.
For these two reasons, I beg a brief conversation with you. It would be no use to write letters instead. We could write volumes and still not understand one another half as much as we should with a quarter of an hour’s conversation. It will not be hard for you to find the time to grant me this. For, however much I hasten to obey you, you know that I have informed Madame de Rosemonde about my plans to spend part of the autumn with her, and I shall at least have to wait for a letter to have a pretext of business which obliges me to leave.
Adieu, Madame. This word has never cost me so much to write as at this moment when it recalls to me the idea of our separation. If only you could imagine how it makes me suffer, I dare believe you would be a little grateful for my willingness to please you. At least be kind enough to receive the assurance and homage of my most tender and respectful love.
From —, 26 August 17**
LETTER 40 (CONTINUED)
The Vicomte de Valmont to the Marquise de Merteuil
Now let us consider, my dear. You feel as I do that the scrupulously honourable Madame de Tourvel could not grant me the first of my demands, and thus betray the trust of her friends by disclosing who her accusers are to me. So by making all my promises depend on this condition, I am not holding myself to anything. But you will also realize that her refusal of this request will be a way of my obtaining the other things; when I leave, I win out by entering into a correspondence with her that she has herself legitimized; I scarcely count the rendez-vous I have begged of her, which actually has no other motive than to prepare her to consent to others when I really need them.
The one thing that remains for me to do before I go is to find out who these people are who are so busy damaging me in my dealings with her. I presume it is her pedant of a husband. I hope so. Apart from the fact that conjugal prohibition is a spur to desire, I could be sure that from the moment my beauty consents to write to me I should have nothing more to fear from her husband, since she would already necessarily be deceiving him.
But if she has a friend intimate enough to be in her confidence, and that friend is against me, I believe it will be necessary to stir up a quarrel between them, and I hope I shall be able to do this. But first I need some information.
I really thought I was about to learn something yesterday. But this woman never behaves like other people. We were in her room at the time when it was announced that dinner was served. She was only just finishing her toilette, and I noticed that in her haste and confusion she had left the key in her writing-desk. And I knew she never removed the key to her room. I was thinking about it during dinner when I heard her maid come downstairs. I took a swift decision. I pretended I had a nosebleed and went out. I rushed upstairs to her desk, but I found all the drawers unlocked and not the slightest sign of a letter. And yet at this time of the year we have no fires in which to burn them. Whatever does she do with the letters she receives? For she receives a great many! I neglected nothing, I looked everywhere. But all I acquired was the conviction that she must still have this precious treasure in her pockets.
How can I get hold of them? Since yesterday I have been vainly trying to think how. I am determined to do so. I regret not having the skills of a pickpocket. Should this, indeed, not form part of the education of a man of intrigue? Would it not be amusing to steal the letter or the portrait of a rival, or pull something from a prude’s pockets that would lay bare her hypocrisy? But our parents do not consider these things. And though I think of everything, all I can do is realize my ineptitude, and I am incapable of doing anything about it.
Whatever the case, I came back to the table extremely put out. However, I was somewhat mollified by my beauty’s air of concern about my feigned condition and I took advantage of it to assure her that for some time I had been excessively agitated, and it had been damaging my health. Convinced as she is that she is the cause of it, should she not in all conscience behave in a way that would calm my anxieties? But though so religious, she is not very charitable. She refuses to give alms in the name of love and this refusal is quite enough, in my opinion, to warrant me stealing them. But adieu, for here I am chattering away and all I can think of is those accursed letters.
From —, 27 August 17**
LETTER 43
The Présidente de Tourvel to the Vicomte de Valmont
Why seek to lessen my feelings of gratitude, Monsieur? Why should you wish to accede to only half of what I demand of you, and try to bargain, as it were, over a perfectly straightforward course of action? Is it not enough that I feel how much I ask of you? Not only are you asking a great deal, you are asking the impossible. For if my friends have talked about you, they have done so simply out of concern for me. And even if they are mistaken, their intentions were none the less good. And you are proposing that I should acknowledge this mark of friendship on their part by betraying their trust! I have already put myself in the wrong by telling you about it, and now you make me only too aware of this. What with anyone else would have been just candour is madness where you are concerned, and I should be guilty of great wrongdoing if I yielded to your demands. I appeal to you, on your honour, did you believe I was capable of doing that? Should you ever have proposed such a thing? No, of course not. And I am sure when you reflect upon it further you will no longer press me on the matter.
Your request that I write to you is scarcely easier to grant. And, in all fairness, you cannot lay the blame for this on me. I do not wish to offend you, but in view of the reputation you have acquired and which, on your own admission, you at least partly deserve, how could any woman admit to being in correspondence with you? And how could an honest woman be capable of resolving to do what she knows she must keep secret?
And another thing: if I could be certain your letters were such that I would never have reason to complain of them, that I might always be able to justify in my own mind the receiving of them, then perhaps the desire to prove to you that I am guided by reason and not hatred would make me override these powerful considerations, and go much further than I o
ught in allowing you to write to me occasionally. If indeed you desire this as much as you say you do, you will abide willingly by the single condition which could make me agree to it. And if you are at all grateful for what I am doing at this moment for your sake, you will not put off your departure any longer.
Allow me to observe, while on this subject, that you received a letter this morning but did not take advantage of it to announce your departure to Madame de Rosemonde, as you promised. I hope henceforth that nothing will stop you keeping your word. I trust above all that you will not on that account wait for me to grant the interview you ask for, and which I absolutely do not wish to have with you. And instead of the orders you say you find necessary, you will make do with this plea, which I make to you now once again. Farewell, Monsieur.
From —, 27 August 17**
LETTER 44
The Vicomte de Valmont to the Marquise de Merteuil
Share my joy, my dearest. She loves me. I have triumphed over her unruly heart. In vain she pretends to hide it; happily my cleverness has discovered her secret. Thanks to my painstaking exertions I have found out everything I need to know. Since last night – oh blessed night! – I am once more in my element. I have come into my own again. I have lifted the veil from a twofold mystery of love and infamy. I shall enjoy the one and be revenged for the other. I shall fly from pleasure to pleasure. The very thought of it transports me into a state in which I have some trouble reminding myself to proceed with caution; and I may have trouble too in putting some order into my account of what occurred. But let me try.
Only yesterday, after writing you a letter, I received one from the celestial being. I am sending it to you. You will see that she gives me, in the least clumsy manner possible, permission to write to her. But she urges me to leave, and I knew I should not be able to postpone it much longer without damaging my cause.
However, I was still uncertain what to do, because I was tormented by the desire to know who could have said things about me. I made an attempt to win over the maid and have her empty her mistress’s pockets for me, which she could easily do in the evening and put things back next morning without arousing the least suspicion. I offered her ten louis for this small service, but she turned out to be a timid or conscientious prude of a girl who could be won over by neither money nor eloquence. I was still lecturing her when the supper bell went. I had to leave her. I was only too relieved when she said she would keep my secret, though I was none too sure she would.
Never before had I been in such bad humour. I felt compromised. And I blamed myself all evening for my lack of caution.
When I had returned, not without some disquiet, to my room, I spoke to my valet, who ought to have some credit with the girl because of his successful love affair with her. I asked him either to obtain from her what I had asked or at least ensure her discretion. But though usually so confident, he seemed rather dubious about the success of the undertaking, and made an observation on this subject which astonished me by its depth:
‘Monsieur surely knows better than I do,’ he said, ‘that going to bed with a woman simply makes her do what she likes doing. But it is often a far cry between that and making her do what we want her to do.’ ‘The rascal’s good sense appals me at times.’*
‘I vouch for this girl even less,’ he added, ‘because I have reason to believe she has another lover and that I only owe my success with her to the fact that there is so little to do in the country. So, were it not for my eagerness to serve Monsieur, I should only have had her once.’ (This fellow is a real treasure!) ‘As to the secret,’ he continued, ‘what would be the use of making her promise, since she will risk nothing by telling lies? If we mention it to her again, that would only make her more aware of its importance, and she would be all the more likely to go trying to curry favour with her mistress.’
The more sensibly he reasoned, the greater the difficulty I was in. Luckily the fellow was in a garrulous mood and, as I needed his services, I let him run on. In the course of his telling me about his affair with this girl I learned that, since the room she occupies is only separated from that of her mistress by a partition, through which suspicious noises might be heard, it was in his own room that they met each night. I immediately made my plans. I told him about them and we carried them out successfully.
I waited until two in the morning. And then, as agreed, I went to the room where they met, carrying a light, and pretending that I had rung several times without getting an answer. My confidant, who plays his parts to perfection, executed a little scene of surprise, despair and apology, which I brought to a conclusion by pretending I needed some water and sending him to heat some up for me. And the conscientious chambermaid was even more ashamed, for my man tried to outdo me in ingenuity by making sure she was attired in a manner admissible for, though not excused by, the time of year.
Knowing that the more humiliated the girl was, the more easily I could deal with her, I did not allow her to change either her position or her state of undress. And when I had ordered my valet to wait for me in my rooms I sat down beside her on the bed, which was in extreme disarray, and began to talk to her. I needed to retain the authority that circumstances had given me over her. So I remained composed, in a manner which would have done credit to the restrained Scipio himself;22 and without taking the smallest liberty with her – which, however, the occasion and her exposure would seem to give her reason to expect – I talked business to her as calmly as if I were talking to the public prosecutor.
My conditions were that I would keep the secret faithfully as long as she would hand over to me at roughly the same time the following day the contents of her mistress’s pockets. ‘Moreover,’ I added, ‘I offered you ten louis yesterday. I am promising you them again today. I do not wish to abuse your position.’ All was granted, as you can guess. So I retired and allowed the happy couple to make up for lost time.
I used mine to get some sleep. And when I woke, needing an excuse to leave my beauty’s letter unanswered before going through her papers, something I should not be able to do until the following night, I decided to go out hunting and I spent nearly the whole day in that pursuit.
On my return I was received rather coldly. I incline to believe there was a touch of pique that I was showing so little eagerness to make the most of the time I had left, especially since that kinder letter she had written to me. I suppose this because Madame de Rosemonde chided me a little for my long absence, and my beauty replied, with some asperity: ‘Oh, we must not scold Monsieur de Valmont for enjoying the one pleasure he may find here.’ I complained of the unfairness of this remark and took the opportunity to assure them that I enjoyed the company of the ladies so much that I would put off writing a very interesting letter that I had to send. I added that, since for several nights I had been unable to get any rest, I wished to see whether being very tired would restore my sleep to me. And my look was enough to make her understand both what my letter was about and the cause of my sleeplessness. Throughout the evening I was careful to retain an air of gentle melancholy, which seemed to have some success, and beneath which I hid my impatience for the hour when the secret being so obstinately hidden from me should be revealed. Finally we separated, and a little while later the faithful chambermaid came to bring me the reward that we had agreed for my discretion.
Once I had my hands on this treasure I proceeded to its examination with my customary prudence. For it was vital to put everything back in its place. First I found two letters from the husband, an indigestible hotchpotch of details about legal proceedings and outpourings of conjugal love, which I was patient enough to read in their entirety, and where I found not a single mention of myself. They made me cross, and I put them back. But my temper was improved by finding in my hand the pieces of my famous letter from Dijon, carefully joined together. Fortunately, upon a whim, I glanced through it again. You can imagine how delighted I was to detect upon it the quite distinct traces of tears of my adorable devotee. I admit I
gave in to an adolescent impulse and kissed this letter with a passion I no longer thought myself capable of. I continued my happy research. I rediscovered all my letters together in the order they were written. And an even more agreeable surprise was to find the very first one, the one I thought had been sent back to me by the cruel woman, faithfully copied out in her hand, in writing that was shaky and distorted, proof enough of the sweet agitation of her heart during this activity.
Up to that point I was full of love. Soon this gave way to fury. Who do you suppose it is who wants to ruin me in the eyes of the woman I adore? What Fury do you think is vicious enough to engage in such villainy? You know her. It is your friend, your relative. It is Madame de Volanges. You cannot imagine what unspeakable lies that devilish shrew has spun about me. She is the one, the only one, who has made this angelic woman worried that she is in danger. It is through her advice, because of her pernicious warnings, that I am forced to leave. It is to her that I am being sacrificed. Oh, there is no doubt at all I must seduce her daughter. But that is not enough; I must ruin her. And since the age of this wretched woman protects her from my blows I must attack her through the object of her affections.
So she wants me to come back to Paris! She is obliging me. Very well, then, I shall return. But she will rue the day I came. I am very sorry that Danceny should be the hero of this adventure. He is fundamentally an honest man and that will get in our way. However, he is in love, and I see him frequently. Perhaps there may be some way of profiting from this. But I am forgetting myself in my rage, and that I must tell you all about what happened today. Let us resume.
Dangerous Liaisons Page 12