Erotic Classics I

by Various Authors

This last remark confirmed all my intimations; I saw very clearly I was once again in the clutches of one of those libertines moved by cruel passions, whose most cherished delights consist in enjoying the agonies or the death of the luckless victims procured them by money; I observed I was in danger of losing my life.

  And then a knock at the door; Dubois leaves and an instant later ushers in the young Lyonnaise she had mentioned shortly before. I’ll now try to sketch the two personages in whose company you are going to see me for a while. The Monseigneur, whose name and estate T never discovered, was, as I told you, a man of forty years, slender, indeed slight of frame, but vigorously constituted, sinewy, with his muscles almost constantly tensed, powerful biceps showing upon arms that were covered with a growth of thick black hair; everything about him proclaimed strength and good health; his face was animated, his gaze ardent, his eyes small, black, and wicked, there were splendid white teeth in his mouth, and liveliness in his every feature; his height was above average, and this man’s amatory goad, which I was to have but too frequent occasion to see and feel, was roughly a foot long and above eight inches around. This incisive, nervous, constantly alerted and oozing instrument, ribboned with great purple veins that rendered its aspect still more formidable, was levitated throughout the séance, which lasted five or six hours; never once did it sink or falter. I had never before or since found a more hirsute man: he resembled those fauns described in fables. His powerful hands ended in fingers whose strength was that of a vice; as for his character, it seemed to me harsh, abrupt, cruel, his mind was inclined to that sarcasm and teasing of a sort calculated to redouble the sufferings one was perfectly well able to see one had to expect such a man would strive to inflict.

  The little Lyonnaise was called Eulalie. A glimpse of her was enough to convince one of her distinguished birth and virtue: she was the daughter of one of the City’s foremost families from whose house Dubois’ criminal hirelings had abducted her under the pretext of conveying her to a rendezvous with the lover she idolized; together with an enchanting forthrightness and naïveté, she possessed one of the most delightful countenances imaginable. Barely sixteen years old, Eulalie had the face of a genuine Madonna; her features were embellished by an enviable innocence and modesty; she had little color but was only the more fetching for that; and the sparkle in her superb eyes endowed her pretty face with all the fire and warmth whereof, at first glance, this pallor seemed to deprive her; her rather generous mouth was filled with the prettiest teeth, her already fully matured breasts seemed yet whiter than her complexion; but she was no sense lacking in plumpness: her form was round and well furnished, all her flesh was firm, sweet, and succulent. Dubois asserted it were impossible to behold a more beautiful ass: little expert in these matters, you will permit me to abstain from judging here. A fine mossy growth shadowed her fore end; majestic blond hair floated about all those charms, rendering them still more piquant; and to complete the masterpiece, Nature, who seemed to have created it for pleasure, had endowed her with the sweetest and most lovable temperament. Tender and delicate flower, thus were you to grace the world for but an instant in order more swiftly to be withered!

  “Oh, Madame!” she said upon recognizing Dubois, “is it in this way you have deceived me! . . . Just Heaven! where have you brought me?”

  “You shall see, my child,” put in the master of the house, abruptly seizing Eulalie, drawing her to him and forthwith beginning his kisses while, upon his orders, I excited him with one hand.

  Eulalie sought to protect herself, but, thrusting the girl toward the libertine, Dubois eliminated all possibility of her escape. The sitting was long; for very fresh, new-blown was that flower, and the hornet’s desire to drain its pollen was commensurately great. His iterated suckings were succeeded by an inspection of Eulalie’s neck; betimes, I palpated his member and felt it throb with growing insistence.

  “Well,” said Monseigneur, “here are two victims who shall fill my cup of joy to overflowing: Dubois, you shall be well paid, for I am well served. Let’s move into my boudoir; follow us, dear woman, come,” he continued as he led us away; “you’ll leave tonight, but I need you for the party.”

  Dubois resigns herself, and we pass into the debauchee’s pleasure chamber, where we are stripped naked.

  Oh, Madame, I shall not attempt to represent the infamies of which I was at once victim and witness. This monster’s pleasures were those of the executioner; his unique joy consisted in decapitating. My luckless companion . . . oh, no! Madame . . . no! do not require me to finish . . . I was about to share her fate; spurred on by Dubois, the villain had decided to render my torture yet more horrible when both experienced a need to revive their strength; whereupon they sat down to eat. . . . What a debauch! But ought I complain? for did it not save my life? Besotted with wine, exhausted by overeating, both fell dead drunk and slumbered amidst the litter that remained from their feast. No sooner do I see them collapse than I leap to the skirt and mantle Dubois had just removed in order to appear more immodest in her patron’s view; I snatch up a candle and spring toward the stairway: this house, divested, or nearly so, of servants, contains nothing to frustrate my escape, I do encounter someone, I put on a terrified air and cry to him to make all haste to relieve his master who is dying, and I reach the door without meeting further obstacles. I have no acquaintance with the roads, I’d not been allowed to see the one whereby we had come, I take the first I see . . . ’tis the one leading to Grenoble; there is nothing denied us when fortune deigns momentarily to smile upon us; at the inn everyone was still abed, I enter secretly and fly to Valbois’ room, knock, Valbois wakes and scarcely recognizes me in my disordered state; he demands to know what has befallen me, I relate the horrors whereof I was simultaneously an observer and object.

  “You can have Dubois arrested,” I tell him, “she’s not far from here, I might even be able to point out the way. . . . Quite apart from all her other crimes, the wretch has taken both my clothing and the five louis you gave me.”

  “O Thérèse,” says Valbois, “there’s no denying it, you are without doubt the unluckiest girl on earth, but, nevertheless, my honest creature, do you not perceive, amidst all these afflictions which beset you, a celestial arm that saves you? may that be unto you as one additional motive for perpetual virtuousness, for never do good deeds go unrewarded. We will not chase after Dubois, my reasons for letting her go in peace are the same you expounded yesterday, let us simply repair the harm she has done you: here, first of all, is the money she stole from you. In an hour’s time I’ll have a seamstress bring two complete outfits for you, and some linen.

  “But you have got to leave, Thérèse, you must leave this very day, Bertrand expects you, I’ve persuaded her to delay her departure a few hours more, join her. . . .”

  “O virtuous young man,” I cried, falling into my benefactor’s arms, “may Heaven someday repay you for the kindness you have done me.”

  “Ah, Thérèse,” said Valbois, embracing me, “the happiness you wish me . . . I’ve enjoyed it already, ’tis presently mine, since your own is my doing . . . fare thee well.”

  And thus it was I left Grenoble, Madame, and though I had not found in that city all the felicity I had imagined was awaiting me there, at least I had never met in another so many kindly and goodhearted people assembled to sympathize with or assuage my woes.

  My conductress and I were in a small covered carriage drawn by one horse we drove from within; we had with us, beside Madame Bertrand’s baggage, her baby girl of fifteen months whom she was still suckling and for whom I straightway, to my vast misfortune, formed an attachment quite as deep as was that of the mother who had brought the infant into the world.

  She was, this Bertrand, an unattractive person, suspicious, gossipy, noisy, monotonous, and dull-witted. Every night we regularly emptied the carriage and transported everything into our inn and then went to sleep in the same room. Un
til Lyon, everything went along very smoothly, but during the three days this woman needed for her business dealings, I fell upon someone I was far from expecting to encounter in that city.

  Together with girls from the hotel whom I had got to accompany me, I would take walks on the Rhone quay; one day I all of a sudden espied the Reverend Father Antonin formerly of Saint Mary-in-the-Wood, now superior in charge of his order’s establishment located in that city. That monk accosted me and after rebuking me in a very low and still sharper tone for my flight, and having given me to understand I would be running great risks of recapture were he to relay information to the Burgundian monastery, he added, softening his manner, that he would not breathe a word if I should be willing that very instant to come to visit him in his new quarters and to bring with me the girl I was with, who struck him as worth having; then repeating his proposal aloud, and to this other creature: “We shall reward you handsomely, both of you,” quoth the monster; “there are ten of us in our house, and I promise you a minimum of one louis from each if your complacency is unlimited.” I flush crimson upon hearing these words; I spend a moment trying to convince the monk he has made a mistake; failing at that, I attempt to use signs to induce him to be silent, but nothing prevails with this insolent fellow, and his solicitations become only the more heated; at last having received repeated refusals, he demands to know our address; in order to get rid of him, I immediately give a fictitious one, he writes it down, and leaves us with the assurance we will soon meet again.

  Upon returning to our inn I explained as best I could the history of this unfortunate acquaintance; but whether my companion was not at all satisfied by what I told her, or whether she may perhaps have been exceedingly annoyed by my virtuous performance which deprived her of an adventure wherefrom she might have earned much, she waggled her tongue, the effects of which were only too plainly revealed by Bertrand’s remarks upon the occasion of the deplorable catastrophe I am going to relate to you in a moment; however, the monk never did reappear, and we left Lyon.

  Having quit the city late, we could get no further than Villefranche that day, and there we stopped for the night; ’twas in that town, Madame, there took place the horrible event which today causes me to appear before you in a criminal guise, although I was no more a malefactor in that one of my life’s fateful circumstances than in any other of those where you have observed me so unjustly assaulted by the blows of fate; and as in many another instance, so this time I was flung into the abyss by nothing other than the goodness of my heart and the wickedness of men.

  Having made Villefranche toward six o’clock in the evening, we supped in haste and retired directly, that we might be able to undertake a longer stage on the morrow; we had not been two hours in bed when a dreadful smell of smoke roused us from sleep; convinced the flames are near at hand, we get instantly from bed. Just Heaven! the havoc wrought by the fire was already but too frightful; half-naked, we open our door and all around us hear nothing but the fracas of collapsing walls, the noise of burning timbers and woodwork and the shrieks of those who had fallen into the blaze; surrounded by devouring flames we have no idea in which direction to run; to escape their violence, we rush past them and soon find ourselves lost in a milling crush of wretches who, like ourselves, are seeking salvation in flight; at this point I remember that my conductress, more concerned for her own than for her child’s safety, has not thought of preserving it from death; without a word to the woman, I fly to our chamber, having to pass through the conflagration and to sustain burns in several places: I snatch up the poor little creature, spring forward to restore her to her mother: I advance along a half-consumed beam, miss my footing, instinctively thrust out my hands, this natural reflex forces me to release the precious burden in my arms . . . it slips from my grasp and the unlucky child falls into the inferno before its own mother’s eyes; at this instant I am myself seized . . . carried away; too upset to be able to distinguish anything, I am unaware whether ’tis aid or peril which surrounds me but, to my grief, I am but too fully enlightened when, flung into a post chaise, I discover myself beside Dubois who, clapping a pistol to my head, threatens to blow out my brains if I utter a syllable . . .

  “Ah, little villain,” says she, “I’ve got you now and this time for good.”

  “Oh, Madame! you?” I exclaim. “Here?”

  “Everything that has just transpired is my doing,” the monster replies, “’twas by arson I saved your life; and by a fire you’re going to lose it: in order to catch you I’d have followed you to Hell had it been necessary. Monseigneur was furious, believe me, when he found out you had escaped; I get two hundred louis for every girl I procure him, and not only did he not want to pay me for Eulalie, but he menaced me with all his anger could produce were I to fail to bring you back. I discovered I’d missed you by two hours at Lyon; yesterday I reached Villefranche an hour after your arrival, I had the hotel burned by the henchmen I always have in my employ, I wanted to incinerate you or get you back; I’ve got you, I m returning you to a house your flight has plunged into trouble and unquiet, and I’m taking you there, Thérèse, to be treated in a cruel manner. Monseigneur swore he’d not have tortures terrible enough for you, and we’ll not step from this carriage until we are at his seat. Well, Thérèse, what is your present opinion of Virtue?”

  “Oh, Madame! that it is very frequently crime’s prey; that it is happy when triumphant; but that it ought to be the unique object of the Heavenly God’s rewards even though human atrocities bring about its downfall upon earth.”

  “You’ve not long to wait before you know, Thérèse, whether there is really a God who punishes or recompenses the deeds of mortals. . . . Ah! if, in the eternal inexistence you are shortly going to enter, if ‘twere possible to cogitate in that state of annihilation, how much you would regret the fruitless sacrifices your inflexible stubbornness has forced you to make to phantoms who have never doled out any but the wages of sorrow. . . . Thérèse, there is yet time left to you: if you wish to be my accomplice I’ll save you, for, I avow, ’tis more than I can bear to see you break down ever and ever again upon Virtue’s routes all beset by perils. What? are you not yet sufficiently punished for your good behavior and false principles? What kind of misery do you have to know in order to be persuaded to mend your ways? What then are the examples you require in order to be convinced the attitude you have adopted is the worst of all and that, as I have told you a hundred times over, one must expect nothing but calamity when, breasting the crowd’s headlong stampede, one wishes to be virtuous and alone in a completely corrupt society. You count upon an avenging God; cease to be a gull, Thérèse, disabuse yourself, the God you fabricate for yourself is but a fiction whose stupid existence is never found elsewhere but in the heads of the crazed; ’tis a phantom invented by human wickedness; the solitary purpose of this illusion is to deceive mankind or to create armed divisions among men. The service it were possible to render humankind would have been instantly to cut the throat of the first impostor who took it into his head to speak of God to men. How much blood that one murder would have spared the universe! Get on, get on with you, Thérèse, perpetually active Nature, Nature acting always, has no need of a master for her government. And if indeed this master did exist, after all the faults and sins with which he has stuffed creation, would he, think you, would he merit anything from us but scorn and outrage? Ah, if he exists, your God, how I do hate him! Thérèse, how I abhor him! Yes, were this existence authentic, I affirm that the mere pleasure of perpetually irritating whatever I found that bore his impress or bespoke his touch would become for me the most precious compensation for the necessity in which I would find myself to acknowledge some belief in him. . . . Once again, Thérèse, do you wish to become my confederate? A superb possibility presents itself, with courage we can execute the thing; I’ll save your life if you’ll undertake it. This Monseigneur to whose house we are going, and whom you know, lives alone in the country ho
use where he gives his parties; their species, with which you are familiar, requires isolation; a single valet lives with him when he takes up residence there for the sake of his pleasures: the man riding ahead of the coach, you and I, dear girl, that’s three of us against two; when that libertine is inflamed by his lecheries, I’ll snatch away the saber with which he decapitates his victims, you’ll hold him, we’ll kill him, and meanwhile my man will have done in the valet. There’s money hidden in that house; more than eight hundred thousand francs, Thérèse, I’m sure of it, the thing’s well worth the trouble . . . Choose, clever creature, decide: death or an alliance; if you betray me, if you expose my plan to him, I’ll accuse you of having contrived it alone, and don’t doubt for a moment that the confidence he has always had in me will tip the balance my way . . . think carefully before you give me your answer: this man is a villain; hence, by assassinating him we merely aid the law whose rigorous treatment he deserves. A day does not go by, Thérèse, without this rascal murdering a girl; is it then to outrage Virtue by punishing Crime? And does the reasonable proposition I make you still alarm your wild principles?”

  “Be certain of it, Madame,” I answered; “it is not with object of chastening crime you propose this deed, it is rather with the sole intention of committing one yourself; consequently there cannot be but great evil in doing what you suggest, and no semblance of legitimacy can appear thereupon; better still, even were you to intend to avenge humanity for this man’s horrors, you would still be committing evil by doing so, for this is not a problem which concerns you: there are laws decreed to punish the guilty; let those laws take their course, it is not unto our feeble hands the Supreme Being has entrusted their sword, never might we wield that blade without affronting justice.”