The Lady of the Camellias

by Alexandre Dumas fils

  “What do I care?”

  “Madam will come home, or if she doesn’t, there will be time in the day to go see what has detained her. You will get yourself killed on the road.”

  “There is no danger, my dear Nanine. Until tomorrow.”

  The good-natured girl went to get my coat, threw it over my shoulders, and offered to go wake the inn owner, Mère Arnould, and inquire if it would be possible to get a carriage, but I refused, convinced I would lose more time in this possibly fruitless attempt than it would take me to complete half the journey.

  Also I needed fresh air, as well as physical exertion to exhaust the overexcitement to which I had fallen prey.

  I took the key to the apartment of the rue d’Antin, and, after having said good-bye to Nanine, who had accompanied me as far as the gate, I left.

  I started out running, but the earth was newly damp, which was doubly tiring. After a quarter hour of running, I was forced to stop; I was bathed in sweat. Recovering my breath, I continued on my path. The night was so dark that I trembled at every moment, thinking I might stumble into one of the trees along the roadside—looming suddenly before my eyes, they looked like giant ghosts charging at me.

  I saw one or two transport wagons, which I soon left behind.

  A calèche approached at a full trot heading for Bougival. At the moment it passed in front of me, the hope sprang to mind that Marguerite was within.

  I stopped and cried out, “Marguerite! Marguerite!”

  But nobody answered, and the calèche continued on its way. I watched it recede into the distance, and continued on.

  It took me two hours to reach the edge of the Place de l’Étoile.

  The sight of Paris restored my strength, and at a run I descended the long avenue I had crossed so many times.

  That night nobody was there.

  You would have thought it was the boulevard of a dead city.

  The day began to break.

  When I arrived at the rue d’Antin, the great city was already stirring before completely waking.

  Five o’clock struck in the Church of Saint-Roch at the moment I entered Marguerite’s building.

  I gave my name to the porter, who had received enough twenty-franc pieces from me to know I had the right to come visit Mlle Gautier at five o’clock in the morning.

  I passed without interference.

  I could have asked him if Marguerite was at home, but he might have responded no, and I preferred to remain in doubt for two minutes longer because in doubt, I still could hope.

  I put my ear to the door, trying to detect a sound, a movement.

  Nothing. The silence of the countryside seemed to extend all the way here.

  I opened the door and entered.

  All the curtains were hermetically closed.

  I drew open the dining room curtains, then headed to the bedroom, and pushed open the door.

  I leapt at the curtain cord and pulled it violently. The curtains flew open; a weak daylight broke through. I ran to the bed.

  It was empty!

  I opened the doors one after the other; I entered all the rooms.

  Nobody.

  It was enough to drive you mad.

  I entered the dressing room, opened the window, and called out for Prudence many times.

  Mme Duvernoy’s window remained shut.

  I then went down to see the porter and asked if Mlle Gautier had come home during the day.

  “Yes,” responded the man, “with Mme Duvernoy.”

  “She left no word for me?”

  “Nothing.”

  “Do you know what they did next?”

  “They got into a carriage.”

  “What sort of carriage?”

  “A private carriage.”

  What did it all mean?

  I rang at the next door.

  “Where are you going, sir?” the concierge asked after having opened the door.

  “To see Mme Duvernoy.”

  “She is not back.”

  “Are you sure?”

  “Yes, sir, and here is even a letter that someone brought her last night and which I have not yet given to her.”

  And the porter showed me a letter, at which I mechanically glanced.

  I recognized Marguerite’s handwriting.

  I took the letter.

  The address bore these words:

  “To Mme Duvernoy, to give to M. Duval.”

  “This letter is for me,” I told the porter, and showed him the address.

  “You are Monsieur Duval?” replied this man.

  “Yes.”

  “Ah! I recognize you; you often come to see Mme Duvernoy.”

  Once in the street, I broke the seal of this letter.

  A lightning bolt could have landed at my feet and I would not have been more shocked than I was by what I read there.

  “By the time you read this letter, Armand, I will already be the mistress of another man. Everything, therefore, is over between us.

  “Return to the side of your father, my friend, go see your sister again—that chaste young girl, unaware of all our miseries—in whose company you will quickly forget what you have suffered because of that lost girl called Marguerite Gautier, whom you once tried to love for an instant, and who owes to you the only happy moments of a life that, she hopes, will not now last long.”

  When I read the last word, I thought I would go mad.

  At one moment I truly feared I would fall down on the street. A cloud passed before my eyes, and the blood rushed to my temples.

  At last I got hold of myself. I looked around me, astonished to see the lives of others continue without being slowed by my despair.

  I was not strong enough to bear alone the blow that Marguerite had brought upon me.

  It was then that I remembered that my father was in the same city as I, and that in ten minutes’ time I could be by his side, and that, whatever the cause of my pain, he would share it with me.

  I ran like a madman, like a thief, to the Hôtel de Paris. I found the key in the door of my father’s room. I entered.

  He was reading.

  From the slight degree of astonishment he showed in seeing me appear, you would have thought he had expected me.

  I threw myself into his arms without saying a word, I gave him Marguerite’s letter and, sinking to my knees beside his bed, I wept hot tears.

  CHAPTER XXIII

  As the ordinary routine of daily life resumed its course, I could not believe the day that broke would not resemble the ones that had preceded it. There were moments when I told myself that some circumstance I could not recall had brought me to spend the night away from Marguerite, but that if I returned to Bougival, I would find her anxious, just as I had been, and that she would ask me who it was who had kept me so far away from her.

  Once existence has solidified into habit, as had happened with this love affair, it seems impossible that this habit could be broken without simultaneously shattering all the other mainsprings of life.

  I was therefore forced to reread that letter from Marguerite time and again, to convince myself I had not dreamed it.

  My body, succumbing to moral shock, was incapable of a single movement. My anxiety, my nighttime journey, the news of the morning, had exhausted me. My father took advantage of this total prostration of my forces to ask me to formally consent to leave with him.

  I promised everything he wanted. I was incapable of enduring an argument, and I needed genuine affection to help me survive what had just happened.

  I was only too happy that my father was willing to console me for such heartbreak.

  All I recall is that around five o’clock that afternoon he had me step into a post chaise with him. Without telling me anything, he’d had my trunks packed, had
them loaded with his own behind the carriage, and taken me off.

  I had no idea of what I was doing until the city had disappeared and the solitude of the road reminded me of the emptiness of my heart.

  Again I was overcome by tears.

  My father understood that words, even from him, would not console me, and let me cry without saying a word, contenting himself with sometimes gripping my hand, as if to remind me that I had a friend next to me.

  That night I slept a little. I dreamt of Marguerite.

  I woke with a start, not understanding why I was in a carriage.

  Then reality came back to me, and I let my head sink on my chest.

  I did not dare talk to my father; I was too afraid he might say, “You see, I was right when I denied that woman’s ability to love.”

  But he did not abuse his advantage, and we arrived at C . . . without his having said anything to me but words completely unrelated to the events that had caused my departure.

  When I embraced my sister, I recalled the words of Marguerite’s letter concerning her, but understood at once that, good as she was, my sister was incapable of making me forget my mistress.

  Hunting season was open; my father thought it would provide a distraction for me. He organized shooting parties with neighbors and friends. I attended them without repugnance and without enthusiasm, with the same apathy that characterized all my actions after my departure.

  We were hunting for game. I was brought to my post. I set my unloaded gun down beside me and daydreamed.

  I watched the clouds pass. I let my thoughts wander across the lonely plains, and from time to time I would hear my name called by some hunter, pointing out a hare ten steps away from me.

  None of these details escaped my father, and he did not let himself be deceived by my tranquil exterior. He understood very well that, defeated as it was, my heart might someday experience a terrible, perhaps dangerous reaction, and while avoiding the appearance of consoling me, he did his utmost to distract me.

  My sister, naturally, had not been made aware of all that had occurred. She could not understand why I, usually so cheerful, had suddenly become so dreamy and sad.

  Sometimes, surprised in the midst of my sadness by an uneasy glance from my father, I would give him my hand and clasp his as if tacitly begging his pardon for the pain that, in spite of myself, I had caused him.

  A month passed this way, but it was all I could bear.

  The memory of Marguerite pursued me endlessly. I had loved this woman too much, and I still did, for her to become indifferent to me at once. Whatever feelings I might have for her, I simply had to see her again, and at once.

  This desire entered my mind and planted itself there with all the violence of the determination that finally reemerges in a body that has been paralyzed for a long time.

  It was not in the future, in one month, in a week that I had to see Marguerite; it was the day following the very day when the idea seized me, and I went to tell my father that I was leaving him for business that called me back to Paris, but that I would return promptly.

  No doubt he guessed the motive for my departure, because he urged me to stay; but, seeing that the suppression of this desire, in the excitable state I was in, might have fatal consequences for me, he hugged me and begged me, almost in tears, to return quickly to his side.

  I did not sleep all the way to Paris.

  Once I was there, what would I do? I did not know, but first of all I needed to find out what had become of Marguerite.

  I went to my apartment to get dressed, and as the weather was good, and there was plenty of time, I went to the Champs-Élysées.

  After half an hour I saw Marguerite’s carriage approach from afar, from the Rond-Point at the Place de la Concorde.

  She had bought back her horses, because the carriage was just as it used to be, except she was not inside it.

  Hardly had I noticed this absence when, following the eyes of others around me, I saw Marguerite, on foot, accompanied by a woman I’d never seen before.

  In passing alongside me, she turned pale, and a nervous smile tightened her lips. As for me, the violent beating of my heart shook my chest, but I succeeded in maintaining a chilly expression on my face, and coldly saluted my old mistress, who reached her carriage almost at the same time, and climbed into it with her friend.

  I knew Marguerite. Meeting me unexpectedly must have disconcerted her. Without doubt she had learned of my departure, which must have calmed her in the aftermath of our rupture; but seeing me come back, and finding herself face-to-face with me, pale as I was, she must have understood that my return had a purpose, and asked herself what was going to happen.

  If I had come upon Marguerite unhappy—if, as a sort of revenge, I had been able to rescue her in some way—I would perhaps have forgiven her, and certainly would not have thought of doing her harm. But I found her happy, at least so it appeared; another man had returned to her the luxury I could not provide for her. As a consequence, our rupture, initiated by her, seemed to take on the basest character. I felt as humiliated in my pride as in my love; she absolutely had to pay for the suffering she had caused me.

  I could not be indifferent to what this woman was doing, and surely, the thing that would hurt her the most would be my indifference; so that was the sentiment I had to feign, not only for her eyes, but also for the eyes of others.

  Trying to put on a smiling face, I presented myself at Prudence’s.

  The chambermaid went to announce me and made me wait a few moments in the living room.

  At last Mme Duvernoy appeared and invited me into her boudoir. As soon as I sat down, I heard the door of the living room open. A light step made the parquet creak, and then the door of the building slammed violently.

  “Am I disturbing you?” I asked Prudence.

  “Not at all; Marguerite was here. When she heard your name announced, she ran away; it is she who has just left.”

  “She is afraid of me now?”

  “No, but she believes it would be disagreeable for you to see her.”

  “Why then,” I said, making an effort to breathe naturally, as emotion was choking me, “the poor girl has left me to get back her carriage, her furniture, and her diamonds. She has done the right thing, and I should not resent her for it. I ran into her today,” I continued casually.

  “Where?” said Prudence, looking at me and seeming to ask herself if this man was really the same one she had known who had been so in love.

  “On the Champs-Élysées; she was with another very pretty woman. Who is that woman?”

  “What does she look like?”

  “A blonde, slender, with long curls, blue eyes, very elegant.”

  “Ah! That’s Olympe, a very pretty girl, indeed.”

  “Who does she live with?”

  “With nobody, with everybody.”

  “And where does she live?”

  “Rue Tronchet, number . . . Ah! Wait, you would like to pursue her?”

  “You never know what might happen.”

  “And Marguerite?”

  “To tell you that I don’t think of her at all anymore would be a lie, but I am one of those men for whom the manner in which an affair ends carries great weight. Marguerite sent me away me in such a light manner that I felt like a fool for having been as in love as I was, for I was truly very much in love with that girl.”

  You may guess in what tone I attempted to say these things; sweat poured down my forehead.

  “Come now, she loved you very much, and she still loves you; the proof is that after she saw you today, she came immediately to tell me about this encounter. When she arrived, she was trembling; she was almost ill.”

  “Well, what did she tell you?”

  “She said to me, ‘No doubt he will come to see you,’ and begged me to ask your forgive
ness.”

  “I forgive her; you may tell her that. She is a good girl, but she’s a girl of a certain type, and what she did to me I should have expected. I am grateful to her for her decisiveness, because today I ask myself where my idea of building a life with her would have led. It was folly.”

  “She will be very happy to learn that you are reconciled to the necessity in which she found herself. It was time for her to leave you, my dear. The scoundrel of a businessman she had planned to sell her furniture to had contacted her creditors to ask how much she owed them; they had taken fright, and everything was going to be sold in two days.”

  “And now it’s all paid off?”

  “Just about.”

  “And who provided the funds?”

  “The Comte de N . . . . Ah! My dear! There are men made just for that purpose. In short, he gave her twenty thousand francs, but that was his limit. He knows Marguerite is not in love with him, but that does not keep him from being very kind to her. As you saw, he bought back her horses, he redeemed her jewels, and he gives her as much money as the duke gave her. If she would like a tranquil life, that man will stay with her for a long time.”

  “And what is she doing? Is she living entirely in Paris?”

  “She never wanted to return to Bougival after you left. I am the one who went there and got all her things, and even yours, which I’ve made into a bundle that you can pick up here. Everything is there, except for a small portfolio with your monogram on it. Marguerite wanted to keep it; she has it at her place. If you are attached to it, I will ask for it back from her.”

  “She may keep it,” I stammered, for I felt the tears rise from my heart to my eyes at the memory of the village where I had been so happy, and at the thought that Marguerite wanted to hold on to something of mine that reminded her of me.

  If she had entered at that moment, my resolutions of vengeance would have disappeared, and I would have fallen at her feet.

  “Besides,” Prudence resumed, “I’ve never seen her as she is now. She hardly sleeps anymore, she goes to the balls, she has supper, she even drinks too much. Very recently, after a supper, she had to stay in bed for a week; and when the doctor permitted her to get up, she started it up again, at risk of her life. Are you going to go see her?”