The Confession of a Child of the Century — Volume 2

by Alfred de Musset

Then she would stand before the mirror arraying herself as if for a soiree, affecting a coquetry that she was far from feeling, trying to adopt my tone, laughing and skipping about the room. "Am I to your taste?" she would ask. "Which one of your mistresses do I resemble? Am I beautiful, enough to make you forget that any one can believe in love? Have I a sufficiently careless air to suit you?" Then, in the midst of that factitious joy, she would turn her back and I could see her shudder until the flowers she had placed in her hair trembled. I threw myself at her feet.

"Stop!" I cried, "you resemble only too closely that which you try to imitate, that which my mouth has been so vile as to conjure up before you. Lay aside those flowers and that dress. Let us wash away such mimicry with a sincere tear; do not remind me that I am but a prodigal son; I remember the past too well."

But even this repentance was cruel, as it proved to her that the phantoms in my heart were full of reality. In yielding to an impulse of horror I merely gave her to understand that her resignation and her desire to please me only served to call up an impure image.

And it was true; I reached her side transported with joy, swearing that I would regret my past life; on my knees I protested my respect for her; then a gesture, a word, a trick of turning as she approached me, recalled to my mind the fact that such and such a woman had made that gesture, had used that word, had that same trick of turning.

Poor devoted soul! What didst thou suffer in seeing me turn pale before thee, in seeing my arms fall as though lifeless at my side! When the kiss died on my lips, and the full glance of love, that pure ray of God's light, fled from my eyes like an arrow turned by the wind! Ah! Brigitte! what diamonds trickled from thine eyes! What treasures of charity didst thou exhaust with patient hand! How pitiful thy love!

For a long time good and bad days succeeded each other almost regularly; I showed myself alternately cruel and scornful, tender and devoted, insensible and haughty, repentant and submissive. The face of Desgenais, which had at first appeared to me as though to warn me whither I was drifting, was now constantly before me. On my days of doubt and coldness, I conversed, so to speak, with him; often when I had offended Brigitte by some cruel mockery I said to myself "If he were in my place he would do as I do!"

And then at other times, when putting on my hat to visit Brigitte, I would look in my glass and say: "What is there so terrible about it, anyway? I have, after all, a pretty mistress; she has given herself to a libertine, let her take me for what I am." I reached her side with a smile on my lips, I sank into a chair with an air of deliberate insolence; then I saw Brigitte approach, her large eyes filled with tenderness and anxiety; I seized her little hands in mine and lost myself in an infinite dream.

How name a thing that is nameless? Was I good or bad? Was I distrustful or a fool? It is useless to reflect on it; it happened thus.

One of our neighbors was a young woman whose name was Madame Daniel. She possessed some beauty, and still more coquetry; she was poor, but tried to pass for rich; she would come to see us after dinner and always played a heavy game against us, although her losses embarrassed her; she sang, but had no voice. In the solitude of that unknown village, where an unkind fate had buried her, she was consumed with an uncontrollable passion for pleasure. She talked of nothing but Paris, which she visited two or three times a year. She pretended to keep up with the fashions, and my dear Brigitte assisted her as best she could, while smiling with pity. Her husband was employed by the government; once a year he would take her to the house of the chief of his department, where, attired in her best, the little woman danced to her heart's content. She would return with shining eyes and tired body; she would come to us to tell of her prowess, and her success in assaulting the masculine heart. The rest of the time she read novels, never taking the trouble to look after her household affairs, which were not always in the best condition.

Whenever I saw her, I laughed at her, finding nothing so ridiculous as the high life she thought she was leading. I would interrupt her description of a ball to inquire about her husband and her father-in-law, both of whom she detested, the one because he was her husband, and the other because he was only a peasant; in short, we were always disputing on some subject.