"Nobody can be absolutely free in a community where every individual is inextricably mixed up with the fate of others. Supposing I had invited some women friends to supper, what would you have said?"
She insisted that she was free to do as she liked; that she was at liberty, if she felt so inclined, to ruin my reputation; that her freedom was, in fact, absolute. She was a savage; freedom, as she interpreted it, was the rule of an autocrat who trampled the honour and happiness of her fellow creatures into the dust.
This scene, which began with a quarrel, led to floods of tears and ended with hysterics, was followed by another which made me feel even more uneasy, more especially as I was not sufficiently initiated into the secrets of sexual life to deal with its anomalies, which terrified me, like all anomalies which are difficult of explanation.
One evening, when the maid was busy making up Marie's bed for the night, I heard a half-suppressed scream and smothered laughter, as if some one were being tickled. I felt a sudden fear; an inexplicable terror and a wave of passionate anger swept over me; I opened the door quickly and caught Marie, with her hands on the girl's shoulders, in the act of pressing her lips upon her white throat.
"What are you doing," I exclaimed furiously, "are you mad?"
"I am only teasing her," answered Marie cynically. "What has that to do with you?"
"It has everything to do with me! Come here!"
And under four eyes I explained to her the nature of her offence.
But she accused me of a vicious imagination, told me that I was perverted and saw vice everywhere.
It is a fatal thing to catch a woman red-handed. She deluged me with abuse.