Circumstances were not favourable to me. This Vressac had been awkward enough to give offence to the Vicomte; so much so that the Vicomtesse can no longer receive him at home, and this visit to the good Comtesse had been arranged between them, in order to try and snatch a few nights. The Vicomte had at first even shown signs of ill-humour at meeting Vressac there; but, as his love of sport is even stronger than his jealousy, he stayed none the less: and the Comtesse, always the same as you know her, after lodging the wife in the great corridor, put the husband on one side and the lover on the other, and left them to arrange things amongst themselves. The evil destiny of both willed that I should be housed opposite them.
That very day, that is to say, yesterday, Vressac, who, as you will well believe, cajoles the Vicomte, went out shooting with him in spite of his distaste for sport, and quite counted on consoling himself at night in the wife’s arms for the ennui which the husband caused him all day: but I judged that he would have need of repose, and busied myself with the means of persuading his mistress to give him the time to take it.
I succeeded, and persuaded her to pick a quarrel with him concerning that very same shooting party to which, very obviously, he had only consented for her sake. She could not have chosen a more sorry pretext; but no woman is better endowed than the Vicomtesse with that talent, common to all women, of putting ill-humour in the place of reason, and of being never so difficult to appease as when she is in the wrong. Neither was the moment convenient for explanations; and, as I only wished her for one night, I consented to their reconciliation on the morrow.
Vressac was greeted sullenly on his return. He sought to demand the cause; he was abused. He tried to justify himself; the husband, who was present, served for a pretext to break off the conversation; finally, he attempted to take advantage of a moment when the husband was absent, to ask that she would be kind enough to listen to him that night: it was then that the Vicomtesse became sublime. She declaimed against the audacity of men who, because they have experienced a woman’s favours, suppose that they have the right to abuse her, even when she has cause of complaint against him; and, having thus skilfully changed the issue, she talked sentiment and delicacy so well that Vressac grew dumb and confused, and I myself was tempted to believe that she was right: for you must know that, as a friend of both of them, I made a third at this conversation.
In the end, she declared positively that she would not add the fatigues of love to those of the chase, and that she would reproach herself were she to disturb such sweet pleasures. The husband returned. The disconsolate Vressac, who was no longer at liberty to reply, addressed himself to me; and, having, at great length, expounded his reasons, which I knew as well as he, he begged me to speak to the Vicomtesse, and I promised him to do so. I spoke to her, in effect; but it was in order to thank her, and to arrange the hour and manner of our rendez-vous.
She told me that, situated as she was between her husband and her lover, she had thought it more prudent to go to Vressac than to receive him in her apartment; and that, since I was placed opposite her, she thought it was safer also to come to me; that she would repair to my room as soon as her waiting-maid had left her alone; that I had only to leave my door ajar and await her.
Everything was carried out as we had arranged; and she came to my room about one o’clock in the morning,
“Dans le simple appareil
D’une beauté qu’on vient d’arracher au sommeil.”[24]
As I am quite without vanity, I will not go into the details of the night; but you know me, and I was satisfied with myself.