He kicked open the writing desk, and with his iron fists broke the shelves and pigeon holes, laying bare a secret drawer and stacks of love letters it shielded. These he confiscated. Then locked himself into his room to enjoy his disgrace. This monster is a Masochist and Sadist combined. He loves both to inflict suffering upon himself and upon others.
What monsters royalties be!
In the meanwhile Marie experienced all the tortures of purgatory; she thought of flight, of suicide. Before she could indulge in either her husband was back: Othello in the last act.
Marie was frightened stiff, her brain a whirl, her limbs inert. Rape most foul this crowned satyr committed. "He fell upon me as a pack of hounds overwhelm a hunted, wounded she-stag," she said.
Afterwards he commanded her to describe minutely every detail of her relations with the other. He was primed with the letter-accounts; he made her dot her amorous I's and cross her bawdry T's. And every attempt at omission he punished with kicks and cuffs; no drayman or brick-layer could give a more expert exhibition of woman-beating! And he violated her again.
This was the beginning of a series of outrages of the same gross character. Marie suffered for years and years that His Royal Highness may gratify his unclean fancies: he the pander; she the Cyprian.
"If I ceased having lovers, I think he would kill me," says Marie.
Alas, such is the stuff "God's Anointed" are made of! In the face of such, we pronounce a hypocritical j'accuse upon the Louis's and Pompadours, upon Marie Antoinette even.
The Duchess, who knows, gave Ferdinand an apartment near my own. We are living here like man and wife. He sometimes calls me "Frau Professor."