“Well what is it?” she asked, frightened.
“Don’t be frightened,” he said, laughing under his moustache. “Don’t be frightened. I only wanted to tell you ... that you are my wife. Do you understand that? Don’t try to deny it. I felt it at the ball the other night, when I had my arm round you, waltzing with you. Don’t try to deny that you pressed yourself against me for a moment. You’re my wife. I felt it then and I feel it now. And you feel it too, though you would like to deny it. But that won’t help you. What has been can’t be altered; and what has been ... always remains part of you. There, you can’t say that I am not speaking prettily and delicately. Not an oath, not an improper word has escaped my lips. For I don’t want to make you angry. I only want to make you confess that what I say is true and that you are still my wife. That law doesn’t signify. It’s another law that rules us. It’s a law that rules you especially; a law which, without our ever suspecting it, brings us together again, even though it does so by a very strange, roundabout path, along which you, especially, have strayed. That law rules you especially. I am convinced that you still love me, or at least that you are still in love with me. I feel it, I know it as a fact: don’t try to deny it. It’s no use, Cornélie. And I’ll tell you something besides: I am in love with you too and more so than ever. I feel it when you’re flirting with those fellows. I could wring your neck then, I could break every bone in their bodies.... Don’t be afraid: I’m not going to; I’m not in a temper. I just wanted to talk to you calmly and make you see the truth. Do you see it before you? It is in-con-tro-ver-tible. You see, you have nothing to say in reply. Facts are facts.... Will you show me the door now? Do you still propose to speak to Mrs. Uxeley? I shouldn’t, if I were you. Your friend, the princess, knows who I am: leave it at that. Had the old woman never heard my name, or has she forgotten it? Forgotten it, I expect. Well, then, don’t trouble to refresh her ancient memory. Leave things as they are. It’s better to say nothing. No, the position is not ridiculous and it’s not humorous either. It has become very serious: the truth is always serious. It is strange, I admit: I should never have expected it. It’s a revelation to me as well.... And now I’ve said what I had to say. Less than five minutes by my watch. They will hardly have noticed your absence in the drawing-room. And now I’m going; but first give your husband a kiss, for I am your husband ... and always shall be.”
She stood trembling before him. It was his voice, which fell like molten bronze into her soul, into her body, and lamed and paralysed her. It was his voice of persuasion, of persuasive charm, the voice which she knew of old, the voice that compelled her to do everything that he wanted. Under the influence of that voice she became a thing, a chattel, something that belonged to him, once he had branded her for ever as his mate. She was powerless to cast him out of herself, to shake him from herself, to erase from herself the stamp of his possession and the brand which marked her as his property. She was his; and anything that otherwise was herself had left her. There was no longer in her brain either memory or thought....
She saw him come up to her and put his arm around her. He took her to his breast slowly but so firmly that he seemed to be taking possession of her entirely. She felt herself melting away in his arms as in a scorching flame. On her lips she felt his mouth, his moustache, pressing, pressing, pressing, until she closed her eyes, half-fainting. He said something more in her ear, with that voice under which she seemed not to count, as though she were nothing, as though she existed only through him. When he released her, she staggered on her feet.
“Come, pull yourself together,” she heard him say, calmly, authoritatively, omnipotently. “And accept the position. Things are as they are. There’s no altering them. Thank you for letting me speak to you. Everything is all right between us now: I’m sure of it. And now au revoir. Au revoir....”
He kissed her again:
“Give me a kiss too,” he said, with that voice of his.
She flung her arm round his body and kissed him on the lips.
“Au revoir,” he said, once more.
She saw him laugh under his moustache; his eyes laughed at her with flames of gold; and he went away. She heard his feet going down the stairs and ringing on the marble of the hall, with the strength of his firm tread.... She remained standing as though bereft of life. In the drawing-room, next to the room in which she was, the hum of laughing voices sounded loudly. She saw Rome before her, saw Duco, in a short flash of lightning.... It was gone.... And, collapsing into a chair, she uttered a suppressed cry of despair, put her hands before her face and sobbed, restraining her despair before all those people, dully, as from a stifling throat.