"Yes, ... I gasped out, ... I know, but I thought I saw her ... did she not come in ... that door?"
"Yes, sir, she entered by that door and went out by the opposite one, that one over there," said she, pointing to a door opening on New Vivienne street.
I suppressed an oath, and rushed out of the door opening on this new street, as if I expected to find Mlle. de Chateaudun patiently waiting for me to join her on the pavement. My head was in such a whirl that I had not the remotest idea of where I was going, and I wandered recklessly through little streets that I had never heard of before—it made no difference to me whether I ran into Scylla or Charybdis—I cared not what became of me.
Like the fool that repeats over and over again the same words without understanding their meaning, I kept saying: "The fiend of a woman! the fiend of a woman!" At this moment all my love seemed turned to hate! but when this hate had calmed down to chill despair, I began to reflect with agonizing fear that perhaps Irene had seen me at the Odeon with those dreadful women. I felt that I was ruined in her eyes for ever! She would never listen to my attempt at vindication or apologies—women are so unforgiving when a man strays for a moment from the path of propriety, and they regard little weaknesses in the light of premeditated crimes, too heinous for pardon—Irene would cry out with the poet:
"Tu te fais criminel pour te justifier!"
You are fortunate, my dear Edgar, in having found the woman you have always dreamed of and hoped for; you will have all the charms of love without its troubles; it is folly to believe that love is strengthened by its own torments and stimulated by sorrows. A storm is only admired by those on shore; the suffering sailors curse the raging sea and pray for a calm.
Your letter, my dear Edgar, is filled with that calm happiness that is the foundation of all true love; in return, I can only send you an account of my despair. Friendship is often a union of these two contrasts.
Enjoy your happy lot, my friend; your reputation is made. You have a good name, an enviable and an individual philosophy, borrowed neither from the Greeks nor the Germans. Your future is beautiful; cherish the sweetest dreams; the woman you love will realize them all.
Night is a bad counsellor, so I dare not make any resolutions, or come to any decision at this dark hour. I shall wait for the sun to enlighten my mind.
In my despair I have the mournful consolation of knowing that Irene is in Paris. This great city has no undiscovered secrets; everything and every person hid in its many houses is obliged sooner or later to appear in the streets. I form the most extravagant projects; I will buy, if necessary, the indiscretion of all the discreet lips that guard the doors; I shall recruit an army of salaried spies. On the coast of the Coromandel there is a tribe of Indians whose profession is to dive into the Gulf of Bengal, that immense bathing-tub of the sun, and search for a beautiful pearl that lies buried among the coral beds at the bottom of the ocean. It is a pearl of great price, as valuable as the finest diamond.... Irene is my pearl of great price, and I will search for and find her in this great ocean of men and houses called Paris.... After thinking and wondering till I am dizzy and sick at heart, I have come to the conclusion that Irene is acting in this manner to test my love—this thought consoles me a little, and I try to drown my sorrow in the thought of our mutual happiness, when I shall have triumphantly passed through the ordeal.