One could and can do such things in London. They are impossible in Paris, where the consent of parents is obligatory, even in the case of those who are no longer minors, and where at least a month is always consumed in absurd preliminaries and red tape.
I firmly believe that, had it been necessary for Sarah to get married in France, she would never have done it! Such a decision, in her case, required to be made and carried out practically on the spot, while she was under the influence of one of her fantastic moods. Marriage to her, I am sure, was not the solemn, semi-religious event that it is in the lives of most women. For her it was merely another escapade—the crowning one, if you like.
Almost everything else on the list of follies she had committed. Why not marriage?
That, at any rate, is the opinion I have always held. But Berton had a graver conception of the matter.
In his view Sarah was so tremendously infatuated by Damala that she married him to make him wholly hers. He used to say:
“She lived in constant terror that Damala’s fancy would change, that some other woman would cross his path, and that he would leave her.
“She was completely under the fellow’s domination. If any good man, of high and noble principles, had offered Sarah his name, she would have refused him scornfully; she would have answered that she would tie her life to no man’s.
“But with Damala it was another matter. It was she who desired passionately to hold him—not the reverse. At least, such is my belief. Sarah too, when she remembered how easily she had fallen a victim to it herself, was often much perturbed at seeing how quickly women were captured by Damala’s fatal charm.
“She could think of no way to bind him to her except by marriage. So, despite her distaste for the orthodox union, she determined on the ceremony.
“She waited until we got to London, where such things can be done over-night, and then took advantage of one of Damala’s affectionate spells to persuade him to marry her. He agreed; a priest was sent for, and they were married—all in the space of a few hours.”