A Tragic Idyl

by Paul Bourget

Olivier would begin to walk about from his room to that of his wife when Pierre had left him, talking to her, trying to utter affectionate words, fighting against the haunting idea which he knew would completely possess him shortly. Immediately he entered his room, what he called "his temptation" grasped him, bound him, and dominated him. All his Roman souvenirs recurred to his imagination. He saw Ely again. Hot the proud, coquettish Ely of former times, not the woman he had brutalized while desiring her, hated while loving her, through despair of never possessing her completely, but the Ely of the present moment, the woman whom he had seen so tender, so passionate, so sincere, with a soul that resembled her beauty. And all his soul went out toward this woman in an impulse of love and longing. He spoke to her aloud, appealing to her like a madman. The tone of his own voice would awake him from his dream. He felt all the horror and madness of this childishness. He realized the crime of his cowardly yearning. He thought of his friend, saying to himself, "If he only knew!" He would like to have begged his pardon for the impossibility of ceasing to love Ely, and also pardon for having made the vow he had not the power to keep. He knew that at the same moment Pierre was suffering as he was himself. The idea was dreadful. At these moments of his martyrdom one thought recurred again and again to Olivier's mind, one idea possessed his heart. He felt that he ought to go to Pierre and say: "You love her, and she loves you. Remain with her, and forget me."

Alas! when such a project, with all its supreme magnanimity, occurred to him, he felt strongly that Pierre would reply, No! and that he himself was not sincere. He understood it with a mingling of terror and shame. In spite of all it was a joy for him—a savage, hideous joy, but still a joy—to think that if Ely was no longer his mistress she would nevermore be the mistress of his friend.

They were cruel moments. The time was not less miserable for Pierre. He also, the moment he was alone, tried not to think of Ely. And in trying he felt that he was yielding. In order to drive her image away he would call up in his mind the image of his friend, and this formed the very nature of his suffering. He would tell himself that Olivier had been this woman's lover, and this fact, which he knew to be the truth, which he knew to be of the most complete, the most, indisputable verity, took possession of his brain. He felt as though a hand had taken him by the head, a hand that would never let him go again.

While Olivier was thinking about his mistress in Rome, a softened, ennobled mistress, transformed by the love that Pierre inspired in her, Pierre perceived, beyond the sweet and gentle Ely of the past winter, the woman whom Olivier had described to him without naming her. He saw her again, coquettish and perverse, with the same beautiful face in which he had believed so sincerely. He told himself that she had had two other lovers, one when she was Olivier's mistress and one before then. Olivier, Pierre, and those two men made four, and probably there were others of whom he did not know. The idea that this woman, whom he had believed he possessed in all the purity of her soul, had simply passed from one adultery to another, the idea that she had come to him sullied by so many intrigues, maddened him with pain. All the episodes of his delightful romance, of his fresh and lovely idyl, faded away and became vile in his eyes. He saw nothing in it now save the lustful desire of a woman, wounded in her pride, who had attracted him by one artful plan after another.

Then he would open the drawer in which he preserved the relics of what had been his happiness. He would take out the cigarette case he had bought at Monte Carlo with such happiness. The sight of this foreign trinket wounded his soul, for it brought back to him the words uttered by his friend in the woods of Vallauris, "She had lovers before me; at any rate she had one, a Russian, who was killed at Plevna."

It was probably this lover who had given Ely the object around which he, Pierre, had woven so many cherished ideas, which he had worshipped almost with a scrupulous piety. This ironical contrast was so humiliating that the young man quivered with indignation.

Then he would see in another corner of the drawer the packet of letters from his mistress. He had not had strength to destroy them. Other words spoken by Olivier recurred to his memory—words in which he had affirmed, had vowed that she had loved him, Pierre, truly and sincerely. Did not every detail of their romantic intimacy prove that Olivier was right? Was it possible that she had lied upon the yacht, at Genoa, and in so many other unforgetable hours? A passionate desire to see her again took possession of Pierre. It appeared to him that if he could only see her, question her, understand her, his sufferings would be soothed. He imagined the questions that he would ask and her replies. He could hear her voice. All his energy melted away before the fatal weakness of his desire, a degraded desire whose sensuality was sharpened by scorn. And at such moments the young man hated himself. He remembered his vow. He remembered all he owed to his self-respect, all he owed to his friend. What he had said at the moment of the sacrifice was true—he felt that it was true. If ever he again saw Ely, nevermore could he meet Olivier. He had a confused impression already that he hated them both. He had suffered so much from him on her account; so much from her on his account. Honor finally always won the day, and he would hold himself erect, strengthen himself in the renunciation he had resolved upon. "It is only a trial," he said to himself, "and it will not last forever. Once I am far from here I shall forget it."

This singular existence had lasted five days, when two incidents happened, one after the other, one caused by the other—two incidents that were to have a decisive influence upon the tragic dénouement of the tragic situation.

The first was a visit from the jovial and artful Corancez. Pierre had, in fact, expected him before. In order to put a bar to any tentative at reconciliation, the young man had given strict orders that he was at home to no one. But Corancez was one of those people who have the gift of triumphing over the most difficult obstacles. And on the morning of the sixth day, a morning as bright and radiant as the one upon which they had visited the Jenny together, Hautefeuille saw him again enter his room, the everlasting bunch of pinks in his buttonhole, a smile on his lips, a healthy color in his face, and his eyes bright with happiness. A patch of dry collodion upon his temple bore witness to the fact that he had received a severe blow either the night before or very recently. The purple swelling was still visible. But this sign of an accident did not diminish his good humor nor the gayety of his physiognomy.

"Oh, this little cut," he said to Hautefeuille, after having lightly excused himself for insisting upon seeing him, "you want to know what caused it? Well, it's another proof of my luck. And, in spite of the homily of Monseigneur Lagumina, the Frenchman has cheated the Italian. It was caused by a little attempt that my brother-in-law made to bring about my death. That is all," he added, with his usual jesting laugh.