madame ceres.
“only extreme things are tolerable.”
count robert de montesquiou.
i.
madame clarence’s drawing-room.
madame clarence the widow of an exalted functionary of the republic, loved to entertain. every thursday she collected together some friends of modest condition who took pleasure in conversation. the ladies who went to see her, very different in age and rank, were all without money and had all suffered much. there was a duchess who looked like a fortune-teller and a fortune-teller who looked like a duchess. madame clarence was pretty enough to maintain some old liaisons but not to form new ones, and she generally inspired a quiet esteem. she had a very pretty daughter, who, since she had no dower, caused some alarm among the male guests; for the penguins were as much afraid of portionless girls as they were of the devil himself. eveline clarence, noticing their reserve and perceiving its cause, used to hand them their tea with an air of disdain. moreover, she seldom appeared at the parties and talked only to the ladies or the very young people. her discreet and retiring presence put no restraint upon the conversation, since those who took part in it thought either that as she was a young girl she would not understand it, or that, being twenty-five years old, she might listen to everything.
one thursday therefore, in madame clarence’s drawing-room, the conversation turned upon love. the ladies spoke of it with pride, delicacy? and mystery, the men with discretion and fatuity; everyone took an interest in the conversation, for each one was interested in what he or she said. a great deal of wit flowed; brilliant apostrophes were launched forth and keen repartees were returned. but when professor haddock began to speak he overwhelmed everybody.
“it is the same with our ideas on love as with our ideas on everything else,” said he, “they rest upon anterior habits whose very memory has been effaced. in morals, the limitations that have lost their grounds for existing, the most useless obligations, the cruelest and most injurious restraints, are because of their profound antiquity and the mystery of their origin, the least disputed and the least disputable as well as the most respected, and they are those that cannot be violated without incurring the most severe blame. all morality relative to the relations of the sexes is founded on this principle: that a woman once obtained belongs to the man, that she is his property like his horse or his weapons. and this having ceased to be true, absurdities result from it, such as the marriage or contract of sale of a woman to a man, with clauses restricting the right of ownership introduced as a consequence of the gradual diminution of the claims of the possessor.
“the obligation imposed on a girl that she should bring her virginity to her husband comes from the times when girls were married immediately they were of a marriageable age. it is ridiculous that a girl who marries at twenty-five or thirty should be subject to that obligation. you will, perhaps, say that it is a present with which her husband, if she gets one at last, will be gratified; but every moment we see men wooing married women and showing themselves perfectly satisfied to take them as they find them.
“still, even in our own day, the duty of girls is determined in religious morality by the old belief that god, the most powerful of warriors, is polygamous, that he has reserved all maidens for himself, and that men can only take those whom he has left. this belief, although traces of it exist in several metaphors of mysticism, is abandoned today by most civilised peoples. however, it still dominates the education of girls not only among our believers, but even among our free-thinkers, who, as a rule, think freely for the reason that they do not think at all.
“discretion means ability to separate and discern. we say that a girl is discreet when she knows nothing at all. we cultivate her ignorance. in spite of all our care the most discreet know something, for we cannot conceal from them their own nature and their own sensations. but they know badly, they know in a wrong way. that is all we obtain by our careful education . . . ”
“sir,” suddenly said joseph boutourle, the high treasurer of alca, “believe me, there are innocent girls, perfectly innocent girls, and it is a great pity. i have known three. they married, and the result was tragical.”
“i have noticed,” professor haddock went on, “that europeans in general and penguins in particular occupy themselves, after sport and motoring, with nothing so much as with love. it is giving a great deal of importance to a matter that has very little weight.”
“then, professor,” exclaimed madame cremeur in a choking voice, “when a woman has completely surrendered herself to you, you think it is a matter of no importance?”
“no, madam; it can have its importance,” answered professor haddock, “but it is necessary to examine if when she surrenders herself to us she offers us a delicious fruit-garden or a plot of thistles and dandelions. and then, do we not misuse words? in love, a woman lends herself rather than gives herself. look at the pretty madame pensee . . . ”
“she is my mother,” said a tall, fair young man.
“sir, i have the greatest respect for her,” replied professor haddock; “do not be afraid that i intend to say anything in the least offensive about her. but allow me to tell you that, as a rule, the opinions of sons about their mothers are not to be relied on. they do not bear enough in mind that a mother is a mother only because she loved, and that she can still love. that, however, is the case, and it would be deplorable were it otherwise. i have noticed, on the contrary, that daughters do not deceive themselves about their mothers’ faculty for loving or about the use they make of it; they are rivals; they have their eyes upon them.”
the insupportable professor spoke a great deal longer, adding indecorum to awkwardness, and impertinence to incivility, accumulating incongruities, despising what is respectable, respecting what is despicable; but no one listened to him further.
during this time in a room that was simple without grace, a room sad for the want of love, a room which, like all young girls’ rooms, had something of the cold atmosphere of a place of waiting about it, eveline clarence turned over the pages of club annuals and prospectuses of charities in order to obtain from them some acquaintance with society. being convinced that her mother, shut up in her own intellectual but poor world, could neither bring her out nor push her into prominence, she decided that she herself would seek the best means of winning a husband. at once calm and obstinate, without dreams or illusions, and regarding marriage as but a ticket of admission or a passport, she kept before her mind a clear notion of the hazards, difficulties, and chances of her enterprise. she had the art of pleasing and a coldness of temperament that enabled her to turn it to its fullest advantage. her weakness lay in the fact that she was dazzled by anything that had an aristocratic air.
when she was alone with her mother she said: “mamma, we will go tomorrow to father douillard’s retreat.”
