My Memoirs. Marguerite Steinheil

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СКАЧАТЬ met Gounod, who came several times to the Impasse Ronsin, and I sang with the old composer a duet of his of which he was very fond, entitled "D'un cœur qui t'aime." Once he played to me many pages of his "Rédemption," the sacred trilogy which he had dedicated to Queen Victoria. I did not know him very long, for he died in 1893 at Saint Cloud, where, two years later, another great man, Pasteur, was to die.

      I also met Ferdinand de Lesseps, le grand Français. He was eighty-seven then and very weak. I never knew a man whose kindness and modesty equalled that of this giant, who had given the world the Suez Canal.

      Eleven months after my marriage my daughter was born and I nearly lost my life. The birth of my child was a source of pure delight to me, and I forgot all my worries and bitter disappointments. My happiness, however, was short-lived. For a reason which I will not reveal, and at which I will not even hint, I determined to divorce. I consulted on the matter M. B., my husband's closest friend, a famous barrister and Attorney-General. He advised me to go to Beaucourt with my baby, and not to make an irrevocable decision. Twice a week during the many months I spent at Beaucourt with my mother, I received letters from the Attorney-General, and their burden was always the same: "Come back to Paris and to him. Forgive.... We will all do our best to make your life a happy one. Don't divorce, for your child's sake...." My mother, who was indulgence incarnate and had a holy terror of divorce, gave me similar advice, and one day I returned home, had a long and painful conversation with my husband, in which it was agreed that, for the love of little Marthe, we wouldn't divorce, and would henceforth be "friends," each living in his or her own way. M. Steinheil, later on, said to an intimate friend, who repeated the remark at my trial, "My wife is only a friend to me; she has full liberty, and I don't control her actions...." It was further agreed that when we would have to discuss some matter of importance we would do so in writing. Thanks to this method, no one ever guessed that, although living under one roof, my husband and I were separated. Indeed, this way of discussing by letter had many advantages, and even the most united couples should adopt it. It helps you to avoid bitter, hurtful words, prevents quarrelling, and servants cannot overhear.... Moreover, it often happens that while reading over a letter you have just written, you grow calm and realise the futility and uselessness of what you said. The letter is torn to pieces, and common sense comes, smiling, on the scene....

      Notwithstanding the separation, I continued to do all that I could for my husband. I looked after the house and assisted him in his work just as I had done before. But need I say that my dream of love and happiness was hopelessly shattered, and that had it not been for my little Marthe my life would have been almost unbearable.

      It has often been said that an unsuitable match or the failure of her conjugal happiness urges any intelligent or sensitive woman on towards adventures and new interests, and leads her to live on illusions. I do not believe that I ever deluded myself with chimeras, except, perhaps, in the days when my father built up around me a real and yet fairy world of ideal joys, but there is no doubt that after I had shaken off the dejection which weighed upon me like a heavy and unbearable cloak, I realised that in order to live at all I would have to occupy my mind, find an outlet for my energy, and seek new interests everywhere. I was quite incapable of dumb resignation. With me, to strive and accomplish has always been a necessity. I clearly saw that I should live only if I lived intensely, ardently, even feverishly, and had more to do every day than I possibly could do. I took a passionate interest in people, in things, in events; I studied music, art, even politics; and my life from that time belonged to my daughter and to society.

      Without clearly realising what was taking place in me and in my home, my friends instinctively showed me renewed sympathy, especially M. B., the Attorney-General. He called almost every day, read to me, filled my mind with new ideas, introduced all kinds of interesting people to me, and created around me an atmosphere which, although artificial, had a wonderful fascination, and made me almost forget all that I wanted so much to forget.

      My husband and I often spent evenings in his salon, where scores of magistrates and famous barristers gathered. It was there that I met an extremely beautiful and elegant woman, surrounded by an eager circle of admirers, and her husband, who paid me many commonplace compliments. I afterwards met them in many drawing-rooms. The man was M. Trouard Riolle, and was to be, years afterwards, the Public Prosecutor at my trial. He struck me as an extremely well-groomed and boring poseur, who seemed to think that every woman at once fell in love with him, and that directly he was introduced any glance or remark of his would fascinate her. I soon saw that he was an ambitious and scheming man. His wife, the daughter of the head of the Havas Agency, was as wealthy as she was beautiful.

      From one drawing-room I went to another, and very soon I knew what is usually called le Tout-Paris.

      Among the many able men I met who paid their addresses to me none was more sympathetic to me than M. B., and I was gradually conquered by this Attorney-General's eloquence, his refinement, which reminded me of M. Doriand's exquisite courtesy, his self-control, and his capable and masterly way of dealing with affairs, which contrasted so impressively with the attitude of too many of the men whom I saw around me, lounging lazily and carelessly through life. He was tall and fair, wore side whiskers, and had small, shrewd, and sensuous eyes; he was a witty causeur, on whose words every one hung fascinated. People were anxious to be admitted to his salon, and he was a great favourite, especially with women, for although he was inevitably blasé, he had still that natural and romantic charm which very soon wins a woman to its owner.

      I entertained a great deal, gave parties, concerts, dinners. I held a reception once a week, and between two and seven three to four hundred persons would pass through the salons of the villa in the Impasse Ronsin. There came statesmen and diplomatists, famous authors and famous composers, generals and admirals, scientists and officials, business magnates and great financiers, State-councillors, explorers, men with historic names, men who were making names for themselves, and judges, a whole body of judges....

      And there were the opera, charity bazaars, visits to the poor of my district, chamber music, private theatricals, hunting, the Salons, the grande semaine, first nights, concerts, receptions at various Embassies and at the Elysée.... And there came every year a stay at Biarritz or on the Riviera, a month or two at the seaside.... And there was my husband's work, and the work I did with him... and music ... and, above all, my daughter, my little Marthe....

CHAPTER IV

       MY SALON

       Table of Contents

      MY drawing-room was a room about 60 feet by 80, and 18 feet high. One entered it from the verandah by doors which, when folded back, made one room of the two. At the far end there was a monumental and ancient chimney-piece of carved wood; on either side of it were cabinets filled with cameos, rare china and silver. The furniture was chiefly Louis XV. and XVI. On the left stood an organ and various stringed instruments, and on the right a grand piano. On the walls hung huge seventeenth-century Gobelins illustrating the story of Judith, Ashuerus and Holofernes, and framed with the classic fruit-and-flower border. I need hardly say that palms and flowers were everywhere in evidence. The salon communicated with the dining-room by a wide opening, so that several hundred persons could easily be entertained.

      The Parisian life, brilliant and exhausting, strenuous and artificial, was above all intoxicating, and I needed such intoxication.... The wit, the culture, the taste, the flights of fancy of so many men and women around me, their enthusiasms, their sympathy, their conversations, their qualities, and even their defects, became necessary to me.

      Life could not be dull with these companions, whatever their ideas and their habits or their hobbies.

      There was, for instance, old M. H., a distinguished author and a man of the world, who had СКАЧАТЬ