Comedy of Marriage and Other Tales. Guy de Maupassant

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SCENE I.

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      Mme. de Sallus in her drawing-room, seated in a corner by the fireplace. Enter Jacques de RANDOL noiselessly; glances to see that no one is looking, and kisses Mme. de Sallus quickly upon her hair. She starts; utters a faint cry, and turns upon him.

      MME. DE SALLUS

      Oh! How imprudent you are!

      JACQUES DE RANDOL

      Don't be afraid; no one saw me.

      MME. DE SALLUS

      But the servants!

      JACQUES DE RANDOL

      Oh, they are in the outer hall.

      MME. DE SALLUS

      How is that? No one announced you

      JACQUES DE RANDOL

      No, they simply opened the door for me.

      MME. DE SALLUS

      But what will they think?

      JACQUES DE RANDOL

      Well, they will doubtless think that I don't count.

      MME. DE SALLUS

      But I will not permit it. I must have you announced in future. It does not look well.

      JACQUES DE RANDOL [laughs]

      Perhaps they will even go so far as to announce your husband—

      MME. DE SALLUS

      Jacques, this jesting is out of place.

      JACQUES DE RANDOL

      Forgive me. [Sits.] Are you waiting for anybody?

      MME. DE SALLUS

      Yes—probably. You know that I always receive when I am at home.

      JACQUES DE RANDOL

      I know that I always have the pleasure of seeing you for about five minutes—just enough time to ask you how you feel, and then some one else comes in—some one in love with you, of course—who impatiently awaits my departure.

      MME. DE SALLUS [smiles]

      Well, what can I do? I am not your wife, so how can it be otherwise?

      JACQUES DE RANDOL

      Ah! If you only were my wife!

      MME. DE SALLUS

      If I were your wife?

      JACQUES DE RANDOL

      I would snatch you away for five or six months, far from this horrible town, and keep you all to myself.

      MME. DE SALLUS

      You would soon have enough of me.

      JACQUES DE RANDOL

      No, no!

      MME. DE SALLUS

      Yes, yes!

      JACQUES DE RANDOL

      Do you know that it is absolute torture to love a woman like you?

      MME. DE SALLUS [bridles]

      And why?

      JACQUES DE RANDOL

      Because I covet you as the starving covet the food they see behind the glassy barriers of a restaurant.

      MME. DE SALLUS

      Oh, Jacques!

      JACQUES DE RANDOL

      I tell you it is true! A woman of the world belongs to the world; that is to say, to everyone except the man to whom she gives herself. He can see her with open doors for a quarter of an hour every three days—not oftener, because of servants. In exceptional cases, with a thousand precautions, with a thousand fears, with a thousand subterfuges, she СКАЧАТЬ