"My dear..." "You've grasped me by the only handle left to me, the supreme passion, that locks out all the others, the cardinal sin of gluttony." "Sadly, the only sin left, the last one." "Indeed!" "They're the delights of Capua!" "But Hannibal mustn't linger on those delights." "No, I'll go to Canossa for you." "I promise!" "Or more precisely to 46 rue des Carmes, at Senora Vellini's." "So that species has a name?" "Yes, she's Spanish, born in 1799 in Malaga, so that..." "So that... she's 36 years old." "A good age to make way for another." "Has your best friend the Marquise de Flers, lost her mind?" "What has this Marigny done to her?" "He's a womanizer and a gambler, and penniless..." "I know..." "And she lets him marry her wealthy granddaughter?" "The jewel of the French aristocracy!" "That's the limit!" "She, who was always so wise, has taken leave of her senses!" "She should marry him herself!" "Hold your tongue!" "It's the talk of the town, dear friend!" "Here we are: 46 rue des Carmes!" "I shall inform the Senora of the wedding of Miss de Polastron to her beloved Marigny and I hope to provoke quite a scandal." "If it managed to dash this marriage, you'd pleasure me more than you ever did." "Such ingratitude!" "Monsieur de Prony!" "In person." "How fares my pretty?" " Is the Senora at home to visitors?" " Yes, sir." "I'll keep the stick, I need it." "Monsieur de Prony, Madame." "Well, then..." "So how is the Goddess of Capriciousness?" "You're just as capricious, Viscount." "You used to visit me, you came often." "You seemed to hold me in your affection." "Then...!" "One fine day, you disappeared without warning." "I was taking the waters, my dear." "Taking the waters, for two whole years?" "You're not in earnest, Viscount!" "Anyway, it hasn't done much for your gout!" "None of us are getting any younger, my dear!" "You still see Monsieur de Marigny?" "Certainly." "Is it long since his last visit?" "He comes when he pleases, he is free..." "Do many people meet every day after ten years?" "Ten years of a less than perfect fidelity." "Neither of us has been faithful." "It's been an unusual relationship." "With more hate than love." "All the better!" "I'd be sorry to see you unhappy." "Are you aware of Monsieur de Marigny's forthcoming wedding?" "Don't worry, with each woman he has had, in your world or mine, people ran to tell me!" "Twice if not once!" "He'll come back to me, as always!" "This time it's more than a love affair, it's a marriage." "Well..." "If you insist, it's a love affair and a marriage, but it's not an ending." "An ending to the liaison between Marigny and myself, there is none, Monsieur de Prony!" "So you're unfaithful tonight, to your lovely fiancee, Monsieur de Marigny?" "You're not at Madame de Flers'?" "No, sir." "Nor are you at Madame d'Artelles'." "I dined there!" "What's the matter?" "Nothing..." "See how you lie." "Leave me, Ryno!" " Leave me..." " Not on your life!" "Why do you want to escape me?" "What did that viper of a Viscount say to put you in such a fluster?" "Nothing I didn't already know." "It's just that he took such delight in telling me." "You're hurting yourself." "You pay too much attention to people and their unkind words." "What do they know about you and I?" "What can they understand about us?" "Nothing..." "They understand nothing..." "He won't come now, it's past midnight." "He might yet arrive." "What if he did?" "If he found you here, he'd know you had waited for him." "Where would that get us!" "Never let men rule you." "The most sincere love isn't devoid of conceit." "Your grandmother is right." "It's his loss!" "Go to bed like a good girl, and tomorrow, act with coolness toward him." "Pretend to be uninterested in him." "Now she has retired, allow me to predict that she'll be incapable of the slightest stratagem!" "She already loves him too much!" "What's wrong with loving the man she'll marry in a week?" "We are not old for nothing, my dear." "You know as well as I do that one must never give a man the certainty of conquest." "That young girls, and even their mothers, are taken in, is a law of our species." "We would never become mothers, if we were clear-sighted." "But when even grandmothers are fooled by this pitiful comedy of seduction..." "It's because I'm much younger than my age." "I was charmed and mesmerized like the others, and so happy about it, dear Countess, that your bad auguries have no power to weaken my optimism." "What you're saying is most grave!" "He has turned your head more than hers." "Hasn't he!" "Here, have a cup." "To pick you up." "It's no laughing matter, I assure you." "Have you no remorse, on the eve of this wedding, of marrying your granddaughter to a mere gentleman without title, a penniless adventurer!" "She's rich enough for both of them!" "What's more, he's an unbridled libertine, who has no scruples in compromising his conquests." "You and I belong to the age of Laclos!" "An age when such matters were easily forgiven!" "The young people we knew, and loved, were far worse than those of today, and yet we didn't become old maids." "Our mothers had the courage to marry us to some dreadful rascals, and we had the brazen good luck to be quite happy!" "You can speak you bewitched the Marquis de Flers!" "Hermangarde is prettier than I was, she'll manage." "She doesn't have your talent for strategy!" "In love, the first to suffer has lost." "She's already trapped." "Hermangarde is what I cherish most." "Would I let her navigate alone on the ocean of perfidy that is men's hearts?" "No!" "This marriage will be my masterpiece." "Your masterpiece!" "You're even madder than they say." "Good-bye, my friend!" "And where might he be this evening?" "He has a mistress, dear Marquise." "He has had for 10 years." "Only you and I were unaware of it until now." "I hate you!" "You'll come back to me, Ryno!" "I say it without a trace of joy, without pride, without triumphant jealousy." "You'll trample on the girl you're marrying and come back to me." "I've never loved anyone as I love her." "Not even you, Vellini!" "The feelings you stirred in my heart at twenty, she has revived in a heart of thirty, which is old and worn." "You don't cheat on the one you love with someone you no longer love." "Is that what you believe?" "I warned you this evening meant good-bye." "So good-bye!" "May what you say be true..." "Oliva!" "See Monsieur de Marigny out!" "M. De Cerisy has waited 2 hours in the library." "Let him wait!" "Or let him leave!" "In any case, I'm free." "I owe nobody nothing." "When all Paris was up in arms about his liaisons with Madame de Mendoze and others, he was deceiving them with that creature." "A courtesan on the wane, and rather vulgar, I hear..." "I'll let you guess what men seek in her." "Vulgar or not, she must be very crafty to wrest Monsieur de Marigny from so many women!" "After too much sweetness, one may appreciate the scent of an alkali." "Still, 10 years!" "Persian marriages only last 7!" "10 years together without being compelled to it by law!" "That's unheard of in Paris!" "I know we're late." "If a box is rented by the year I can arrive late if I want!" "Time you retired, my child." "I must have a last word with M. De Marigny." "This secrecy means you're plotting?" "Perhaps!" "Come and kiss me, and leave us!" "Don't be jealous, in two days he'll be all yours." "And you, I permit you to kiss her..." "There." "What if that was your good-bye kiss?" "Yes, if it were the last kiss, and you never saw her again?" "And I canceled the wedding?" "What have I done?" "Nothing!" "I chose you, despite all the warnings." "But listen, M. De Marigny, those warnings have become so alarming..." "I was sure of it." "When I met Viscount de Prony as I left the house of a woman" "I know well, I guessed he'd been sent by Countess d'Artelles." "She tried hard to stop this marriage!" "Let's be frank you've been what is known as a libertine." "Even if your heart is loftier than your morals, you have had an intimate relationship with that Vellini, a sort of kept woman, and have lived with her for ten years." "That is so." "She was my mistress, but she no longer is." "What?" "She no longer is?" "When you're not here, you're at her house!" "When one is as smitten as I, and one is loved in return by someone as sublime as Miss de Polastron," "there's no room for other sentiments." "I do believe you sincerely love my granddaughter, but what if I was unable to believe that this ten year affair that you admit to, is indeed finished, when you're still seeing that woman?" "You would do me great offence." "If I gave my word to the Marquise de Flers," "Miss de Polastron's grandmother, she must believe me!" "I believe you." "When did she cease to be your mistress?" "A long time ago." "But let us be quite clear..." "I'll be completely frank with you." "You're too far above other women to reproach me my sincerity." "It's now a long time since Vellini was my mistress." "We separated amicably long before I met Hermangarde." "But if I were to deny that habit inexorably took me back to this woman, my former love... and that each time..." "I yielded for a few hours to the burning feelings of the past," "then I'd be lying." "I see the distinction, and accept it." "Still, for Hermangarde, and for polite society, whether you love her or not, that woman is your mistress!" "The wrong, the danger here is less in the feelings than in the situation." "You're right, but the situation is no longer." "The day Viscount de Prony saw me," "I said goodbye to Senora Vellini." "Why didn't you say so sooner, my boy?" "You would have eased my mind." "Now, I'm reassured." "But tell me, won't this woman create a commotion" "Sunday at your wedding?" "Countess d'Artelles and Monsieur de Prony are sure..." "They don't know Vellini." "She's too proud to degrade herself like that!" "Some may see her as a creature, but she's a woman of great nobility." "But I understand why you fear a moment of weakness." "I told you I plan to leave Paris right after my wedding." "I can promise you it will be for good." "I'm not insisting on that!" "You love Paris too much to bury yourself in the provinces." "I'm not a barbarous grandmother guarding the fidelity due her granddaughter." "It is Hermangarde I love, and yet..." "Although everything is over between Vellini and I, being near such a woman is good for no man!" "I, more than any other, must fear and avoid it!" "You must have really loved her, to still fear her so!" "Damn herb teas, let's have some port wine!" "It'll cheer us up." "You know I devised that trip to the Opera," "I who hate going out, just see her from closer!" "You'd have been disappointed." "Vellini doesn't justify for many the power she has over some." "So I've been told, yes!" "But how did you become one of her victims, Monsieur de Marigny?" "You're reputed to be a most formidable Don Juan!" "The truth is so far from that!" "For ten years, I was indeed under her spell." "But we were each other's victims." "Sometimes in turn." "Sometimes together." "It's a sad tale." "Tell it to me." "To what end?" "What better sign of friendship can you give me," "I, who'll become your grandmother on Sunday, than the trust of your past?" "So I know everything about the husband I chose for Hermangarde." "Since you command me..." "It began ten years ago." "I was returning from Baden, at the end of the summer." "There I had surrendered to my taste for women and gambling." "I was weary, as one is after the intense pursuit of pleasure..." "I was at the Opera with a married woman who bestowed her favors on me, but was becoming possessive." "I'll be right back." "Ryno!" "What a fine surprise!" "Sit down!" "Where were you headed?" "I was fleeing!" "If faithful husbands who envy us knew how unhappy we are... when their wives, who we idolized, yield to us." "The disillusion and boredom which result from their surrender!" "I'm just back from Spain with a horde of curiosities." "And one that I'd like you to admire." "It's not an object, it's a woman." "From Malaga... a capricious who can out stare the sun." "How amazing!" "There she is!" " Yet you won't understand..." " How so?" "She's a bit..."moorish"." "Just come to dinner tomorrow." "A costume party for them, my house guests." "You'll see what I see in her." "The illegitimate child of an Italian princess and a famed Spanish matador..." "She led a shady life in Seville before being rescued by a marriage to a wealthy English baronet!" "You're not English, and too young to fall for... that ugly mutt." "It'd be pure vice!" "Beware, your voice carries!" "Too late!" "She heard you." "Miss Marie-Cornelie Falcone!" "You're the first!" "Sir Reginald Annesley, meet our leading soprano." "In London we adore you!" "What are you singing now?" "I just did "Iphigenia"." "Monsieur Ryno de Marigny!" "Ryno, you look no different." "I hate disguises." "You made no effort, that's perfect." "Come!" "Lady Vellini Annesley..." "Ryno de Marigny." "What are you disguised as?" "I said, what are you disguised as?" "The Devil!" "I bought a little knick-knack..." "A little box." "Its lid reminds me strangely of one of the loveliest guests here." "Look, pass it around..." "You hardly looked at it!" "I so admired you in "Alice" by Robert Le Diable," "You're our finest voice." "Thank you." "What is it?" "I wore my stage costume, I figured it'd do." "Costume parties are a bore." "You came as a she-devil?" "No, as The Devil!" "I hate anything feminine!" "Except in young men, of course." "Of course!" "Like Titian's "Portrait of Lorenzo de Medici", or Lotto's "Portait of a Young Man"." "That's my glass!" "I want to read your thoughts." "Not a chance!" "My blunder has hurt you?" "Not your "blunder", your "conceit"!" "That's inexcusable." "Then I won't excuse myself!" "Well?" "My dear Count, if you wanted sole possession of this woman, you shouldn't have asked me to dinner!" "I'll fight you obstinately for her." "I accept the challenge!" "But I warn you:" "She loathes you." "We'll see." "If you weren't already wed, I'd ask you to marry me on the spot." "But... you're not English and too young, to indulge in such folly." "It would be pure vice." "Spanish women are as vain as French women." "No." "But they sense an insult, and can hate even better than they can love." "Forgive me." "It was a premature and silly opinion." "Just chatter." "I have nothing to forgive you." "Likes and dislikes are involuntary!" "Let me play him." "It is my wife who brings me luck..." "I couldn't avoid the Mareuil townhouse knowing that haughty and heartless creature would be there to mock the madness of my undertaking..." "Sir Reginald Annesley isn't in, sir." "I know she's in, I saw her." "I have orders to keep you out." "Count de Mareuil is a personal friend!" "Brawling in my house?" "Let go of Monsieur de Marigny." "I've come every day, left my card." "The Senora's hatred of you has grown since that dinner where you changed your mind." "She delights in arousing her husband's jealousy, by describing how openly you courted her, claiming her virtue has been offended." "The hussy!" "So the very polite Sir Reginald Annesley, an amiable baronet, feels he can act, not as a gentleman, but as an informed husband." " Let me see her." " Impossible." "I ruined myself for her." "I have but a sou to live on, and I'd gladly lose that to see her just once." "You who live beside her, can't you plead my cause?" "It'd be pointless!" "Forget her..." "Or pray to God!" "At St Gervais Church, at vespers." "Spanish ladies are devout." "I'll be eternally grateful to you." "Go!" "My pride couldn't offer itself any consolation." "Clearly, she disliked me as much as she'd said." "Every afternoon, I haunted the Bois de Boulogne, at the hour favored by fashionable strollers, on the off chance of meeting her." "Madame..." "Chance is kinder than you it arranged this appointment!" "Chance is a fool!" "What appointment?" "It's an encounter!" "That's your path!" "This is mine!" "Pass by!" "I'd be a fool to waste this chance to see you!" "Sir Reginald stopped off briefly, he'll be here in an instant." "How base to bring up your husband." "Say you trust in my repentance." "I have only this to say to you for the second time, pass by!" "You brand so well what is yours, that I crave a second mark." "Reginald!" "That name hurts more than your whip!" "I'll stifle it on your lips." "At four paces, and fire!" "Not now, sir." "Not in front of Madame." "Tomorrow at a time of your choosing." "At six in the morning, in this wood that saw the affront, and shall see the punishment." "Why not now?" "I'd have enjoyed seeing you killed today." "Look!" "She came in person, just to see me die!" "It's outrageous!" "I'll chide Sir Reginald about this." "A woman has no place here." "Do nothing of the sort." "The matador's daughter wants blood let her see it flow!" "My witnesses..." "Monsieur de Marigny asked me first." "And Count de Cerisy." "Here are mine." "I hope my husband kills you." "Run for a surgeon!" "My God, the master's wounded!" "Don't move!" "You're mad!" "What are you doing?" "I want to drink his blood!" "No one can stop me!" "Will he die?" "Will he die?" "After what you just did, his wound has a greater chance of becoming infected!" "The wound was so deep for 2 months" "I hung between life and death, racked by atrocious pains." "Yet I followed the doctor's orders, with the blind obedience of a man desperate to get well." "Marquise, I wanted to get well to see her again." "That same dream again..." "My God, I'm still dreaming..." "I surrender, Ryno." "I struggled hard, but I am beaten." "Though cured of my wounds, I remained in there where Vellini came very early and left just before dawn." "The odor of love..." "Hold me tight..." "I love..." "Ryno..." "I miss you already." "You don't have another, I hope." "I swear!" "Too easy." "Swear it, on my head!" "I swear it." "Locking me in?" "Double-locking you!" "Like your slave?" "My prisoner." "Later you'll be my slave." "Ten past seven!" "How punctual you are!" "You never miss roll-call, like clockwork..." "Why are you still up?" "I'm trying to tell you..." "Given the very limited nature of our life together," "I could, if I so wished, sleep elsewhere every night without you noticing..." "Listen to what I'm saying!" "Let go of me!" "Go sleep off your drunkenness, as usual." "Sorry!" "You're my wife!" "Not for much longer." "My leaving has nothing to do with you." "I'll always be grateful that you made me your legitimate wife." "But I love Ryno de Marigny." "One can't fight that." "Bye." "The next day, all of Paris, the young things seen in chic cafes and boxes at the Opera... knew Lady Annesley had left her husband." "The scandal was huge." "I, being upper crust by my birth and acquaintances, suddenly inspired all kinds of horrors in ladies who you know, but who didn't ban me from their salons." "Vellini, who wasn't part of that gossipy/ nd judgmental set, didn't suffer from what she was unaware of." "Though Paris, for a year, was the start of a liaison that lasted for ten." "There!" "No, you can't stop now!" "Tell me all about those ten years." "After that year, we left for Algeria." "We had a little daughter." "It's been five days..." "We can't stay this way." "We must bury her." "Let's burn her instead!" "This thing... that... here and in this place... was no longer love but an unending fury... a kind of barbarous rape..." "I disapproved of it heart and soul." "But nothing could sway her..." "She had to go through with it." "And I had to let her... even if it made me feel disgusted with myself." "Don't be ashamed, I understand." "Back in Paris... our relationship became a wretched repetition of that night." "Our daughter's death had placed a wall between us..." "I no longer existed in her eyes..." "Except... that she was so totally organized for pleasure... that she always needed it..." "At such times, I hated her." "I went as far as to wish her dead." "I began to submerge her with bitter words, poisoned by disgust." "I left the house more and more, vowing to end the relationship." "When I'd get home, she was still as I'd left her." "The only thing which kept us together was the bottomless abyss of our caresses," "and we threw ourselves into it, Marquise, worse than before." "And all my hate was engulfed in its flames." "But sooner or later, love withers in these terrible games, doesn't it?" "It falls, mutilated in the battle of two hearts." "It gets back up for a short time, only to fall even more mutilated..." "Then we no longer love each other?" "My poor child, we both know we no longer love each other." "It is written on your brow." "Boredom overwhelms you, you're not a weak creature who deludes herself." "Let us separate." "It's the only way to end this nobly." "Go on, I'm enthralled!" "I told her that we'd stay friends, and I proved it to her." "We spent even more time together, now that we'd separated." "I took her to the theater," "I went riding with her." "My elegant friends who dumped their mistresses when they were through with them, made fun of me and our supposed sentimental separation." "My dear man, they'd say, you'll never be rid of that woman you still love her!" "Marquise, I was sure of the opposite." "I'd returned to my bachelor life with such total joy to have any doubts about my control of myself." "Vellini agreed we no longer loved each other, and stuck her claws into Cerisy." "So it was your Malaguena who ruined that poor devil Cerisy?" "I'm not painting a rosy picture of her." "I'm speaking frankly to you." "Anyone else but you would protest loudly, and deny one could wreck one's life for that creature." "My child, we weren't as narrow-minded in the 18th century as in this one!" "And, believe me, I've remained ferociously 18th century!" "It's you, Ryno!" "You didn't expect me?" "My God, you're burning, You have a fever?" "I don't know, but I'm bored." "Maybe this Spanish sunshine makes you homesick." "Well..." "You may be right!" "You're still the same Vellini!" "The wild woman who no one can stand up to!" "Life is standing up to me!" "I don't know what's wrong, but I'm suffering!" "I was happier with you, Ryno." "Does Cerisy upset you, my poor girl?" "Him?" "You know about him?" "They told you?" "No he doesn't upset me, the poor man." "He wouldn't dare." "He is subservient, paralyzed, totally devoted to me!" "Only, it bores me." "I preferred life when you detested me." "And you, are you happy?" "What if I'm not?" "Don't lie to me!" "You met a woman in London and returned with her to Paris." "You came back together ten days ago." "The woman you mention is a noble Parisian." "When you meet a compatriot abroad, you link up easily, and without consequences." "And she was traveling with her husband!" "You're not in love with her?" "Weren't you two at the Opera last night?" "You were, Ryno!" "I saw you there." "But you were so immersed in your new mistress, you never saw me." "What if it's true?" "She's the first woman I've loved since our split." "Why do you adopt that tone?" "I know it's wrong." "Why do you insist on stopping to love me?" "Not loving is the worst misfortune!" "Why won't you answer?" "You made me suffer too much." "I can't go back to that." "But you like to come back here when it suits you, as much as it suits you, nose in the air, hands in your pockets, without any commitment!" "How very convenient..." "Whereas with... your Countess..." "Countess who?" "Countess de Mendoze." "Stop that!" "Or I'll never come here again!" "So what?" "You think I still love you?" "What do I care about you and your Countess de Mendoze?" "You don't believe me?" "Then put your hand on my heart and tell me of your joy with your new mistress." "If your heart beats faster, spurn me." "Tell me how she makes love." "She's a noble lady, incredibly cold and prudish." "Repelled by the base acts of love." "She finally gave in to me in a flood of tears, as if she despised herself, but her love was too strong..." "She doesn't open her legs, she clenches them." "Do you like that?" "I almost force her." "She closes her eyes, refuses to look at me." "And she weeps, it is very impressive." "How does she come?" "That's not the point." "I doubt she gets any pleasure." "Her surrender, her sacrifice is what's sublime!" "It flatters your tiny pride." "But that's not love..." "Most women refuse to know what it is to give oneself to a man." "What it is to hold a man in one's belly." "What do you find so extraordinary about her?" "You, above all!" "I don't understand..." "If at least you'd replaced me with someone a hundred times more gifted at pleasuring you..." "You'd be desperately jealous." "Perhaps, but at least not humiliated." "Does her title excite you?" "Be quiet!" "She's a great lady." "If you knew her, you'd keep quiet!" "She's way above you." "It's light." "I've exhausted you." "My young friend, one doesn't need sleep at my age." "I spent many a sleepless night in my youth." "Fireside chats are the ballroom follies of old age." "And now I know everything about the husband I chose for Hermangarde." "You gave me the self-assurance I lacked." "You trusted me when they all scorned Ryno de Marigny." "My own family never understood who I was, or what I could become." "Thank you." "You're my real mother." "I love you like a son..." "I never felt that for my mother." "I love Hermangarde more than anything." "I know!" "My granddaughter is my greatest treasure." "I'm glad I didn't oppose your happiness, or Hermangarde's!" "He had the nerve to tell her his whole story, he reveled in it!" "My dear, as I always said, it's the perverse influence of over-provocative novels on female common sense!" "Here's the text chosen by the bride and groom, from the gospel according to St Matthew" ""Some Pharisees came to Jesus and tested him, saying" ""May a man divorce his wife for any cause he pleases?" ""He answered" ""Have you not read, that the Creator" ""made them male and female and said," ""A man leaves his father and mother," ""to be united to his wife and become one flesh." ""They are no longer two, but one flesh." ""What God has united, let not man separate." ""They objected" ""Why did Moses say a man may divorce his wife with a letter?" ""He said to them" ""Your stubbornness is why Moses let you divorce your wives." ""But in the beginning it was not so." ""A man may only divorce his wife for unchastity." ""If he marries another, it is adultery." ""Some disciples said If it is so for a man and his wife," ""it is best not to marry." ""He said to them" ""Only those God appointed can accept this." ""Some men are born eunuchs from their mother's womb." ""Others were made so by men." ""Others became eunuchs for the Kingdom of Heaven." ""Let those accept it who can."" ""Imitate me, as I imitate Christ." ""But know that Christ is the head of all men," ""as a husband is the head of his wife, and God the head of Christ." ""Any man who prays with his head covered" ""brings shame upon his head." ""Any woman who prays with her head unveiled" ""brings shame on her head, as if it had been shaved." ""A woman who is unveiled, is as if shorn." ""If it is shameful for her to be shorn," ""she should wear a veil." ""A man must not cover his head," ""for he is the image and glory of God," ""but woman is the glory of man." ""Man did not come from woman, but woman from man." ""Man was not created for woman, but woman for man." ""A woman must have" ""a sign of authority on her head," ""out of regard for the angels."" "Epistle of St Paul to the Corinthians." "How the sea rises!" "The spring tide." "M. De Marigny will have forgotten." "If they are too tardy, how they will get back?" "You're still not concerned?" "I hope they don't catch cold." "Did you do as I did, Marquise?" "You wrote to someone?" "I see a letter in your hands." "To whom would I write, my dear?" "To Viscount de Prony, like you, to admonish him!" "This letter you see is neither from me, nor to me." "It's for M. De Marigny, and was just handed to me." " Is it from Paris?" " Yes, it is." "You know this handwriting?" "Marquise, what an awful scribble!" "I know no one who writes like that." "It's a woman's handwriting." "A washerwoman's!" "Washerwomen don't fold their letters like this, or possess seals like this one." "Look!" "My God!" "Could it be that his old mistress, who has been silent until now, has changed her mind?" "It would seem likely!" "She lay low for four months and now springs back to life!" "Quite astute of her." "She thinks by now the joy of a lovely young wife has worn off." "A big mistake!" "He's still deeply in love with his wife, she's wasting her time." "Coming from you, this confidence reassures me." "Yes, be reassured." "Let's both be reassured!" "What's a letter after all?" "There they are." "We were caught by the tide." "We came back by boat." "You're soaked!" "Get warm by the fire." "If you fall ill, where will we be then!" "I'm not cold." "I have to get used to the breeze, now I'm the wife of a man who loves the sea." "M. De Marigny, I was given a letter for you from Paris." "Thank you." "Why did you come here?" "Because it pleased me to." "Isn't the open air as much mine as anyone's?" "I came here because I was bored with not seeing you, because you didn't reply to my letters." "Why did you pursue me here?" "If I feel like living on these shores, spending my days on this cliff..." "Doesn't it all belong to me as much as to you?" "What are you afraid of?" "Deep down you're unsure of yourself." "I like this place, and I want to live here." "If I'm not wanted, go away!" "As for me, I'm taking possession of it today." "It could be said that I came here like a beggar, to plead for a glance from the sovereign, who... banished me..." "If I betrayed the love of my life, I'd hate myself." "So would you..." "If you refuse to put your arms for a minute around your Malaguena, you'd better kill me," "At least then I'd feel no more pain." "What are you waiting for?" "We're alone up here!" "See, there's no one!" "Take up your gun!" "You see..." "If anyone hears, you missed a seagull." "If I fall into the sea, you'll be sure to be faithful." "Shoot!" "You're mad!" "Not now!" "She's asleep." "Be good." "One kiss!" "One kiss first!" "A real one!" "Weren't you to take the dogs out?" "Did Ryno wake you, Grandmother?" "No, my child, your husband did not wake me." "I wasn't asleep." "Are you really leaving us?" "Winter is coming." "Dampness doesn't agree with rheumatism." "I love this place, I'm happy here." "But I love you more than any place." "If I ask him, Ryno will return to Paris." "Make sure you don't!" "You don't yet know, my sweet, how fragile is a woman's happiness." "Ryno idolizes you." "Here, what would he love, if not you?" "But in Paris, there are so many distractions, and for a woman who is loved, every distraction is a mortal enemy." "You're right, grandmother." "No woman owns the key to a man's heart for long." "But if you miss us, send word, and we'll return to Paris." "Have a good trip." "There's no handsomer couple in all Paris!" "Ryno!" "Not so fast!" "I didn't realize you weren't following." "I'm so silly." " Well, doctor?" " Madame de Marigny is pregnant." "As of now, I forbid you to get on a horse." "Do you realize, when I think of it, I break into a cold sweat..." "It's my son!" "Madame may catch cold." "It is unwise in your state." "It's lovely weather." "I need fresh air." "Keep covered, the weather changes fast here." "I'm a grown woman!" "Why, it's the lady of the manor, the Marquise's daughter!" "Old Griffon!" "Who's that woman sitting on a pile of ropes?" "You don't know her?" "Everyone around here knows her now." "Often, she comes fishing with us." "You're even handsomer than when I first saw you." "And now we're reunited." "Be quiet!" "Talk, if you want..." "Say what you want." "It's only too true that I came." "As God is my witness, you're the cause of more kisses," "of more tenderness for Hermangarde than I'd have given her if you hadn't existed!" "I kissed her like a drowning man clings to a floating log." "They say that in battle, when thoroughbred horses are lightly injured by a bayonet," "a mysterious attraction for pain urges them forward to" "impale themselves right to the heart." "It's the same with you, since the day I saw you again." "Is that my horse?" "It's just the wind." "Don't leave me." "It's the wind." "It's the wind." "It can't be her!" "You see, there's no one!" "Come back inside." "Rebuke me." "Tell me what you're thinking." "You're worrying for nothing." "Everything is fine." "The worst is this silence." "In fact, no." "I was thinking of Countess de Mendoze." "You knew she died?" "Is she happier where she is now?" "You mean I kill everyone close to me." "I didn't say that." "There's something terrible in my fate!" "I always knew it." "After a year and a half of uncertainty, I have just now received the proof of something I had calculated and foreseen, as one calculates an eclipse." "In fact, it is also an eclipse." "That paragon of husbands, Monsieur de Marigny..." "Monsieur de Marigny?" "...has done like the dog in the Bible." "He has returned... you know where?" "What you're saying is most unsavory!" "Saying isn't doing!" "Let's see..." "It's ten o'clock exactly." "Where do you think Monsieur de Marigny is now?" "That genius of conjugal love!" "My God!" "So my poor friend the Marquise de Flers did well to die." "He's at 46 rue des Carmes, at Senora Vellini's." "Are you sure of this?" "He was at the Opera last night with his wife." "He left around the same time I did..." "I saw him get into his carriage under the arches, it was after Act Two." "He left Madame de Marigny in her box, with Madame de Spaur and Madame de Vanvres." "What proves he went to Rue de Carmes?" "I saw him enter her house myself!" "His carriage parked in front of the door testified to the fact to anyone who passed by." "Monsieur de Marigny does not like secrecy." "What I like about him is that, if one day he's a government minister, he'll revel in being unpopular." "I know of no man who defies opinion better than he!" "Just like a man!" "And yet..." "You needn't believe me, Monsieur de Prony, but I swear he was madly in love with Hermangarde." "I witnessed that love, and I'll never forget it." "That's just as well, Countess." "That way, at least someone will remember." "For he probably no longer does."