The women’s movement, Italy, Duco … Was it a dream? Was the great happiness, the precious harmony a dream and was she now awaking from a year’s dreaming? Was she divorced or not? She had to force herself to remember the formalities: yes, they were legally divorced. But was she divorced, was everything over between them? And was she really no longer his wife?
What had been the point of his searching for her once he had seen her in Nice? Oh, he had told her, during the cotillon. That endless cotillon! He had become proud of her when he saw how beautiful and chic and happy she seemed in the victoria of Mrs Uxeley or the princess — and he had grown jealous. She, that beautiful woman, had been his wife! He had felt he had a right to her, despite the law! What was the law? Did the law make her a wife, or had he made her a wife? And he had made her feel that right, together with the irredeemability of the past. It had been irredeemable, ineradicable …
She looked around her, at her wit’s end. And she began to cry, sob … Then she felt something in her strengthen, resistance cry out in her like a spring that finally tensed again now she was resting and was no longer under his gaze. She didn’t want this. She didn’t want it. She didn’t want to feel him in her blood. If she met him again, she would speak to him more calmly, curtly, and order him to leave her, she would show him the door, have him thrown out … Her fists clenched in fury. She hated him. She thought of Duco … And she thought of writing to him, telling him everything. And she thought of returning to him as soon as possible. He wasn’t a dream: he existed, though he lived far away, in Florence. She had saved some money; they could find happiness again in the studio in Rome. She would write to him and she wanted to leave as soon as possible. With Duco she would be safe. Oh, she longed for him, to lie so softly and luxuriantly in his arms, against his chest, as if in the embrace of a single wondrous happiness. Had it been true, their happiness, their love and harmony? Yes, it had existed, it wasn’t a dream. There was his portrait; there on the wall a couple of his watercolours: the sea at Sorrento and the skies above Amalfi, produced in those days that had been like poetry. She would be safe with him. With Duco she would not feel Rudolf, her husband, in her blood … She felt Duco in her soul, and her soul would be stronger! She would feel Duco in her soul, in her heart in the whole of her deepest being and from him would gather her supreme strength, like a bundle of gleaming swords! Even now, when she thought of him with such longing, she could feel herself growing stronger. She could have talked to Brox now. Yesterday he had taken her by surprise, wedged her between himself and the mirror, till she had seen him double and had no longer known what to do and was lost. That would never happen again. It had simply been the surprise. If she talked to him again, she would triumph with what she had learned and as a woman who had stood on her own feet. And she got up, and opened the windows and put on a peignoir. She looked at the blue sea, at the colourful movement on the Promenade. And she sat down and wrote to Duco. She wrote everything, the first startled encounters, her surprise and defeat at the ball … Her pen raced across the paper. She did not hear a knock at the door or Urania cautiously entering, expecting to find her still asleep and anxious to know how she felt. She read a portion of her letter excitedly and said she was ashamed of her weakness of yesterday. How could she have behaved like that: she did not understand herself.
No, she didn’t understand herself. Now she felt somewhat rested, was talking to Urania, who reminded her of Rome, with a long letter to Duco in her hand … now she did not understand at all herself and asked what was a dream: her Italian year of happiness or yesterday’s nightmare?
L
SHE STAYED AT HOME for a day, tired, and deep inside, almost unconsciously, nevertheless frightened of meeting him. But Mrs Uxeley, who would not hear of sickness or exhaustion, was so upset that the following day Cornélie accompanied her to the Promenade des Anglais. Acquaintances came up and talked to them and thronged about their chairs; and among them was Rudolf Brox. But Cornélie avoided all familiarity. A week later, though, he appeared at Mrs Uxeley’s at-home day, and in the round of the formalities — these were courtesy calls after the party — he was able to speak to her alone for a minute. He approached her with that smile of his, as if his eyes, as if his moustache, were smiling. And she collected her thoughts, so as to be strong with him.
“Rudolf,” she said in an aloof tone. “It’s simply ridiculous. If you don’t find it tactless, then at least try to find it ridiculous. It tickles your sense of humour, but just think what people would say about this in Holland … The other day at the party you took me by surprise and — I don’t know how — I found myself giving in to your strange desire to dance with me and lead the cotillon figures. I freely admit I was confused. Now I can see everything plainly and clearly and I’m telling you: I don’t want to see you again. I don’t want to talk to you. I don’t want to turn the high seriousness of our divorce into farce.”
“You know from before that that lofty tone gets you nowhere with me, these airs and graces and that grand manner, and on the contrary it prompts me to do exactly what you don’t want …”
“If that’s the case, I’ll simply tell Mrs Uxeley about my relationship with you and ask her to deny you access to her house …”
He laughed. She got angry.
“Do you intend to act like a gentleman? Or like a blackguard?”
He went red and his fists clenched.
“Damn!” he hissed into his moustache.
“Would you like to strike me and abuse me perhaps?” she went on contemptuously.
He controlled himself.
“We’re in a full drawing-room at the moment,” she continued, taunting him. “What if we were alone? Your fist is already clenching! You’d beat me as you did once before. Brute! Brute!!!”
“And you’re brave in that full drawing-room!” he laughed, with that laugh of his that drove her into a fury, if she was not held in check by it. “No, I wouldn’t beat you,” he went on. “I’d kiss you …”
“This is the last time you’ll ever talk to me!” she hissed in fury. “Go away! Go away! I don’t know what I’ll do, I’ll make a scene!”
He sat down calmly.
“Go ahead,” he said quietly.
She stood in front of him trembling, powerless. People talked to her, the servant brought round tea. She was in a circle of gentlemen, and controlling herself she joked with a shrill, nervous kind of jollity and flirted more provocatively than ever. There was a small court around her, with the Duke di Luca the most forward of all. Rudolf Brox sat close by drinking his tea, ostensibly calm, as if biding his time. But his powerful, domineering blood was seething wildly. He could have killed her and was apoplectic with jealousy. That woman was his, whatever the law said. He would no longer shrink from any scandal. She was beautiful, she was as he wanted her and he wanted her, his wife. He knew how he would win her back and once he had he did not want to lose her again: then she would be his, for as long as he chose. As soon as it was possible to speak to her alone, he turned to her again. She was about to go over to Urania, whom she saw sitting with Mrs Uxeley, when he spoke in her ear, severe, brusque, gruff, “Cornélie …”
She turned round involuntarily, but with her haughty look. She would have preferred to walk on past, but she could not: something prevented her, a mysterious power and superiority, which sounded in his voice and sank into her with a bronze weight that drained and paralysed her energy.