• Choose a category
• All
• Classic-Fiction

By Root 1904 0

grief, showed that an important stage had been reached in the evolution of the beast destined to be transformed into a human being. Nevertheless, I still heard ringing in my ears his “grand pied de grue” and feared an imminent return to the savage state. I had only a very vague idea, however, of what had happened, and this was all the more natural in that M. de Charlus himself was totally unaware that for some days past, and especially that day, even before the shameful episode which had no direct connexion with the violinist’s condition, Morel had been suffering from a recurrence of his neurasthenia. He had, in the previous month, proceeded as rapidly as he had been able, which was a great deal less rapidly than he would have liked, towards the seduction of Jupien’s niece, with whom he was at liberty, now that they were engaged, to go out whenever he chose. But as soon as he had gone a little too far in his attempts at rape, and especially when he suggested to his betrothed that she might make friends with other girls whom she would then procure for him, he had met with a resistance that had enraged him. All at once (either because she had proved too chaste, or on the contrary had finally given herself) his desire had subsided. He had decided to break with her, but feeling that the Baron, depraved though he might be, was far more moral than himself, he was afraid lest, in the event of a rupture, M. de Charlus might throw him out. And so he had decided, a fortnight ago, that he would not see the girl again, would leave M. de Charlus and Jupien to clean up the mess (he employed a more scatological term) by themselves, and, before announcing the rupture, to “bugger off” to an unknown destination.

This outcome had left him a little sad, and it is therefore probable that although his conduct towards Jupien’s niece coincided exactly, down to the minutest details, with the plan of conduct which he had outlined to the Baron as they were dining together at Saint-Mars-le-Vétu, in reality it had been somewhat different, and that sentiments of a less heinous nature, which he had not foreseen in his theoretical conduct, had embellished and softened it in practice. The sole point in which the reality was worse than the theory was this, that in the original plan it had not appeared to him possible that he could remain in Paris after such an act of betrayal. Now, on the contrary, actually to “bugger off” for so small a matter seemed to him excessive. It meant leaving the Baron, who would probably be furious, and forfeiting his position. He would lose all the money that the Baron was now giving him. The thought that this was inevitable made him hysterical; he whimpered for hours on end, and to take his mind off the subject dosed himself cautiously with morphine. Then suddenly he hit upon an idea which no doubt had gradually been taking shape in his mind and gaining strength there for some time, and this was that a rupture with the girl would not inevitably mean a complete break with M. de Charlus. To lose all the Baron’s money was a serious thing. Morel in his uncertainty remained for some days a prey to black thoughts, such as came to him at the sight of Bloch. Then he decided that Jupien and his niece had been trying to set a trap for him, that they might consider themselves lucky to be rid of him so cheaply. He found in short that the girl had been in the wrong in having been so maladroit in failing to keep him attached to her through the senses. Not only did the sacrifice of his position with M. de Charlus seem to him absurd, but he even regretted the expensive dinners he had given the girl since they had become engaged, the exact cost of which he knew by heart, being a true son of the valet who used to bring his “book” every month for my uncle’s inspection. For the word book, in the singular, which means a printed volume to humanity in general, loses that meaning among royalty and servants. To the latter it means their account-book, to the former the register in which we inscribe our names. (At Balbec one day when the Princesse de