The more I reflected the more I said to myself that Marguerite had no
reason for feigning a love which she did not feel, and I said to myself
also that women have two ways of loving, one of which may arise from the
other: they love with the heart or with the senses. Often a woman takes
a lover in obedience to the mere will of the senses, and learns without
expecting it the mystery of immaterial love, and lives henceforth only
through her heart; often a girl who has sought in marriage only the
union of two pure affections receives the sudden revelation of physical
love, that energetic conclusion of the purest impressions of the soul.
In the midst of these thoughts I fell asleep; I was awakened by a letter
from Marguerite containing these words: "Here are my orders: To-night at the Vaudeville.
"Come during the third entr'acte."
I put the letter into a drawer, so that I might always have it at band
in case I doubted its reality, as I did from time to time.
She did not tell me to come to see her during the day, and I dared not
go; but I had so great a desire to see her before the evening that I
went to the Champs-Elysees, where I again saw her pass and repass, as I
had on the previous day.
At seven o'clock I was at the Vaudeville. Never had I gone to a theatre
so early. The boxes filled one after another. Only one remained empty,
the stage box. At the beginning of the third act I heard the door of
the box, on which my eyes had been almost constantly fixed, open, and
Marguerite appeared. She came to the front at once, looked around the
stalls, saw me, and thanked me with a look.
That night she was marvellously beautiful. Was I the cause of this
coquetry? Did she love me enough to believe that the more beautiful she
looked the happier I should be? I did not know, but if that had been
her intention she certainly succeeded, for when she appeared all heads
turned, and the actor who was then on the stage looked to see who had
produced such an effect on the audience by her mere presence there.
And I had the key of this woman's room, and in three or four hours she
would again be mine!
People blame those who let themselves be ruined by actresses and kept
women; what astonishes me is that twenty times greater follies are not
committed for them. One must have lived that life, as I have, to know
how much the little vanities which they afford their lovers every day
help to fasten deeper into the heart, since we have no other word for
it, the love which he has for them.