The Princesse De Cleves Read online

  Throughout this speech, M. de Clèves had remained with his head in his hands and beside himself, without thinking to help his wife up. When she stopped speaking, and he looked at her, seeing her at his feet, her face bathed in tears and of such incomparable beauty, he thought he would die of grief, and kissed her as he raised her to her feet:

  ‘Have pity on me yourself, madame,’ he said, ‘since I deserve it; and forgive me if, in the first throes of so profound an anguish as I feel, I have not responded as I should to a conduct such as yours. You seem to me more worthy of esteem and admiration than any wife that lived; yet I think myself the most unfortunate of men. I have been passionately in love with you since the first moment I saw you; neither your severity, nor my possession of you could extinguish my love: it still endures. Yet I have never been able to inspire love in you, and I see that you are afraid you may feel it for someone else. Who is he, madame, this fortunate man who has caused you to fear? How long has he found favour with you? What has he done to attract you? What path has he discovered that led him to your heart? Not having reached it myself, I sought a kind of consolation in the idea that it was beyond reach. And now another has succeeded where I have failed. I suffer the jealousy both of a husband and of a lover; but it is impossible to feel a husband’s jealousy after what you have done. Your conduct is too noble to give me any uncertainty; even as your lover, I am consoled by it. The confidence and sincerity that you show me are beyond price: you respect me enough to believe that I shall not abuse your trust. You are right, madame, I shall not abuse it, or love you any the less. You have made me unhappy by giving me the greatest proof of fidelity that ever wife gave her husband. But, please, have done and tell me who it is that you wish to avoid.’

  ‘I beg you not to ask this of me,’ she answered. ‘I have determined not to tell you and I think that prudence requires me not to name him.’

  ‘Have no fear,’ said M. de Clèves. ‘I know the world too well not to realize that consideration for a husband is no barrier to loving his wife. One must hate those who do so, but not reproach them; so, once more, madame, I implore you to tell me what I wish to know.’

  ‘It will be pointless for you to insist,’ Mme de Clèves went on. ‘I have the strength to keep silent about something that I think I ought not to reveal. My confession was not the result of weakness, and admitting that truth requires more courage than attempting to conceal it.’

  M. de Nemours heard every word of this conversation, and what Mme de Clèves had just said made him scarcely less jealous than her husband. He was so hopelessly . in love with her that he thought everyone else must share this feeling. It was also true that he had several rivals, but he imagined himself to have still more, and he puzzled to think who this person might be that Mme de Clèves was speaking about. Several times he had thought himself not displeasing to her, but this impression was based on things that seemed so trivial to him at that moment, that he could not imagine he had awoken a passion so strong that it required her to resort to such extraordinary measures. He was so overwhelmed that he hardly knew what was before his eyes and he could not forgive M. de Clèves for not pressing his wife to give him the name that she refused to reveal.

  Even so, M. de Clèves did all he could to learn it; and, after he had urged her in vain, she replied:

  ‘I think you should be satisfied with my sincerity: do notask more of me or give me cause to regret saying what I have. Be content with my repeated assurance that I have done nothing to reveal my feelings and that nothing has been done to me that might give me offence.’

  ‘Oh, madame!’ M. de Clèves suddenly exclaimed. ‘I cannot believe you. I remember how confused you were, the day when your portrait was lost. You gave it away, madame – you gave away the portrait that was so dear to me and legitimately mine. You could not hide your feelings; you are in love, and he knows it; but so far your virtue has preserved you from anything beyond that.’

  ‘Is it possible,’ the princess replied, ‘that you can believe there is any concealment in a confession such as mine, that nothing obliged me to make? Believe me; I have paid a high price for the trust that I ask of you. I beg you, believe that I did not give away my portrait; it is true that I saw it being taken, but I did not want to let it be known that I saw, in case I should lay myself open to hearing things that he has not yet dared to tell me.’

  ‘So, how has he let it be known that he loves you?’ M. de Clèves asked. ‘And what signs of his love has he given you?’

  ‘Spare me,’ she replied, ‘the pain of having to repeat to you details that make me ashamed to have noticed them and which have only too well convinced me of my own weakness.’

  ‘You are right, madame,’ he said, ‘I am being unjust. Refuse me whenever I ask you such things, but do not be offended if I ask them.’

  At this moment, several of their servants who had remained in the park, came to advise M. de Clèves that a gentleman had arrived for him from the King, requesting him to go to Paris that evening. M. de Clèves had to leave and could say nothing to his wife, except that he begged her to join him the next day and implored her to trust to the tenderness and respect that he felt for her, despite his affliction, and to be content with that.

  When he had left and Mme de Clèves remained alone, and when she considered what she had just done, she was so appalled that she could hardly believe it was true. She thought that she had, of her own will, sacrificed the love and respect of her husband and that she had dug a pit for herself from which she would never escape. She wondered why she had done something so rash, and felt that she had embarked upon it almost without intending to do so. The peculiarity of her confession, for which she could see no precedent, made her realize how perilous it was.

  But when she began to think that this remedy, drastic though it might be, was the only one that could protect her against M. de Nemours, she considered that she ought not to regret it and that the risk was not at all too great. She spent the whole night full of uncertainties, worries and fear, but at length her spirit regained its calm. She even felt some contentment at having given this proof of her fidelity to a husband who was so deserving, who felt such respect and affection for her, and who had just provided her with still further evidence of this by the way in which he had reacted to her confession.

  M. de Nemours, meanwhile, had left the place where he had overheard a conversation that affected him so profoundly, and made off into the forest. What Mme de Clèves said about her portrait restored him to life, by letting him know that he was the one whom she did not hate. At first, he gave way to this joy; but it lasted only a short time, when it occurred to him that, having just learned how he had touched her heart, he ought, by the same token, to be convinced that he would never be given any indication of it and that it was impossible to win over a woman who could follow so extraordinary a course. Yet he felt a decided pleasure at having reduced her to this extremity. He considered there was great merit in having gained the love of one so unlike all others of her sex; and, in short, he was infinitely happy and unhappy at the same time. Night overtook him in the forest and he had great difficulty in finding his way back to Mme de Mercoeur’s. He reached there as dawn broke and was at something of a loss to explain what had delayed him. He did so as best he could and returned the same day to Paris with the Vidame.

  He was so full of love and so surprised by what he had heard, that he committed a fairly common indiscretion, which is to speak in general terms of one’s particular feelings and to describe one’s own adventures under assumed names. On the return journey, he steered the conversation towards love and exalted the pleasures of being in love with a person who is deserving of one’s affections. He mentioned the strange effects of that passion and finally, unable to suppress the astonishment he felt at Mme de Clèves’s conduct, recounted it to the Vidame, without naming her or saying that he was involved; but he told the story with such enthusiasm that the Vidame easily guessed it concerned M. de Nemours. He strongly urged
him to admit this. He said that he had known for a long time that the prince was deeply in love and that it was somewhat unfair to mistrust a man who had confided his life’s secret to him. M. de Nemours was too much in love to confess it: he had always concealed it from the Vidame, even though he was fonder of him than of any man at court. He answered that one of his friends had told him the story and made him promise not to speak of it, begging him also to keep the secret. The Vidame assured him that he would not repeat it to anyone; yet M. de Nemours regretted having told him so much.

  At the same time, M. de Clèves had gone to the King, smitten with mortal anguish. Never had any husband felt so passionately towards his wife or respected her so much. What he had discovered did not take away his esteem for her, but made it different in kind from what it had been until then. Most of all, he was obsessed with the wish to discover who had won her favour. M. de Nemours was the first person he thought of, as being the most attractive man at court; and also the Chevalier de Guise and the Maréchal de Saint-André, as two men who had thought they might win her and still paid her a good deal of attention: in this way he reached the conclusion that it must be one of these three. He arrived at the Louvre and the King led him into his study to say that he had been chosen to accompany Madame to Spain: he felt that no one would acquit himself better of the task and no one represent France so creditably as Mme de Clèves. M. de Clèves suitably accepted the honour of being chosen, and even thought of it as a means to remove his wife from the court without there appearing to be a change in her habits. Yet their departure was too distant for it to supply any remedy to his present trouble. He wrote immediately to Mme de Clèves, to tell her what the King had just said, also informing her of his urgent desire for her return to Paris. She did as he asked and when they saw each other, both were plunged into deep sorrow.

  M. de Clèves addressed her as the most honourable man in the world and the one who best deserved what she had done:

  ‘I am not in any way uneasy about your conduct,’ he said. ‘You have more strength and virtue than you think. So it is not fear of the future that distresses me. I am distressed only at seeing you have feelings for another that I have been unable to inspire in you.’

  ‘I do not know what to say,’ she answered. ‘I am overwhelmed with shame when we talk about it. I beg you, spare me these cruel conversations; guide my conduct; ensure that I see nobody. That is all I ask. But allow me not to speak further of something that makes me feel so unworthy of you and which I find so unworthy of myself.’

  ‘You are right, madame,’ he replied. ‘I am taking advantage of your good nature and your trust. But have some pity for the state into which you have plunged me and consider that, despite what you have told me, you are concealing a name that arouses unbearable curiosity in me. I do not ask you to satisfy it; yet I cannot resist telling you that I think the man whom I should envy is either the Maréchal de Saint-André, the Duc de Nemours or the Chevalier de Guise.’

  ‘I shall not give you any answer,’ she said, blushing, ‘or any hint, in my answers, that might diminish or strengthen your suspicions. But if you attempt to confirm them by observing me, you will cause me an embarrassment that will be obvious to everybody. In heaven’s name,’ she went on, ‘please allow me, on the excuse of some illness or other, to see no one.’

  ‘No, madame,’ he replied. ‘It would soon be discovered that that was merely a pretext; and, in any case, I wish to trust nothing except yourself: this is the course that my heart advises me to take, and reason concurs. In your present mood, by allowing you your freedom, I am setting you narrower bounds than I could lay down for you myself.’

  M. de Clèves was not mistaken: the trust that he showed his wife strengthened her still further against M. de Nemours and drove her to even greater resolve than any constraint could have done. So she went to the Louvre and to the Dauphine’s as usual, but so studiously avoided the presence and the eyes of M. de Nemours that she almost deprived him of all the joy he had in believing himself to be loved by her. He saw nothing in her actions that did not persuade him to the contrary. He almost doubted that what he had heard might not be a dream, so unlikely did it appear. The only thing that reassured him he had not made a mistake was the immense sadness of Mme de Clèves, much as she tried to disguise it: it may be that pleasant looks and sweet words would not have increased M. de Nemours’s love to such an extent as this self-denying behaviour.

  One evening when M. and Mme de Clèves were at the Queen’s, someone mentioned a rumour that the King was to appoint another nobleman of the court to accompany Madame to Spain. M. de Clèves was watching his wife as they added that it could be either the Chevalier de Guise or the Maréchal de Saint-André. He noticed that she gave no sign of emotion on hearing these names, or the proposal that they might make the journey with her. This led him to think that neither one was the man whose presence she feared and, wishing to confirm his suspicions, he went into the Queen’s study, where the King was. After staying there for some time, he returned to his wife and whispered to her that he had just learned it was M. de Nemours who would go with them to Spain.

  M. de Nemours’s name and the idea of being obliged to see him daily throughout a long journey, in her husband’s presence, so greatly disturbed Mme de Clèves that she could not hide her emotion; so, wishing to supply an excuse for it:

  ‘It is very unpleasant for you,’ she said, ‘that this prince has been chosen. He will share all the honours and I think you should try to have someone else put in his place.’

  ‘It is nothing connected with my reputation, madame,’ he answered, ‘that makes you afraid that M. de Nemours might accompany me. You are vexed at the news for another reason. This vexation tells me what I should have learned from any other woman through the pleasure that she would have expressed. But fear nothing: what I have just told you is untrue; I made it up, to confirm something that I already suspected only too well.’

  Whereupon he left, seeing his wife’s extreme confusion, and not wishing to add to it by remaining.

  At that moment, M. de Nemours came in and at once noticed Mme de Clèves’s state. He went over to her and whispered that, out of respect, he did not dare ask what made her more distracted than usual. M. de Nemours’s voice brought her back to herself and, looking at him, not having heard what he had just said, full of her own thoughts and of the fear that her husband might see them together:

  ‘In heaven’s name,’ she exclaimed, ‘leave me in peace!’

  ‘Alas, madame,’ he replied, ‘I do, and only too much. What complaint can you have? I dare not speak to you, I dare not even look at you, I approach you only with trepidation. What have I done to deserve what you have just said, and why do you suggest that I am somehow responsible for the unhappiness I see in you?’

  Mme de Clèves was very annoyed at having given M. de Nemours an opportunity to express himself more openly than ever in his life. She left him without answering and returned home, her mind more troubled than it had ever been. Her husband plainly saw that she was in a greater state of confusion. He observed that she was afraid he would speak of what had occurred. She went into a parlour and he followed her.

  ‘Do not try to avoid me, madame,’ he said. ‘I shall say nothing that might distress you; and I beg your forgiveness for the shock that I gave you just now. I have been sufficiently punished for it by what I learned. Of all men, M. de Nemours was the one I feared most. I can see the perils of your situation: be strong, for love of yourself and, if possible, for love of me. I do not ask this of you as a husband, but as a man whose happiness depends on you, and who loves you more tenderly and more passionately than the one your heart prefers.’

  M. de Clèves was overcome with emotion and could hardly finish what he was saying. His wife appreciated how he felt and, bursting into tears, kissed him with such tenderness and sorrow that he was left in a state little different from hers. For some time they remained in silence and parted without having the strength to spe
ak to each other.

  The preparations for Madame’s marriage were concluded. The Duc d’Albe21 arrived for the ceremony. He was greeted with every form of pomp and magnificence imaginable on such an occasion. The King sent out the Prince de Condé, the Cardinals de Lorraine and Guise, the Ducs de Lorraine, Ferrare, Aumale, Bouillon, Guise and Nemours to welcome him. They were attended by many gentlemen and a great number of pages in livery. The King himself received the Duc d’Albe at the main gate of the Louvre, with the two hundred gentlemen-in-waiting and the Connétable at their head. When the duke approached the King, he tried to embrace his knees, but the King restrained him, and made him walk by his side up to the Queen and Madame, for whom the Duc d’Albe had brought a magnificent present on his master’s behalf. He afterwards went to Mme Marguerite, the King’s sister, to offer M. de Savoie’s compliments and to assure her that he would be arriving in a few days’ time. Huge receptions were held at the Louvre to show off the ladies of the court to the Duc d’Albe and the Prince d’Orange who was accompanying him.

  Much though she would have liked to, Mme de Clèves dared not absent herself for fear of displeasing her husband, who positively ordered her to attend. She was still further persuaded by the absence of M. de Nemours. He had gone to receive M. de Savoie and, when the prince arrived, was obliged to remain almost always by his side to help him with everything concerning the marriage ceremony. Consequently, Mme de Clèves did not meet him as often as usual, which brought her a kind of tranquillity.