Part 5

“What I like in this woman is her disinterestedness. She sells her body only the better to surrender herself; it is her weakness. She has a marvelous appetite and can only satisfy it with those of her choice. Those who choose her find her but a servant of Aphrodite. Were she rich, she would be the most honest of women and would only select her loves among those who most resemble the gods. Wealth is a great privilege, even in love. Thus it happens that there are two races on the globe, everlastingly creating and re-creating themselves,—the race submissive to destiny and the race which surmounts it. You have heard the contrary. It is nonsense. Give heed to the voice of a man whom fate overwhelms and who, to be reconciled with a woman he loves, has changed himself into her domestic slave. She will return; I shall again feel the odor of her hair and of her scorn. I have ruined myself for Aspasia. It is right that Aspasia should hold me in contempt.”

I give you quite faithfully some of his words; I have not understood them well. It seemed to me, besides, that his face flushed and grew ruddy, that he was getting drunk. He added words that I understood even less, about the pleasure of suffering and the keen delights of humiliation. Then he recited Theognis’ invective against poverty, thus completing the confession of his absolute incoherence.

He is not always so senseless. He is an unfortunate wretch punished by Aphrodite for having misused love—this is only permitted the gods—but she usually offers him a respite and then his conversation is less depressing. If I am to tell you the end of my experiences, I shall doubtless have to speak of Diogenes. But I am truly forbearing, for he has taken advantage of me.

ANTIPHILOS, _Satyr._

XI

DÉIDAMIE

XI

Monte-Carlo, September 15.

How it all came about, my dear friend, is a puzzling matter, but Diogenes led me into an adventure which could not help make me uneasy, though I am confident the protection of the all-powerful gods will never fail me. Everything was proceeding smoothly; the roguish snares of Déidamie, to which I had at last yielded, had freed me of that vague ennui which tormented me.... But I must make you familiar with this, in the episodic manner, before giving you the recital of the dreadful happenings. Picture to yourself this Phrygian girl, born on the Mæander shores, and if this does not move you, at least you will understand my emotion upon discovering, once more, a lass hailing from my native land! But the Phrygians have always been inconstant: Déidamie is the very embodiment of caprice. Charming maid! She was the inamorata of an archon’s wife, herself strikingly lovely, partaking of the beauty that men have given Pallas Athena.

“You love those who resemble you, O Déidamie of the violet eyes!”

Déidamie loved those who were like her and those unlike her. How privileged women are! They bring grace to their loves. Diogenes explained to me that it was thus they disarmed morality, that power dreaded by mankind, and whose aim is to prevent the extraction of too much pleasure from life. Déidamie was taken away from me while I still loved her. That is a good time to lose a woman. Regrets then are transformed into pleasant memories, and one is spared satiety. Diogenes had predicted that this would hardly last and that Déidamie, being accustomed to feminine cajoleries, would soon weary, after the first days of felicitous astonishment, of a being awkward in tender adorations.

“You will not know,” he said, “how to feed the flame sleeping in her soft eyes. Your bellows will extinguish instead of keeping it alive.”

And he continued:

“I know all about you, Satyros. You always excite curiosity and you never fail to disappoint it. Your career consists of abduction, the sudden surprise, the stupefaction.”

I wanted to reply that there was much truth in his judgment of my character, but I remained silent, meditating on my companion’s wisdom and perspicacity. Yet I thought of Cydalise, of whom he was ignorant. I related the story to him and surprised him. After a moment’s reflection, he confessed that to know and classify the types of women was a vain and sorry task; some one would always turn up to contradict and annihilate the most positive theories.

“What you tell me, Satyros, does not go against the grain, since it instructs me. The science of men and women is composed of exceptions, each one of which constitutes a rule. Thus the science is a very long and laborious one. It thus resembles the Chinese language, which aged men begin to master after sixty years of study and when they no longer have either the strength or the inclination to discourse. The eyes grow impaired in observing men, and it is quite other faculties that are used in the company of women, without which, besides, they would be equally spent. But you cannot understand this, you who were kneaded out of an immortal clay, moulded so that you would never experience exhaustion, and who are the image of a youthfulness whose illusions should be realities.”

While saying this, Diogenes looked at me with an air of envy in which was affection, that air carried by the poor in the presence of vases filled with gold, such as I have seen in the street behind iron railings. He continued, as though issuing from a dream:

“Are you truly immortal, Satyros? The great gods, your masters and the masters of men, are dead....”

“Destiny has overlooked me, Diogenes, and besides, I believe that I have brethren in the depths of every forest, in the grottos of every mountain, in every dale. I have never seen, but I divine them. We are the forces of nature and if we died, you would be condemned to death.”

“That is rather what _we_ are. I think you are confusing immortality and perpetuity.”

I did not answer. I find it difficult to enter into subtleties. It seems to me that my horns then begin to shoot out of my head. This time he looked at me with pity:

“Hm! Satyr,” he said. “To return to a more sensible topic, since Cydalise loves you, why do you not go to find her again?”

“And will you come with me, Diogenes?”

“Without a doubt. You spoke of destiny, and since it has placed in my path a son, or even a grand-cousin of the immortal gods, do you suppose that I can abandon him? You do not know friendship, Satyros. It is man’s virtue.”

Thereupon, he delivered a long discourse which enchanted me by the charmingly cadenced arrangement of its periods. I imagined myself transported to the times of my childhood, I drank his eloquence like my mother’s milk. I was stirred, I wept with emotion and I panted, half-drowned under these harmonious waves. I am Greek and sensitive to the felicities of rhetoric. Ah! had he spoken in Greek, I would have offered to share my divinity with him, but I was thankful for his discretion and embraced him. It was the time propitious for swearing eternal friendship. I passed the remainder of the day congratulating myself on the good fortune which had fallen to my lot among mankind. I had a friend, and without understanding the joys that this should bring me, I considered them great and equal to those painted by Diogenes in his flowered discourse.

He came to live with me. He installed himself in an adjoining room which I was happy to be able to offer him, as is fitting in true friendship, and he did not hesitate to share my frugal repasts, with which he was pleased to be contented. Then he spoke once more of Cydalise, whose portrait arose from the depths of his memories. I described her to him and he forthwith knew her. His talk afforded me pleasure. To speak of her was to revive her under my very eyes, almost under my lips. She was nearer to me, each time I pronounced her name aloud, and it seemed to me that the door was about to open and reveal her.

Cydalise had not returned for nearly a month and she had only written me somewhat enigmatic letters which but half reassured me. The last was a note so brief that I read it at a glance, as one drinks with a single draught the water scooped into the palm of the hand. I had been distracted from my uneasiness by Déidamie’s caprice, but now that the little Phrygian had returned to her friend, I thought deeply of Cydalise. It was easy for Diogenes to prevail on me to go and join her, and as he wished to spare me all the inconveniences of the trip, our departure was decided upon, following a new discourse which profoundly stirred me to the depths of my heart and satisfied my last scruples. We made our preparations. I did not forget the treasure with whose care I was entrusted. Diogenes took charge of it.

You will know the consequences.

ANTIPHILOS, _Satyr._

XII

THE CLUSTER OF GRAPES

XII

Monte-Carlo, September 20.

Consequently we left. Diogenes was in very good spirits and I a trifle out of countenance by such a rapid decision, for he had hardly obtained my consent than, our affairs in order, we were on our way.

“Perhaps,” I said, “Cydalise is returning at the very moment that I leave. What will she think of me?”

But Diogenes seemed quite sure of the matter.

“Doubtless, at this very moment she is climbing the flight of stairs, she knocks at the door, no one answers her, she grows perturbed, she begins to make inquiries. This is possible since everything is possible. But Cydalise is not one of those giddy, thoughtless persons who arrive all of a sudden at the home of their lover, especially when the lover goes by the name of Satyros. Life has given such a one experience. Trust in me, my friend, and let us have no anxieties about the matter.”

As I am always sensitive to the last impression which strikes me, I easily agreed with the opinion of Diogenes and began to examine the landscape which still possessed the richness of summer. Everywhere I imagined I found once more the appearance of the Cogolin countryside and the fragrance of its orange-trees. In vain did Diogenes endeavor to put me right by informing me that we were quite remote from that spot; still I saw the woods of the last days of my liberty, and I grew enthusiastic as though they were about to return.

“Let us get off at this spot,” I would say each moment, “I feel that happiness awaits me in these rocks. A woman has come for me in this very place, she is looking for me, she believes she has spied me behind each clump of arbutus. See, she turns round hopefully and scans the autumn-hued land. Let us get off, let us get off!”

“It is a long time since you beheld the country fields, Satyros,” Diogenes answered. “Your head is turned. What would you have us do in this wild desert? It is nothing but a color, it is nothing but imagination.”

The train slackened its speed and Diogenes had to stop me as I was about to hurl myself through the carriage door. It opened at the same moment and two women entered our compartment where we had been alone up till now. Diogenes now knew that he need no longer watch me. From his pocket he drew a newspaper and began to read tranquilly, confident that I would not try to escape. In fact, I was quite at ease, quite satisfied with the turn of affairs. Although the new arrivals afforded no pleasure to my eyes, they were capable of occupying my imagination. I recognized their coiffure. How many similar heads had I not pursued in days of yore among the shadows of descending night, on the skirt of the vineyards! They were not absolutely ugly and their eyes had even a certain beauty; but what heaviness of outline, what disgracefulness of forms! Certainly I had loved more than one with less comeliness. And these were the types of conquests with which I had once been so elated, those fruits of nature which I had devoured, those earthen urns out of which I had quaffed my pleasures so boldly. These buxom daughters of Pomona carried in each arm a basket of grapes, oranges and vegetables. These they deposited near them, and as I looked at the contents of the baskets more intently than at their owners, one of them addressed me in a singing voice:

“Perhaps you would like to eat a bunch of grapes?”

I stretched my hand forward and she gracefully lifted her heavy basket toward me. She was the less coarse of the two.

“I can only offer you,” I said, “a kiss.”

Both of them commenced to laugh and the other, in an engaging manner, remarked:

“The baskets belong to the two of us.”

I kissed her on the cheek, and her companion on the corner of her lips. I had once again become a faun; my contemptuous reflections had counted for naught against the tempting odor of a market woman!

They laughed so loudly, to conceal their embarrassment, that they failed to notice the train’s arrival at Arcs. Diogenes, whom the scene had diverted from his newspaper, mentioned the fact aloud and the countrywomen hastened to dismount. As I held out their baskets to them, she whom I had touched with my desire bowed to me with a smile while the other said:

“Shall we perhaps meet again?”

I had dominated my emotion. When the train started again, Diogenes sententiously proferred these words which I was long in understanding:

“That is what one gets for having frequented the little courtesans of Toulon.”

Noticing my astonishment, he added:

“Satyros is becoming farther and farther removed from nature. Perhaps we shall be able to make something out of him.”

Diogenes’ perspicacity surprised and enchanted me at the same time. How well the two propositions reunite and how faithfully they render my own sentiment. But what could be the meaning of these words: “Perhaps we shall be able to make something out of him. Am I then nothing, nothing of consequence, nothing serious and true?”

“Diogenes,” I answered, “I understand your first thought; it answers to mine; but what do you propose to make of me? This is vague.”

“A philosopher, Satyros, nothing more and nothing less, a philosopher like myself, that is to say a man who is the dupe of nothing or who, when he is a dupe, knows and enjoys his deception. It is a very rare state of mind and surpasses even that of the Gods whom, if I am to judge by yourself, are totally ignorant and always at the mercy of the impressions of the moment. I was satisfied to notice with what an eye you studied the rustics who tried their best little tricks upon you. That is the first stage. One must know how to resist the passions. The second consists in yielding to them. To be neither above nor below human weakness, which the divine foibles greatly resemble, if once more I can judge by yourself,—here you have the ideal position. Be always at their level, always ready to respond to them.”

“Had I met them along some path, in the mountain, despite my repulsion of the first moment I would not have been able to master my desire.”

“It is thus I understand the second stage,” answered Diogenes, “but there is a third stage, which is still more advantageous. This takes place when a person loves himself sufficiently, loves himself more than the desires which make him leave his egoism. I am journeying toward that condition, which I do not believe you will ever attain, Satyros.”

“No more do I myself believe it, Diogenes. If the nature of the gods is hardly removed from that of men, it nevertheless differs in this essential point: all poetry is forthwith incorporated with its substance, effortlessly and by the very play of desire. I enrich myself where you impoverish yourself, Diogenes.”

It was his turn to meditate upon the profundity of my words. He did not know what to answer, doubtless, for on his face I read ennui and sadness and envy perhaps. Diogenes is no longer very young. I fear his philosophy is only a sort of insouciant resignation to the fatality which weighs on mankind. I perceive—books have already taught me this—that there are as many philosophies as there are ages and temperaments. He has sufficiently outlined this for me by his theory of the three stages. One desires to resist passions when they are so weak that a little attention suffices to master them. One yields to them when they are so strong that a struggle is grievous. One scorns them on the day they become nerveless, when one no longer dare regret the time of their heydey for fear of appearing in the attitude of a vanquished person. That is the moment of virtue. According as young or old men, the feeble or the strong govern society, the one or the other spirit dominates the world. And I really believe that this applies to all human inclinations. States fluctuate according as action or thought and dream are held in higher repute. Ah! I understand why they laugh in Olympus.

ANTIPHILOS, _Satyr._

XIII

THE UNKNOWN WOMAN

XIII

Cannes, December 1.

Good friend, I have not told you what happened to us at Monte-Carlo and it is with difficulty that I now recall it. At first it seemed important and stirring, but I readily see that events have hardly any interest outside of their novelty: this should teach us to view them philosophically at the very moment when they appear most grievous. It really seems to me that the adventure which befell Diogenes, and which affected us both, might have turned out badly for both of us, at least this is what he told me, but my insouciance did not linger on the matter overlong and life soon put me to rights.

“Fortunate Antiphilos!” said Diogenes, gazing at me with an admiration in which anger was mingled, “we are lost and he is as calm as a god! Are you at least capable of giving me some advice? Divine animal, be oracular, be Dodonian, pronounce a number!”

It is probable that I obeyed, for Diogenes manifested a sudden contentment and disappeared, leaving me slightly bewildered by his eccentricities, on one of the garden seats, in the dim shadow of the palm trees. I was not long in finding tranquility, since the place was propitious to peace. Young women passed by accompanied by aged men and the same thoughts certainly did not inhabit their heads, for their glances were unlike. The expressions on the men’s faces were dull, the women looked stupid, and though some among them were quite pretty, they did not inspire me with any desire.

Besides, I do not dispute a woman with any male. Only the rams, goats and bulls intertwine their horns and battle for the conquest of females. I, whose ways are peaceful, only attack unescorted women; it is surer. Unless it be night, I even wait to see, in their eyes, near the dwellings, the provocative little flame which my presence rarely fails to light in their eyes. I do not put myself to any trouble, unless I am sure of pleasing. Diogenes has told me that men are not so constituted and that what often excites them in a woman is her coldness, no less than the obstacles which shield her. On this subject they use in their speech all sorts of images of warfare which make veritable treaties of strategy of their books on love. It is a question of siege, stratagems, skirmishes, attack, defeat, resistance, victory, conquest. I do not understand all these things. Love is naught when it is not the leaping of a twin desire. Yet I would not be worthy of my name of Satyros did I not admit assault and abduction, the surprise which satisfies desire lulled to sleep before it has had time to awake. It is not perhaps the most beautiful side of my nature, but it is such as the gods have made it and besides, neither women nor girls have ever taken offense at it. I must confess that I have completely leashed these habits since living, in the towns, a life similar to that of other men. If I have not yet been able to understand that one lays siege to woman, as Alexander laid siege to the city of Tyre, it is perhaps due to the fact that I still rely more on the candor of her desires than on a possession which, in the strategic system, one generally owes to the weariness of the besieged, to the poliorcetic science of the besieger.

“Satyros,” Diogenes suddenly cried out, “Satyros! You are the true God or at least a true god!”

And, plunging a hand in his pocket, he drew it forth filled with gold pieces.

“But let us be circumspect,” he continued. “One must no longer question destiny. It has answered in no uncertain terms. Let us flee this town. Take my arm on the side where I carry the gold and let us leave without turning our heads.”

“You are wrong, monsieur,” a voice behind us answered. “One does not thus break his lucky streak....”

The voice belonged to an extremely pretty woman who lacked neither elegance nor distinction. Diogenes apostrophized her strongly:

“Are you the guardian dragon of these portals, recovering from mortals the gold which destiny conceded them? Are you....”

“I am not even a dragon of virtue,” answered the young woman, smiling pleasantly. “You are right. It is time to go and breakfast. I will show you the way.”

I had the look of a schoolboy rescued from the perils of an adventure by his elder brother and I found that Diogenes really protected my virtue a little too carefully, for this woman decidedly pleased me. I am ashamed to avow it, but I struggled an instant longer against my desire, I was on the point of obeying Diogenes, my arm relaxed its hold, I felt myself the docile son of the dreariest civilization, which sits down at the roadside and watches its dream pass, without daring to arrest them. But she turned her fair head, her clear eyes toward me, our glances penetrated each other and I suddenly felt myself become again the faun of the forests, the jovial, whinnying faun who can overcome pitchfork blows, but not reasonings.

With a harsh burst of laughter, I scoffed at my hesitations. My companion trembled and grasped my arm tighter. She led me away and I imagined that I was carrying her off, for already I felt her limbs tremble under my strength.

When Diogenes rejoined us in the rooms, to which he had the key, she was already arranging her hair in front of the mirror, while glancing at my reflection in one of its corners. She was murmuring:

“What a man! Amazing!”

He had the rudeness to come and behold us, then he shrugged his shoulders and said:

“It might as well be this one as another. Besides, she is pretty, even though she has blond hair. Satyros could not remain good very long. And one must enliven the journey. We are going far, madam, and the caprices of the gods are short-lived. I leave you, unless you are going to invite me to the repast.”

The nymph was still dressing her hair. I reflected on the fortunate state of women in being able to arrange their hair in delicate situations. I myself did not know what to say, I did not know what to do.

“What repast?” asked the lady. “It is finished,” she added with a happy laugh. “At least, I believe so.”

“And are you ready?” questioned Diogenes.

“Who are you anyway?” she rejoined, almost angry. “Why do you come to interfere?...”

“Madam, I am Satyros’ secretary, and as I fear that he does not know the customs very well....”

“I understand. You imagine me venal? I am life’s slave, that is all. I know how to enjoy, making allowances for my chain and its length, the enchantments of the present moment, and I accept the disappointing after-taste that follows. Leave me with my friend an hour, so that I may gather, under my eyelids, tears for the moment he will quit me.... I have often seen love bud in eyes that followed me, but I have not known how to make the bud thrive, how to keep it fresh, at least, like a rose in a glass of water. When friends abandon me, they tear the rose to bits and sneer, they throw it to the ground and trample it. Are you, too, ashamed of your pleasures?”

“How well she speaks!” exclaimed Diogenes, who loves eloquence. “How I love this flute player! And you say nothing, Satyros?”

But I spoke and she remained.

ANTIPHILOS, _Satyr._

XIV

FLIGHT

XIV

Cannes.