Sometimes, nevertheless, I have an uneasy feeling about placing myself so absolutely, so unconditionally into a woman’s hands. Suppose she did abuse my passion, her power?
Well, then I would experience what has occupied my imagination since my childhood, what has always given me the feeling of seductive terror. A foolish apprehension! It will be a wanton game she will play with me, nothing more. She loves me, and she is good, a noble personality, incapable of a breach of faith. But it lies in her hands —if she wants to she can. What a temptation in this doubt, this fear!
Now I understand Manon l’Escault and the poor chevalier, who, even in the pillory, while she was another man’s mistress, still adored her.
Love knows no virtue, no profit; it loves and forgives and suffers everything, because it must. It is not our judgment that leads us; it is neither the advantages nor the faults which we discover, that make us abandon ourselves, or that repel us.
It is a sweet, soft, enigmatic power that drives us on. We cease to think, to feel, to will; we let ourselves be carried away by it, and ask not whither?
* * * * *
A Russian prince made his first appearance today on the promenade. He aroused general interest on account of his athletic figure, magnificent face, and splendid bearing. The women particularly gaped at him as though he were a wild animal, but he went his way gloomily without paying attention to any one. He was accompanied by two servants, one a negro, completely dressed in red satin, and the other a Circassian in his full gleaming uniform. Suddenly he saw Wanda, and fixed his cold piercing look upon her; he even turned his head after her, and when she had passed, he stood still and followed her with his eyes.
And she—she veritably devoured him with her radiant green eyes—and did everything possible to meet him again.
The cunning coquetry with which she walked, moved, and looked at him, almost stifled me. On the way home I remarked about it. She knit her brows.
“What do you want,” she said, “the prince is a man whom I might like, who even dazzles me, and I am free. I can do what I please—”
“Don’t you love me any longer—” I stammered, frightened.
“I love only you,” she replied, “but I shall have the prince pay court to me.”
“Wanda!”
“Aren’t you my slave?” she said calmly. “Am I not Venus, the cruel northern Venus in Furs?”
I was silent. I felt literally crushed by her words; her cold look entered my heart like a dagger.
“You will find out immediately the prince’s name, residence, and circumstances,” she continued. “Do you understand?”
“But—”
“No argument, obey!” exclaimed Wanda, more sternly than I would have thought possible for her, “and don’t dare to enter my sight until you can answer my questions.”
It was not till afternoon that I could obtain the desired information for Wanda. She let me stand before her like a servant, while she leaned back in her arm-chair and listened to me, smiling. Then she nodded; she seemed to be satisfied.
“Bring me my footstool,” she commanded shortly.
I obeyed, and after having put it before her and having put her feet on it, I remained kneeling.
“How will this end?” I asked sadly after a short pause.
She broke into playful laughter. “Why things haven’t even begun yet.”
“You are more heartless than I imagined,” I replied, hurt.
“Severin,” Wanda began earnestly. “I haven’t done anything yet, not the slightest thing, and you are already calling me heartless. What will happen when I begin to carry your dreams to their realization, when I shall lead a gay, free life and have a circle of admirers about me, when I shall actually fulfil your ideal, tread you underfoot and apply the lash?”
“You take my dreams too seriously.”
“Too seriously? I can’t stop at make-believe, when once I begin,” she replied. “You know I hate all play-acting and comedy. You have wished it. Was it my idea or yours? Did I persuade you or did you inflame my imagination? I am taking things seriously now.”
“Wanda,” I replied, caressingly, “listen quietly to me. We love each other infinitely, we are very happy, will you sacrifice our entire future to a whim?”
“It is no longer a whim,” she exclaimed.
“What is it?” I asked frightened.
“Something that was probably latent in me,” she said quietly and thoughtfully. “Perhaps it would never have come to light, if you had not called it to life, and made it grow. Now that it has become a powerful impulse, fills my whole being, now that I enjoy it, now that I cannot and do not want to do otherwise, now you want to back out— you—are you a man?”
“Dear, sweet Wanda!” I began to caress her, kiss her.
“Don’t—you are not a man—”
“And you,” I flared up.
“I am stubborn,” she said, “you know that. I haven’t a strong imagination, and like you I am weak in execution. But when I make up my mind to do something, I carry it through, and the more certainly, the more opposition I meet. Leave me alone!”
She pushed me away, and got up.
“Wanda!” I likewise rose, and stood facing her.
“Now you know what I am,” she continued. “Once more I warn you. You still have the choice. I am not compelling you to be my slave.”
“Wanda,” I replied with emotion and tears filling my eyes, “don’t you know how I love you?”
Her lips quivered contemptuously.
“You are mistaken, you make yourself out worse than you are; you are good and noble by nature—”
“What do you know about my nature,” she interrupted vehemently, “you will get to know me as I am.”
“Wanda!”
“Decide, will you submit, unconditionally?”
“And if I say no.”
“Then—”
She stepped close up to me, cold and contemptuous. As she stood before me now, the arms folded across her breast, with an evil smile about her lips, she was in fact the despotic woman of my dreams. Her expression seemed hard, and nothing lay in her eyes that promised kindness or mercy.
“Well—” she said at last.
“You are angry,” I cried, “you will punish me.”
“Oh no!” she replied, “I shall let you go. You are free. I am not holding you.”
“Wanda—I, who love you so—”
“Yes, you, my dear sir, you who adore me,” she exclaimed contemptuously, “but who are a coward, a liar, and a breaker of promises. Leave me instantly—”
“Wanda I—”
“Wretch!”
My blood rose in my heart. I threw myself down at her feet and began to cry.
“Tears, too!” She began to laugh. Oh, this laughter was frightful. “Leave me—I don’t want to see you again.”
“Oh my God!” I cried, beside myself. “I will do whatever you command, be your slave, a mere object with which you can do what you will—only don’t send me away—I can’t bear it—I cannot live without you.” I embraced her knees, and covered her hand with kisses.
“Yes, you must be a slave, and feel the lash, for you are not a man,” she said calmly. She said this to me with perfect composure, not angrily, not even excitedly, and it was what hurt most. “Now I know you, your dog-like nature, that adores where it is kicked, and the more, the more it is maltreated. Now I know you, and now you shall come to know me.”
She walked up and down with long strides, while I remained crushed on my knees; my head was hanging supine, tears flowed from my eyes.
“Come here,” Wanda commanded harshly, sitting down on the ottoman. I obeyed her command, and sat down beside her. She looked at me sombrely, and then a light suddenly seemed to illuminate the interior of her eye. Smiling, she drew me toward her breast, and began to kiss the tears out of my eyes.
* * * * *
The odd part of my situation is that I am like the bear in Lily’s park. I can escape and don’t want to; I am ready to endure everything as soon as she threatens to set me free.
* * * * *
If only she would use the whip again. There is something uncanny in the kindness with which she treats me. I seem like a little captive mouse with which a beautiful cat prettily plays. She is ready at any moment to tear it to pieces, and my heart of a mouse threatens to burst.
What are her intentions? What does she purpose to do with me?
* * * * *
It seems she has completely forgotten the contract, my slavehood. Or was it actually only stubbornness? And she gave up her whole plan as soon as I no longer opposed her and submitted to her imperial whim?
How kind she is to me, how tender, how loving! We are spending marvellously happy days.
To-day she had me read to her the scene between Faust and Mephistopheles, in which the latter appears as a wandering scholar. Her glance hung on me with strange pleasure.
“I don’t understand,” she said when I had finished, “how a man who can read such great and beautiful thoughts with such expression, and interpret them so clearly, concisely, and intelligently, can at the same time be such a visionary and supersensual ninny as you are.”
“Were you pleased,” said I, and kissed her forehead.
She gently stroked my brow. “I love you, Severin,” she whispered. “I don’t believe I could ever love any one more than you. Let us be sensible, what do you say?”
Instead of replying I folded her in my arms; a deep inward, yet vaguely sad happiness filled my breast, my eyes grew moist, and a tear fell upon her hand.
“How can you cry!” she exclaimed, “you are a child!”
* * * * *
On a pleasure drive we met the Russian prince in his carriage. He seemed to be unpleasantly surprised to see me by Wanda’s side, and looked as if he wanted to pierce her through and through with his electric gray eyes. She, however, did not seem to notice him. I felt at that moment like kneeling down before her and kissing her feet. She let her glance glide over him indifferently as though he were an inanimate object, a tree, for instance, and turned to me with her gracious smile.
* * * * *
When I said good-night to her to-day she seemed suddenly unaccountably distracted and moody. What was occupying her?
“I am sorry you are going,” she said when I was already standing on the threshold.
“It is entirely in your hands to shorten the hard period of my trial, to cease tormenting me—” I pleaded.
“Do you imagine that this compulsion isn’t a torment for me, too,” Wanda interjected.
“Then end it,” I exclaimed, embracing her, “be my wife.”
“Never, Severin,” she said gently, but with great firmness.
“What do you mean?”
I was frightened in my innermost soul.
“You are not the man for me.”
I looked at her, and slowly withdrew my arm which was still about her waist; then I left the room, and she—she did not call me back.
* * * * *
A sleepless night; I made countless decisions, only to toss them aside again. In the morning I wrote her a letter in which I declared our relationship dissolved. My hand trembled when I put on the seal, and I burned my fingers.
As I went upstairs to hand it to the maid, my knees threatened to give way.
The door opened, and Wanda thrust forth her head full of curling-papers.
“I haven’t had my hair dressed yet,” she said, smiling. “What have you there?”
“A letter—”
“For me?”
I nodded.
“Ah, you want to break with me,” she exclaimed, mockingly.
“Didn’t you tell me yesterday that I wasn’t the man for you?”
“I repeat it now!”
“Very well, then.” My whole body was trembling, my voice failed me, and I handed her the letter.
“Keep it,” she said, measuring me coldly. “You forget that is no longer a question as to whether you satisfy me as a man; as a slave you will doubtless do well enough.”
“Madame!” I exclaimed, aghast.
“That is what you will call me in the future,” replied Wanda, throwing back her head with a movement of unutterable contempt. “Put your affairs in order within the next twenty-four hours. The day after to-morrow I shall start for Italy, and you will accompany me as my servant.”
“Wanda—”
“I forbid any sort of familiarity,” she said, cutting my words short, “likewise you are not to come in unless I call or ring for you, and you are not to speak to me until you are spoken to. From now on your name is no longer Severin, but Gregor.”
I trembled with rage, and yet, unfortunately, I cannot deny it, I also felt a strange pleasure and stimulation.
“But, madame, you know my circumstances,” I began in my confusion. “I am dependent on my father, and I doubt whether he will give me the large sum of money needed for this journey—”
“That means you have no money, Gregor,” said Wanda, delightedly, “so much the better, you are then entirely dependent on me, and in fact my slave.”
“You don’t consider,” I tried to object, “that as man of honor it is impossible for me—”
“I have indeed considered it,” she replied almost with a tone of command. “As a man of honor you must keep your oath and redeem your promise to follow me as slave whithersoever I demand and to obey whatever I command. Now leave me, Gregor!”
I turned toward the door.
“Not yet—you may first kiss my hand.” She held it out to me with a certain proud indifference, and I the dilettante, the donkey, the miserable slave pressed it with intense tenderness against my lips which were dry and hot with excitement.
There was another gracious nod of the head.
Then I was dismissed.
* * * * *
Though it was late in the evening my light was still lit, and a fire was burning in the large green stove. There were still many things among my letters and documents to be put in order. Autumn, as is usually the case with us, had fallen with all its power.
Suddenly she knocked at my window with the handle of her whip.
I opened and saw her standing outside in her ermine-lined jacket and in a high round Cossack cap of ermine of the kind which the great Catherine favored.
“Are you ready, Gregor?” she asked darkly.
“Not yet, mistress,” I replied.
“I like that word,” she said then, “you are always to call me mistress, do you understand? We leave here to-morrow morning at nine o’clock. As far as the district capital you will be my companion and friend, but from the moment that we enter the railway-coach you are my slave, my servant. Now close the window, and open the door.”
After I had done as she had demanded, and after she had entered, she asked, contracting her brows ironically, “well, how do you like me.”
“Wanda, you—”
“Who gave you permission?” She gave me a blow with the whip.
“You are very beautiful, mistress.”
Wanda smiled and sat down in the arm-chair. “Kneel down—here beside my chair.”
I obeyed.
“Kiss my hand.”
I seized her small cold hand and kissed it.
“And the mouth—”
In a surge of passion I threw my arms around the beautiful cruel woman, and covered her face, arms, and breast with glowing kisses. She returned them with equal fervor—the eyelids closed as in a dream. It was after midnight when she left.
At nine o’clock sharp in the morning everything was ready for departure, as she had ordered. We left the little Carpathian health-resort in a comfortable light carriage. The most interesting drama of my life had reached a point of development whose denouement it was then impossible to foretell.
So far everything went well. I sat beside Wanda, and she chatted very graciously and intelligently with me, as with a good friend, concerning Italy, Pisemski’s new novel, and Wagner’s music. She wore a sort of Amazonesque travelling-dress of black cloth with a short jacket of the same material, set with dark fur. It fitted closely and showed her figure to best advantage. Over it she wore dark furs. Her hair wound into an antique knot, lay beneath a small dark fur-hat from which a black veil hung. Wanda was in very good humor; she fed me candies, played with my hair, loosened my neck cloth and made a pretty cockade of it; she covered my knees with her furs and stealthily pressed the fingers of my hand. When our Jewish driver persistently went on nodding to himself, she even gave me a kiss, and her cold lips had the fresh frosty fragrance of a young autumnal rose, which blossoms alone amid bare stalks and yellow leaves and upon whose calyx the first frost has hung tiny diamonds of ice.
* * * * *
We are at the district capital. We get out at the railway station. Wanda throws off her furs and places them over my arm, and goes to secure the tickets.
When she returns she has completely changed.
“Here is your ticket, Gregor,” she says in a tone which supercilious ladies use to their servants.
“A third-class ticket,” I reply with comic horror.
“Of course,” she continues, “but now be careful. You won’t get on until I am settled in my compartment and don’t need you any longer. At each station you will hurry to my car and ask for my orders. Don’t forget. And now give me my furs.”
After I had helped her into them, humbly like a slave, she went to find an empty first-class coupe. I followed. Supporting herself on my shoulder, she got on and I wrapped her feet in bear-skins and placed them on the warming bottle.
Then she nodded to me, and dismissed me. I slowly ascended a third-class carriage, which was filled with abominable tobacco-smoke that seemed like the fogs of Acheron at the entrance to Hades. I now had the leisure to muse about the riddle of human existence, and about its greatest riddle of all—woman.
* * * * *
Whenever the train stops, I jump off, run to her carriage, and with drawn cap await her orders. She wants coffee and then a glass of water, at another time a bowl of warm water to wash her hands, and thus it goes on. She lets several men who have entered her compartment pay court to her. I am dying of jealousy and have to leap about like an antelope so as to secure what she wants quickly and not miss the train.
In this way the night passes. I haven’t had time to eat a mouthful and I can’t sleep, I have to breathe the same oniony air with Polish peasants, Jewish peddlers, and common soldiers.
When I mount the steps of her coupe, she is lying stretched out on cushions in her comfortable furs, covered up with the skins of animals. She is like an oriental despot, and the men sit like Indian deities, straight upright against the walls and scarcely dare to breathe.
