Camille (La Dame aux Camilias)

All these suppositions, as you may see, were improbable enough; but

whatever might have been the reason of her consent, one thing was

certain, she had consented.

Now, I was in love with Marguerite. I had nothing more to ask of her.

Nevertheless, though she was only a kept woman, I had so anticipated for

myself, perhaps to poetize it a little, a hopeless love, that the nearer

the moment approached when I should have nothing more to hope, the more

I doubted. I did not close my eyes all night.

I scarcely knew myself. I was half demented. Now, I seemed to myself not

handsome or rich or elegant enough to possess such a woman, now I was

filled with vanity at the thought of it; then I began to fear lest

Marguerite had no more than a few days' caprice for me, and I said to

myself that since we should soon have to part, it would be better not to

keep her appointment, but to write and tell her my fears and leave her.

From that I went on to unlimited hope, unbounded confidence. I dreamed

incredible dreams of the future; I said to myself that she should owe

to me her moral and physical recovery, that I should spend my whole life

with her, and that her love should make me happier than all the maidenly

loves in the world.

But I can not repeat to you the thousand thoughts that rose from my

heart to my head, and that only faded away with the sleep that came to

me at daybreak.

When I awoke it was two o'clock. The weather was superb. I don't think

life ever seemed to me so beautiful and so full of possibilities. The

memories of the night before came to me without shadow or hindrance,

escorted gaily by the hopes of the night to come. From time to time my

heart leaped with love and joy in my breast. A sweet fever thrilled

me. I thought no more of the reasons which had filled my mind before I

slept. I saw only the result, I thought only of the hour when I was to

see Marguerite again.

It was impossible to stay indoors. My room seemed too small to contain

my happiness. I needed the whole of nature to unbosom myself.

I went out. Passing by the Rue d'Antin, I saw Marguerite's coupe'

waiting for her at the door. I went toward the Champs-Elysees. I loved

all the people whom I met. Love gives one a kind of goodness.

After I had been walking for an hour from the Marly horses to the

Rond-Point, I saw Marguerite's carriage in the distance; I divined

rather than recognised it. As it was turning the corner of the

Champs-Elysees it stopped, and a tall young man left a group of people

with whom he was talking and came up to her. They talked for a few

moments; the young man returned to his friends, the horses set out

again, and as I came near the group I recognised the one who had spoken

to Marguerite as the Comte de G., whose portrait I had seen and whom

Prudence had indicated to me as the man to whom Marguerite owed her

position. It was to him that she had closed her doors the night before;

I imagined that she had stopped her carriage in order to explain to him

why she had done so, and I hoped that at the same time she had found

some new pretext for not receiving him on the following night.