Camille (La Dame aux Camilias)

I might have told you of the beginning of this liaison in a few lines,

but I wanted you to see every step by which we came, I to agree to

whatever Marguerite wished, Marguerite to be unable to live apart from

me.

It was the day after the evening when she came to see me that I sent her

Manon Lescaut.

From that time, seeing that I could not change my mistress's life, I

changed my own. I wished above all not to leave myself time to think

over the position I had accepted, for, in spite of myself, it was a

great distress to me. Thus my life, generally so calm, assumed all

at once an appearance of noise and disorder. Never believe, however

disinterested the love of a kept woman may be, that it will cost one

nothing. Nothing is so expensive as their caprices, flowers, boxes at

the theatre, suppers, days in the country, which one can never refuse to

one's mistress.

As I have told you, I had little money. My father was, and still is,

receveur general at C. He has a great reputation there for loyalty,

thanks to which he was able to find the security which he needed in

order to attain this position.

It is worth forty thousand francs a year, and during the ten years that

he has had it, he has paid off the security and put aside a dowry for

my sister. My father is the most honourable man in the world. When

my mother died, she left six thousand francs a year, which he divided

between my sister and myself on the very day when he received his

appointment; then, when I was twenty-one, he added to this little income

an annual allowance of five thousand francs, assuring me that with

eight thousand francs a year I might live very happily at Paris, if, in

addition to this, I would make a position for myself either in law or

medicine. I came to Paris, studied law, was called to the bar, and, like

many other young men, put my diploma in my pocket, and let myself drift,

as one so easily does in Paris.

My expenses were very moderate; only I used up my year's income in

eight months, and spent the four summer months with my father, which

practically gave me twelve thousand francs a year, and, in addition, the

reputation of a good son. For the rest, not a penny of debt.

This, then, was my position when I made the acquaintance of Marguerite.

You can well understand that, in spite of myself, my expenses soon

increased. Marguerite's nature was very capricious, and, like so many

women, she never regarded as a serious expense those thousand and one

distractions which made up her life. So, wishing to spend as much time

with me as possible, she would write to me in the morning that she would

dine with me, not at home, but at some restaurant in Paris or in the

country. I would call for her, and we would dine and go on to the

theatre, often having supper as well; and by the end of the evening I

had spent four or five louis, which came to two or three thousand francs

a month, which reduced my year to three months and a half, and made it

necessary for me either to go into debt or to leave Marguerite. I would

have consented to anything except the latter.