however, poor, loving creatures who stifle under this happiness as if
under one of those leaden covers that Dante speaks of; they breathe, in
imagination, the pure, vital air that a fatal instinct has revealed to
them; they struggle between duty and desire; they gaze, like captive
doves and with a sorrowful eye, upon the forbidden region where it would
be so blissful to soar; for, in fastening a chain to their feet, the
law did not bandage their eyes, and nature gave them wings; if the wings
tear the chain asunder, shame and misfortune await them! Society
will never forgive the heart that catches a glimpse of the joys it is
unacquainted with; even a brief hour in that paradise has to be expiated
by implacable social damnation and its everlasting flames.

CHAPTER XIV. GERFAUT'S ALLEGORY

There almost always comes a moment when a woman, in her combat against
love, is obliged to call falsehood to the help of duty. Madame de
Bergenheim had entered this terrible period, in which virtue, doubting
its own strength, does not blush to resort to other resources. At the
moment when Octave, a man of experience, was seeking assistance in
exciting her jealousy, she was meditating a plan of defence founded upon
deceit. In order to take away all hope from her lover, she pretended a
sudden affection for her husband, and in spite of her secret remorse
she persisted in this role for two days; but during the night her tears
expiated her treachery. Christian greeted his wife's virtuous coquetry
with the gratitude and eagerness of a husband who has been deprived of
love more than he likes. Gerfaut was very indignant at the sight of this
perfidious manoeuvre, the intention of which he immediately divined; and
his rage wanted only provocation to break out in full force.

One evening they were all gathered in the drawing-room with the
exception of Aline, whom a reprimand from Mademoiselle de Corandeuil
had exiled to her room. The old lady, stretched out in her chair,
had decided to be unfaithful to her whist in favor of conversation.
Marillac, leaning his elbows upon a round table, was negligently
sketching some political caricatures, at that time very much the
fashion, and particularly agreeable to the Legitimist party. Christian,
who was seated near his wife, whose hand he was pressing with caressing
familiarity, passed from one subject to another, and showed in his
conversation the overwhelming conceit of a happy man who regards his