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Petty Troubles of Married Life, essay(s) by Honore de Balzac |
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Part 1 - The Art Of Being A Victim |
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_ Part First The Art Of Being A Victim. On and after the Revolution, our vanquished Caroline adopts an infernal system, the effect of which is to make you regret your victory every hour. She becomes the opposition! Should Adolphe have one more such triumph, he would appear before the Court of Assizes, accused of having smothered his wife between two mattresses, like Shakespeare's Othello. Caroline puts on the air of a martyr; her submission is positively killing. On every occasion she assassinates Adolphe with a "Just as you like!" uttered in tones whose sweetness is something fearful. No elegiac poet could compete with Caroline, who utters elegy upon elegy: elegy in action, elegy in speech: her smile is elegiac, her silence is elegiac, her gestures are elegiac. Here are a few examples, wherein every household will find some of its impressions recorded:
"Yes, love." AFTER DINNER. "What, not dressed yet, Caroline?" exclaims Adolphe, who has just made his appearance, magnificently equipped. He finds Caroline arrayed in a gown fit for an elderly lady of strong conversational powers, a black moire with an old-fashioned fan-waist. Flowers, too badly imitated to deserve the name of artificial, give a gloomy aspect to a head of hair which the chambermaid has carelessly arranged. Caroline's gloves have already seen wear and tear. "I am ready, my dear." "What, in that dress?" "I have no other. A new dress would have cost three hundred francs." "Why did you not tell me?" "I, ask you for anything, after what has happened!" "I'll go alone," says Adolphe, unwilling to be humiliated in his wife. "I dare say you are very glad to," returns Caroline, in a captious tone, "it's plain enough from the way you are got up."
"Sir," says the parlor servant in a whisper to his master, "the cook doesn't know what on earth to do!" "What's the matter?" "You said nothing to her, sir: and she has only two side-dishes, the beef, a chicken, a salad and vegetables." "Caroline, didn't you give the necessary orders?" "How did I know that you had company, and besides I can't take it upon myself to give orders here! You delivered me from all care on that point, and I thank heaven for it every day of my life."
"Ah, so you are working those slippers for your dear Adolphe?" Adolphe is standing before the fire-place as complacently as may be. "No, madame, it's for a tradesman who pays me for them: like the convicts, my labor enables me to treat myself to some little comforts." Adolphe reddens; he can't very well beat his wife, and Madame de Fischtaminel looks at him as much as to say, "What does this mean?" "You cough a good deal, my darling," says Madame de Fischtaminel. "Oh!" returns Caroline, "what is life to me?"
"There is nothing easier than for a woman to be happy," says Caroline in reply to a woman who complains of her husband. "Tell us your secret, madame," says M. de Fischtaminel agreeably. "A woman has nothing to do but to meddle with nothing to consider herself as the first servant in the house or as a slave that the master takes care of, to have no will of her own, and never to make an observation: thus all goes well." This, delivered in a bitter tone and with tears in her voice, alarms Adolphe, who looks fixedly at his wife. "You forget, madame, the happiness of telling about one's happiness," he returns, darting at her a glance worthy of the tyrant in a melodrama. Quite satisfied with having shown herself assassinated or on the point of being so, Caroline turns her head aside, furtively wipes away a tear, and says: "Happiness cannot be described!" This incident, as they say at the Chamber, leads to nothing, but Ferdinand looks upon his cousin as an angel about to be offered up.
"Ah, too happy they!" exclaims Caroline, as if she were foretelling the manner of her death.
"Why, what's the matter, children?" asks the mother-in-law; "you seem to be at swords' points." "Oh, dear me," says Adolphe, "nothing but that Caroline has had the management of the house and didn't manage it right, that's all." "She got into debt, I suppose?" "Yes, dearest mamma." "Look here, Adolphe," says the mother-in-law, after having waited to be left alone with her son, "would you prefer to have my daughter magnificently dressed, to have everything go on smoothly, _without its costing you anything_?" Imagine, if you can, the expression of Adolphe's physiognomy, as he hears _this declaration of woman's rights_!
"Ah! you have a charming husband!" says Madame Deschars. Adolphe tosses his head proudly, and looks at Caroline. "My husband, madame! I cost that gentleman nothing, thank heaven! All I have was given me by my mother." Adolphe turns suddenly about and goes to talk with Madame de Fischtaminel.
"How much have you spent this year, dear?" "I don't know." "Examine your accounts." Adolphe discovers that he has spent a third more than during Caroline's worst year. "And I've cost you nothing for my dress," she adds.
"What's the matter?" "Nothing, I'm nervous." "I didn't know you were subject to that." "O Adolphe, you won't see anything! Look, my rings come off my fingers: you don't love me any more--I'm a burden to you--" She weeps, she won't listen, she weeps afresh at every word Adolphe utters. "Suppose you take the management of the house back again?" "Ah!" she exclaims, rising sharply to her feet, like a spring figure in a box, "now that you've had enough of your experience! Thank you! Do you suppose it's money that I want? Singular method, yours, of pouring balm upon a wounded heart. No, go away." "Very well, just as you like, Caroline." This "just as you like" is the first expression of indifference towards a wife: and Caroline sees before her an abyss towards which she had been walking of her own free will. _ |
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