finished_summaries/cliffnotes/The Red and the Black/section_17_part_0.txt
The Red and the Black.part 2.chapters 29-32
chapters 29-32
{"name": "Chapters 29-32", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20201128052739/https://www.cliffsnotes.com/literature/r/the-red-and-the-black/summary-and-analysis/part-2-chapters-2932", "summary": "Mme. de Fervaques is beginning to respond and finally answers Julien's letters. Ultimately, she is writing him a letter daily, which Julien doesn't open and answers with the letters from Korasov. Mathilde, finding the present state of affairs unbearable, encounters Julien one day in the library. She reproaches him from having neglected her, his wife, then collapses in tears. Julien initiates no action in the way of response. Mathilde then reproaches herself for having forgotten her pride, and finding Mme. de Fervaques' letters to Julien all unopened, she is beside herself with rage, insults him, then confessing her love, begs for mercy, and faints at his feet. Julien has triumphed. Mathilde asks Julien if Mme. de Fervaques has shown him proof of her love. Julien answers no, indirectly and diplomatically. He demands guarantees from Mathilde that she will not continue this cruel game with him. She has nothing but the \"intensity of her love and her unhappiness if he no longer loves her.\" Julien withdraws respectfully, requesting time to reflect. Mathilde has found happiness in renouncing her pride. Julien feels obligated to appear in Mme. de Fervaques' box at the opera. The latter mistakenly believes that the tears in Julien's eyes are shed for her. Julien catches sight of Mathilde in another box, weeping. Going to her box, Julien hears Mathilde murmur tearfully \"guarantees.\" Giving himself over to the expansive joy of his love in the solitude of his room, Julien hits upon a new stratagem to perpetuate Mathilde's love: He must frighten her. The next day, she offers to elope with him. He rejects the offer, reminding her that this mood would soon pass. Walking in the garden with Mathilde, Julien confesses how he used to watch for her there, but he then denies immediately the truth of this avowal. He continues to write to Mme. de Fervaques despite Mathilde's disapproval. Mathilde is now truly in love. She acts recklessly, but Julien maintains caution. She announces triumphantly, to Julien's consternation, that she is pregnant and that this is the guarantee which he demanded. She insists on informing her father but defers to Julien's view that it would be better to delay in writing the letter. In her letter, Mathilde assumes all blame and expresses the hope that her father will forgive both of them. She announces her intention of marrying Julien, and she suggests that their future situation will depend upon how M. de la Mole receives this news.", "analysis": "These chapters narrate the victory that Julien wins over Mathilde as his stratagem succeeds. It is here that the Cornelian nature of their love is most fully exemplified: They are nearest when farthest apart. Julien can force an avowal from Mathilde only by refusing to respond in any way to her successive anger, tears, scorn, then tenderness. Note that Julien does not utter a word in this interview. He must not betray his extreme joy, and they seem condemned to love each other separately. This scene in Chapter 29 is the exact antithesis of a normal love scene. Instead of mutual tenderness and intimacy leading to a reciprocal avowal, there is a progression in hostility and silence leading to an avowal of defeat and submission. Mathilde's initial eruption is spontaneous -- -she reproaches Julien for having neglected her. Her next reaction is equally spontaneous but results from the first -- she has humiliated herself and weeps tears of shame. Julien proves that he has progressed in controlling his sensibility by treating her with impassive coldness. His lack of response intensifies her shame to the point that she explodes in anger. Opening the drawer and finding the letters unopened, Mathilde next resorts, in her uncontrollable rage, to insults. Instantly repenting, however, she avows her love and faints. Julien can only enjoy his love as a triumph when his victim is reduced to unconsciousness as an object. This scene no doubt inspired Proust in his demonstration of the impossibility of possessing another through love. Stendhal's portrayal of Mathilde in this scene is an excellent example of the author's unique character presentation. The reader seems to witness at first hand a process of becoming that is simultaneous with the character's acts. It has been said that the words as Stendhal uses them do more than they say. Mathilde faints because she is one of those superior beings whose emotional makeup is so intense that beyond a certain point, it shuts out reality. Julien reacted similarly in his initial interview with Pirard. Note that Mme. de Fervaques remains hypocritical, even toward herself. She does not admit to herself that she is beginning to love Julien, and since her pride would suffer by addressing letters to him, she is reduced to requesting that he give her self-addressed envelopes. There is a faint glimpse of the role played by Mme. de Renal as confidante to Elise; however, Stendhal chooses not to exploit it. Mme. de Fervaques confides in Mathilde and asks her advice on how to deal with Julien. Stendhal utilizes chapter division to isolate and put into relief a scene, or part of a scene, as is evidenced by the artificial chapter division between 29 and 30. The latter in fact continues the previous scene, but the dramatic effect inherent in 29 would not have been otherwise achieved. Chapter 30 rounds out Julien's victory. He continues to exert incomparable self-control to the point of hypocritically telling Mathilde that he loves Mme. de Fervaques. Finally, he comes to the conscious awareness of the necessity of maintaining a distance in order to continue to be loved by Mathilde. The reader has long since been aware of this fact. The short scene that concludes Chapter 30 represents a different angle of vision from which to see the situation between Julien and Mathilde. They appear at the opera separately, yet in their separateness they are similarly affected. Both are reduced to tears; both are enjoying their love vicariously by association with the spectacle itself. Julien is permitted to maintain the superiority of the unobserved observer. The glance that the eyes bestow is a means of communication between the elect, believes Stendhal. Thus, he gives much importance to the role of Julien's eyes in his adventures. In Chapter 31, Julien hides his eyes as he sits near Mathilde at the opera lest they betray his true feelings. Note in Stendhal's intervention to express approval of Julien's progress the use of the present tense and \"may.\" These are intended to convince the reader of the veracity of the narrative and is a much abused device to which eighteenth- and nineteenth-century novelists resort. The result is the complicity so vehemently denounced by the \"new French novelists\": The omniscient novelist would pass off fiction as truth; and in this complicity, the public agrees to pretend that what it is reading is indeed fact. It might be argued that Stendhal in particular needs to establish such a complicity since his practice of withholding proof of his hero's superiority might alienate the reader. Stendhal prefers the garden as a setting for amorous adventures. Julien's affair with Mme. de Renal began and progressed in the garden. The garden scene in Chapter 31 evokes Julien's solitary anguish as he watched for Mathilde when he thought he wasn't loved. It is also the setting of the reversal of a previous meeting between them: Mathilde tortured Julien to maintain her ascendancy by telling him of her past loves; now, Julien, momentarily giving way to an expression of his \"past\" love for her, uses the same stratagem to maintain his present supremacy over Mathilde. He brutally denies the veracity of the words he has just spoken. Julien is testing Mathilde to ascertain to what degree his unchecked sincerity has dampened her love. His own \"guarantee\" consists of continuing to write the letters. He realizes that he must keep Mathilde in constant doubt as to whether he loves her. Chapter 32 presents at once the culmination of their conflict, the transformation of Mathilde's love, and it puts into motion the subject matter to be fully developed in the next few chapters. Circumstances somewhat beyond Julien's control seem to give a new direction to their relationship. Things are getting out of hand for Julien. Mathilde has accepted him as her master, it is true. Her proud nature requires that she continue the struggle elsewhere, however. First, by her reckless, almost promiscuous conduct with a social inferior, she flouts respectability. Mathilde's pregnancy is the beginning of the end for Julien. For Mathilde, it is the renewal in a different form of her dream of heroism and martyrdom. Her duty, she informs Julien, is to inform her father of this turn of events, and joyfully, she sees this heroic act as a way of proving her merit in Julien's eyes and as a way to compete with him in bravery. Julien has succeeded in convincing Mathilde that her love for him is stronger than his for her. This satisfies Mathilde, giving her a kind of superiority over him. The letter to her father, her \"best friend,\" is certainly consistent with Mathilde's character. Love is for her so intimately associated with the infliction of pain on herself and others that she logically turns to the person she loves best after Julien to initiate a new conflict. A \"great soul\" requires that others of the elect participate in a kind of ritualistic sacrifice. Fabrice in The Charterhouse of Parma has a similar demanding relationship with the other elect in that novel. The next three chapters recount a struggle of wills between Mathilde and M. de la Mole."}
CHAPTER LIX

ENNUI


        Sacrificing one's self to one's passions, let it pass;
        but sacrificing one's self to passions which one has not
        got! Oh! melancholy nineteenth century!
                                            _Girodet_.


Madame de Fervaques had begun reading Julien's long letters without any
pleasure, but she now began to think about them; one thing, however,
grieved her. "What a pity that M. Sorel was not a real priest! He could
then be admitted to a kind of intimacy; but in view of that cross,
and that almost lay dress, one is exposed to cruel questions and what
is one to answer?" She did not finish the train of thought, "Some
malicious woman friend may think, and even spread it about that he is
some lower middle-class cousin or other, a relative of my father, some
tradesman who has been decorated by the National Guard." Up to the
time which she had seen Julien, madame de Fervaque's greatest pleasure
had been writing the word marechale after her name. Consequently a
morbid parvenu vanity, which was ready to take umbrage at everything,
combatted the awakening of her interest in him. "It would be so easy
for me," said the marechale, "to make him a grand vicar in some diocese
near Paris! but plain M. Sorel, and what is more, a man who is the
secretary of M. de la Mole! It is heart-breaking."

For the first time in her life this soul, which was afraid of
everything, was moved by an interest which was alien to its own
pretensions to rank and superiority. Her old porter noticed that
whenever he brought a letter from this handsome young man, who always
looked so sad, he was certain to see that absent, discontented
expression, which the marechale always made a point of assuming on the
entry of any of her servants, immediately disappear. The boredom of a
mode of life whose ambitions were concentrated on impressing the public
without her having at heart any real faculty of enjoyment for that kind
of success, had become so intolerable since she had begun to think of
Julien that, all that was necessary to prevent her chambermaids being
bullied for a whole day, was that their mistress should have passed
an hour in the society of this strange young man on the evening of
the preceding day. His budding credit was proof against very cleverly
written anonymous letters. It was in vain that Tanbeau supplied M. de
Luz, de Croisenois, de Caylus, with two or three very clever calumnies
which these gentlemen were only too glad to spread, without making
too many enquiries of the actual truth of the charges. The marechale,
whose temperament was not calculated to be proof against these vulgar
expedients related her doubts to Mathilde, and was always consoled by
her.

One day, madame de Fervaques, after having asked three times if there
were any letters for her, suddenly decided to answer Julien. It was a
case of the triumph of ennui. On reaching the second letter in his name
the marechale almost felt herself pulled up sharp by the unbecomingness
of writing with her own hand so vulgar an address as to M. Sorel, care
of M. le Marquis de la Mole.

"You must bring me envelopes with your address on," she said very drily
to Julien in the evening. "Here I am appointed lover and valet in one,"
thought Julien, and he bowed, amused himself by wrinkling his face up
like Arsene, the old valet of the marquis.

He brought the envelopes that very evening, and he received the third
letter very early on the following day: he read five or six lines at
the beginning, and two or three towards the end. There were four pages
of a small and very close writing. The lady gradually developed the
sweet habit of writing nearly every day. Julien answered by faithful
copies of the Russian letters; and such is the advantage of the
bombastic style that madame de Fervaques was not a bit astonished by
the lack of connection between his answers and her letters. How gravely
irritated would her pride have been if the little Tanbeau who had
constituted himself a voluntary spy on all Julien's movements had been
able to have informed her that all these letters were left unsealed and
thrown haphazard into Julien's drawer.

One morning the porter was bringing into the library a letter to him
from the marechale. Mathilde met the man, saw the letter together with
the address in Julien's handwriting. She entered the library as the
porter was leaving it, the letter was still on the edge of the table.
Julien was very busy with his work and had not yet put it in his drawer.

"I cannot endure this," exclaimed Mathilde, as she took possession
of the letter, "you are completely forgetting me, me your wife, your
conduct is awful, monsieur."

At these words her pride, shocked by the awful unseemliness of her
proceeding, prevented her from speaking. She burst into tears, and soon
seemed to Julien scarcely able to breathe.

Julien was so surprised and embarrassed that he did not fully
appreciate how ideally fortunate this scene was for himself. He helped
Mathilde to sit down; she almost abandoned herself in his arms.

The first minute in which he noticed this movement, he felt an extreme
joy. Immediately afterwards, he thought of Korasoff: "I may lose
everything by a single word."

The strain of carrying out his tactics was so great that his arms
stiffened. "I dare not even allow myself to press this supple, charming
frame to my heart, or she will despise me or treat me badly. What an
awful character!" And while he cursed Mathilde's character, he loved
her a hundred times more. He thought he had a queen in his arms.

Julien's impassive coldness intensified the anguished pride which was
lacerating the soul of mademoiselle de la Mole. She was far from having
the necessary self-possession to try and read in his eyes what he felt
for her at that particular moment. She could not make up her mind to
look at him. She trembled lest she might encounter a contemptuous
expression.

Seated motionless on the library divan, with her head turned in the
opposite direction to Julien, she was a prey to the most poignant
anguish that pride and love can inflict upon a human soul. What an
awful step had she just slipped into taking! "It has been reserved
for me, unhappy woman that I am, to see my most unbecoming advances
rebuffed! and rebuffed by whom?" added her maddened and wounded pride;
"rebuffed by a servant of my father's! That's more than I will put up
with," she said aloud, and rising in a fury, she opened the drawer of
Julien's table, which was two yards in front of her.

She stood petrified with horror when she saw eight or ten unopened
letters, completely like the one the porter had just brought up. She
recognised Julien's handwriting, though more or less disguised, on all
the addresses.

"So," she cried, quite beside herself, "you are not only on good terms
with her, but you actually despise her. You, a nobody, despise madame
la marechale de Fervaques!"

"Oh, forgive me, my dear," she added, throwing herself on her knees;
"despise me if you wish, but love me. I cannot live without your love."
And she fell down in a dead faint.

"So our proud lady is lying at my feet," said Julien to himself.





CHAPTER LX

A BOX AT THE BOUFFES


   As the blackest sky
Foretells the heaviest tempest
               _Don Juan, c._ 1. _st_.76.


In the midst of these great transports Julien felt more surprised than
happy. Mathilde's abuse proved to him the shrewdness of the Russian
tactics. "'Few words, few deeds,' that is my one method of salvation."
He picked up Mathilde, and without saying a word, put her back on the
divan. She was gradually being overcome by tears.

In order to keep herself in countenance, she took madame de Fervaques'
letters in her hands, and slowly broke the seals. She gave a noticeable
nervous movement when she recognised the marechale's handwriting. She
turned over the pages of these letters without reading them. Most of
them were six pages.

"At least answer me," Mathilde said at last, in the most supplicatory
tone, but without daring to look at Julien: "You know how proud I am.
It is the misfortune of my position, and of my temperament, too, I
confess. Has madame de Fervaques robbed me of your heart? Has she made
the sacrifices to which my fatal love swept me?"

A dismal silence was all Julien's answer. "By what right," he thought,
"does she ask me to commit an indiscretion unworthy of an honest man?"
Mathilde tried to read the letters; her eyes were so wet with tears
that it was impossible for her to do so. She had been unhappy for a
month past, but this haughty soul had been very far from owning its own
feelings even to itself. Chance alone had brought about this explosion.
For one instant jealousy and love had won a victory over pride. She
was sitting on the divan, and very near him. He saw her hair and her
alabaster neck. For a moment he forgot all he owed to himself. He
passed his arm around her waist, and clasped her almost to his breast.

She slowly turned her head towards him. He was astonished by the
extreme anguish in her eyes. There was not a trace of their usual
expression.

Julien felt his strength desert him. So great was the deadly pain of
the courageous feat which he was imposing on himself.

"Those eyes will soon express nothing but the coldest disdain," said
Julien to himself, "if I allow myself to be swept away by the happiness
of loving her." She, however, kept repeatedly assuring him at this
moment, in a hushed voice, and in words which she had scarcely the
strength to finish, of all her remorse for those steps which her
inordinate pride had dictated.

"I, too, have pride," said Julien to her, in a scarcely articulate
voice, while his features portrayed the lowest depths of physical
prostration.

Mathilde turned round sharply towards him. Hearing his voice was a
happiness which she had given up hoping. At this moment her only
thought of her haughtiness was to curse it. She would have liked to
have found out some abnormal and incredible actions, in order to prove
to him the extent to which she adored him and detested herself.

"That pride is probably the reason," continued Julien, "why you singled
me out for a moment. My present courageous and manly firmness is
certainly the reason why you respect me. I may entertain love for the
marechale."

Mathilde shuddered; a strange expression came into her eyes. She was
going to hear her sentence pronounced. This shudder did not escape
Julien. He felt his courage weaken.

"Ah," he said to himself, as he listened to the sound of the vain words
which his mouth was articulating, as he thought it were some strange
sound, "if I could only cover those pale cheeks with kisses without
your feeling it."

"I may entertain love for the marechale," he continued, while his voice
became weaker and weaker, "but I certainly have no definite proof of
her interest in me."

Mathilde looked at him. He supported that look. He hoped, at any rate,
that his expression had not betrayed him. He felt himself bathed in a
love that penetrated even into the most secret recesses of his heart.
He had never adored her so much; he was almost as mad as Mathilde. If
she had mustered sufficient self-possession and courage to manoeuvre, he
would have abandoned all his play-acting, and fallen at her feet. He
had sufficient strength to manage to continue speaking: "Ah, Korasoff,"
he exclaimed mentally, "why are you not here? How I need a word from
you to guide me in my conduct." During this time his voice was saying,

"In default of any other sentiment, gratitude would be sufficient to
attach me to the marechale. She has been indulgent to me; she has
consoled me when I have been despised. I cannot put unlimited faith
in certain appearances which are, no doubt, extremely flattering, but
possibly very fleeting."

"Oh, my God!" exclaimed Mathilde.

"Well, what guarantee will you give me?" replied Julien with a sharp,
firm intonation, which seemed to abandon for a moment the prudent forms
of diplomacy. "What guarantee, what god will warrant that the position
to which you seem inclined to restore me at the present moment will
last more than two days?"

"The excess of my love, and my unhappiness if you do not love me," she
said to him, taking his hands and turning towards him.

The spasmodic movement which she had just made had slightly displaced
her tippet; Julien caught a view of her charming shoulders. Her
slightly dishevelled hair recalled a delicious memory....

He was on the point of succumbing. "One imprudent word," he said to
himself, "and I have to start all over again that long series of days
which I have passed in despair. Madame de Renal used to find reasons
for doing what her heart dictated. This young girl of high society
never allows her heart to be moved except when she has proved to
herself by sound logic that it ought to be moved."

He saw this proof in the twinkling of an eye, and in the twinkling
of an eye too, he regained his courage. He took away his hands which
Mathilde was pressing in her own, and moved a little away from her with
a marked respect.

Human courage could not go further. He then busied himself with
putting together madame de Fervaque's letters which were spread out on
the divan, and it was with all the appearance of extreme politeness
that he cruelly exploited the psychological moment by adding,

"Mademoiselle de la Mole will allow me to reflect over all this." He
went rapidly away and left the library; she heard him shut all the
doors one after the other.

"The monster is not the least bit troubled," she said to herself. "But
what am I saying? Monster? He is wise, prudent, good. It is I myself
who have committed more wrong than one can imagine."

This point of view lasted. Mathilde was almost happy today, for she
gave herself up to love unreservedly. One would have said that this
soul had never been disturbed by pride (and what pride!)

She shuddered with horror when a lackey announced madame le Fervaques
into the salon in the evening. The man's voice struck her as sinister.
She could not endure the sight of the marechale, and stopped suddenly.
Julien who had felt little pride over his painful victory, had feared
to face her, and had not dined at the Hotel de la Mole.

His love and his happiness rapidly increased in proportion to the time
that elapsed from the moment of the battle. He was blaming himself
already. "How could I resist her?" he said to himself. "Suppose she
were to go and leave off loving me! One single moment may change that
haughty soul, and I must admit that I have treated her awfully."

In the evening he felt that it was absolutely necessary to put in
an appearance at the Bouffes in madame de Fervaques' box. She had
expressly invited him. Mathilde would be bound to know of his presence
or his discourteous absence. In spite of the clearness of this logic,
he could not at the beginning of the evening bring himself to plunge
into society. By speaking he would lose half his happiness. Ten o'clock
struck and it was absolutely necessary to show himself. Luckily he
found the marechale's box packed with women, and was relegated to a
place near the door where he was completely hidden by the hats. This
position saved him from looking ridiculous; Caroline's divine notes of
despair in the _Matrimonio Segreto_ made him burst into tears. Madame
de Fervaques saw these tears. They represented so great a contrast
with the masculine firmness of his usual expression that the soul
of the old-fashioned lady, saturated as it had been for many years
with all the corroding acid of parvenu haughtiness, was none the less
touched. Such remnants of a woman's heart as she still possessed
impelled her to speak: she wanted to enjoy the sound of his voice at
this moment.

"Have you seen the de la Mole ladies?" she said to him. "They are
in the third tier." Julien immediately craned out over the theatre,
leaning politely enough on the front of the box. He saw Mathilde; her
eyes were shining with tears.

"And yet it is not their Opera day," thought Julien; "how eager she
must be!"

Mathilde had prevailed on her mother to come to the Bouffes in spite
of the inconveniently high tier of the box, which a lady friend of the
family had hastened to offer her. She wanted to see if Julien would
pass the evening with the marechale.





CHAPTER LXI

FRIGHTEN HER


        So this is the fine miracle of your civilisation; you
        have turned love into an ordinary business.--_Barnave_.


Julien rushed into madame de la Mole's box. His eyes first met the
tearful eyes of Mathilde; she was crying without reserve. There were
only insignificant personages present, the friend who had leant her
box, and some men whom she knew. Mathilde placed her hand on Julien's;
she seemed to have forgotten all fear of her mother. Almost stifled as
she was by her tears, she said nothing but this one word: "Guarantees!"

"So long as I don't speak to her," said Julien to himself. He was
himself very moved, and concealed his eyes with his hand as best
he could under the pretext of avoiding the dazzling light of the
third tier of boxes. "If I speak she may suspect the excess of my
emotion, the sound of my voice will betray me. All may yet be lost."
His struggles were more painful than they had been in the morning,
his soul had had the time to become moved. He had been frightened at
seeing Mathilde piqued with vanity. Intoxicated as he was with love and
pleasure he resolved not to speak.

In my view this is one of the finest traits in his character, an
individual capable of such an effort of self-control may go far si
_fata sinant_.

Mademoiselle de la Mole insisted on taking Julien back to the hotel.
Luckily it was raining a great deal, but the marquise had him placed
opposite her, talked to him incessantly, and prevented him saying a
single word to her daughter. One might have thought that the marquise
was nursing Julien's happiness for him; no longer fearing to lose
everything through his excessive emotion, he madly abandoned himself to
his happiness.

Shall I dare to say that when he went back to his room Julien fell
on his knees and covered with kisses the love letters which prince
Korasoff had given him.

"How much I owe you, great man," he exclaimed in his madness. Little
by little he regained his self-possession. He compared himself to a
general who had just won a great battle. "My advantage is definite and
immense," he said to himself, "but what will happen to-morrow? One
instant may ruin everything."

With a passionate gesture he opened the _Memoirs_ which Napoleon had
dictated at St. Helena and for two long hours forced himself to read
them. Only his eyes read; no matter, he made himself do it. During this
singular reading his head and his heart rose to the most exalted level
and worked unconsciously. "Her heart is very different from madame de
Renal's," he said to himself, but he did not go further.

"Frighten her!" he suddenly exclaimed, hurling away the book. "The
enemy will only obey me in so far as I frighten him, but then he will
not dare to show contempt for me."

Intoxicated with joy he walked up and down his little room. In point of
fact his happiness was based rather on pride than on love.

"Frighten her!" he repeated proudly, and he had cause to be proud.

"Madame de Renal always doubted even in her happiest moments if my
love was equal to her own. In this case I have to subjugate a demon,
consequently I must subjugate her." He knew quite well that Mathilde
would be in the library at eight o'clock in the morning of the
following day. He did not appear before nine o'clock. He was burning
with love, but his head dominated his heart.

Scarcely a single minute passed without his repeating to himself. "Keep
her obsessed by this great doubt. Does he love me?" Her own brilliant
position, together with the flattery of all who speak to her, tend a
little too much to make her reassure herself.

He found her sitting on the divan pale and calm, but apparently
completely incapable of making a single movement. She held out her
hand,

"Dear one, it is true I have offended you, perhaps you are angry with
me."

Julien had not been expecting this simple tone. He was on the point of
betraying himself.

"You want guarantees, my dear, she added after a silence which she had
hoped would be broken. Take me away, let us leave for London. I shall
be ruined, dishonoured for ever." She had the courage to take her hand
away from Julien to cover her eyes with it.

All her feelings of reserve and feminine virtue had come back into her
soul. "Well, dishonour me," she said at last with a sigh, "that will be
a guarantee."

"I was happy yesterday, because I had the courage to be severe with
myself," thought Julien. After a short silence he had sufficient
control over his heart to say in an icy tone,

"Once we are on the road to London, once you are dishonoured, to employ
your own expression, who will answer that you will still love me? that
my very presence in the post-chaise will not seem importunate? I am not
a monster; to have ruined your reputation will only make me still more
unhappy. It is not your position in society which is the obstacle, it
is unfortunately your own character. Can you yourself guarantee that
you will love me for eight days?"

"Ah! let her love me for eight days, just eight days," whispered
Julien to himself, "and I will die of happiness. What do I care for
the future, what do I care for life? And yet if I wish that divine
happiness can commence this very minute, it only depends on me."

Mathilde saw that he was pensive.

"So I am completely unworthy of you," she said to him, taking his hand.

Julien kissed her, but at the same time the iron hand of duty gripped
his heart. If she sees how much I adore her I shall lose her. And
before leaving her arms, he had reassumed all that dignity which is
proper to a man.

He managed on this and the following days to conceal his inordinate
happiness. There were moments when he even refused himself the pleasure
of clasping her in his arms. At other times the delirium of happiness
prevailed over all the counsels of prudence.

He had been accustomed to station himself near a bower of honeysuckle
in the garden arranged in such a way so as to conceal the ladder when
he had looked up at Mathilde's blind in the distance, and lamented her
inconstancy. A very big oak tree was quite near, and the trunk of that
tree prevented him from being seen by the indiscreet.

As he passed with Mathilde over this very place which recalled his
excessive unhappiness so vividly, the contrast between his former
despair and his present happiness proved too much for his character.
Tears inundated his eyes, and he carried his sweetheart's hand to his
lips: "It was here I used to live in my thoughts of you, it was from
here that I used to look at that blind, and waited whole hours for the
happy moment when I would see that hand open it."

His weakness was unreserved. He portrayed the extremity of his former
despair in genuine colours which could not possibly have been invented.
Short interjections testified to that present happiness which had put
an end to that awful agony.

"My God, what am I doing?" thought Julien, suddenly recovering himself.
"I am ruining myself."

In his excessive alarm he thought that he already detected a diminution
of the love in mademoiselle de la Mole's eyes. It was an illusion, but
Julien's face suddenly changed its expression and became overspread
by a mortal pallor. His eyes lost their fire, and an expression of
haughtiness touched with malice soon succeeded to his look of the most
genuine and unreserved love.

"But what is the matter with you, my dear," said Mathilde to him, both
tenderly and anxiously.

"I am lying," said Julien irritably, "and I am lying to you. I am
reproaching myself for it, and yet God knows that I respect you
sufficiently not to lie to you. You love me, you are devoted to me, and
I have no need of praises in order to please you."

"Great heavens! are all the charming things you have been telling me
for the last two minutes mere phrases?"

"And I reproach myself for it keenly, dear one. I once made them up for
a woman who loved me, and bored me--it is the weakness of my character.
I denounce myself to you, forgive me."

Bitter tears streamed over Mathilde's cheeks.

"As soon as some trifle offends me and throws me back on my
meditation," continued Julien, "my abominable memory, which I curse at
this very minute, offers me a resource, and I abuse it."

"So I must have slipped, without knowing it, into some action which has
displeased you," said Mathilde with a charming simplicity.

"I remember one day that when you passed near this honeysuckle you
picked a flower, M. de Luz took it from you and you let him keep it. I
was two paces away."

"M. de Luz? It is impossible," replied Mathilde with all her natural
haughtiness. "I do not do things like that."

"I am sure of it," Julien replied sharply.

"Well, my dear, it is true," said Mathilde, as she sadly lowered her
eyes. She knew positively that many months had elapsed since she had
allowed M. de Luz to do such a thing.

Julien looked at her with ineffable tenderness, "No," he said to
himself, "she does not love me less."

In the evening she rallied him with a laugh on his fancy for madame de
Fervaques. "Think of a bourgeois loving a parvenu, those are perhaps
the only type of hearts that my Julien cannot make mad with love. She
has made you into a real dandy," she said playing with his hair.

During the period when he thought himself scorned by Mathilde, Julien
had become one of the best dressed men in Paris. He had, moreover,
a further advantage over other dandies, in as much as once he had
finished dressing he never gave a further thought to his appearance.

One thing still piqued Mathilde, Julien continued to copy out the
Russian letters and send them to the marechale.





CHAPTER LXII

THE TIGER


        Alas, why these things and not other
        things?--_Beaumarchais_.


An English traveller tells of the intimacy in which he lived with a
tiger. He had trained it and would caress it, but he always kept a
cocked pistol on his table.

Julien only abandoned himself to the fulness of his happiness in those
moments when Mathilde could not read the expression in his eyes. He
scrupulously performed his duty of addressing some harsh word to her
from time to time.

When Mathilde's sweetness, which he noticed with some surprise,
together with the completeness of her devotion were on the point of
depriving him of all self-control, he was courageous enough to leave
her suddenly.

Mathilde loved for the first time in her life.

Life had previously always dragged along at a tortoise pace, but now it
flew.

As, however, her pride required to find a vent in some way or other,
she wished to expose herself to all the dangers in which her love could
involve her. It was Julien who was prudent, and it was only when it was
a question of danger that she did not follow her own inclination; but
submissive, and almost humble as she was when with him, she only showed
additional haughtiness to everyone in the house who came near her,
whether relatives or friends.

In the evening she would call Julien to her in the salon in the
presence of sixty people, and have a long and private conversation with
him.

The little Tanbeau installed himself one day close to them. She
requested him to go and fetch from the library the volume of Smollet
which deals with the revolution of 1688, and when he hesitated, added
with an expression of insulting haughtiness, which was a veritable balm
to Julien's soul, "Don't hurry."

"Have you noticed that little monster's expression?" he said to her.

"His uncle has been in attendance in this salon for ten or twelve
years, otherwise I would have had him packed off immediately."

Her behaviour towards MM. de Croisenois, de Luz, etc., though outwardly
perfectly polite, was in reality scarcely less provocative. Mathilde
keenly reproached herself for all the confidential remarks about them
which she had formerly made to Julien, and all the more so since she
did not dare to confess that she had exaggerated to him the, in fact,
almost absolutely innocent manifestations of interest of which these
gentlemen had been the objects. In spite of her best resolutions her
womanly pride invariably prevented her from saying to Julien, "It was
because I was talking to you that I found a pleasure in describing my
weakness in not drawing my hand away, when M. de Croisenois had placed
his on a marble table and had just touched it."

But now, as soon as one of these gentlemen had been speaking to her for
some moments, she found she had a question to put to Julien, and she
made this an excuse for keeping him by her side.

She discovered that she was _enceinte_ and joyfully informed Julien of
the fact.

"Do you doubt me now? Is it not a guarantee? I am your wife for ever."

This announcement struck Julien with profound astonishment. He was on
the point of forgetting the governing principle of his conduct. How am
I to be deliberately cold and insulting towards this poor young girl,
who is ruining herself for my sake. And if she looked at all ill,
he could not, even on those days when the terrible voice of wisdom
made itself heard, find the courage to address to her one of those
harsh remarks which his experience had found so indispensable to the
preservation of their love.

"I will write to my father," said Mathilde to him one day, "he is
more than a father to me, he is a friend; that being so, I think it
unworthy both of you and of myself to try and deceive him, even for a
single minute."

"Great heavens, what are you going to do?" said Julien in alarm.

"My duty," she answered with eyes shining with joy.

She thought she was showing more nobility than her lover.

"But he will pack me off in disgrace."

"It is his right to do so, we must respect it. I will give you my arm,
and we will go out by the front door in full daylight."

Julien was thunderstruck and requested her to put it off for a week.

"I cannot," she answered, "it is the voice of honour, I have seen my
duty, I must follow it, and follow it at once."

"Well, I order you to put it off," said Julien at last. "Your honour
is safe for the present. I am your husband. The position of us will be
changed by this momentous step. I too am within my rights. To-day is
Tuesday, next Tuesday is the duke de Retz's at home; when M. de la Mole
comes home in the evening the porter will give him the fatal letter.
His only thought is to make you a duchess, I am sure of it. Think of
his unhappiness."

"You mean, think of his vengeance?"

"It may be that I pity my benefactor, and am grieved at injuring him,
but I do not fear, and shall never fear anyone."

Mathilde yielded. This was the first occasion, since she had informed
Julien of her condition, that he had spoken to her authoritatively.
She had never loved him so much. The tender part of his soul had
found happiness in seizing on Mathilde's condition as an excuse
for refraining from his cruel remarks to her. The question of the
confession to M. de la Mole deeply moved him. Was he going to be
separated from Mathilde? And, however grieved she would be to see him
go, would she have a thought for him after his departure?

He was almost equally horrified by the thought of the justified
reproaches which the marquis might address to him.

In the evening he confessed to Mathilde the second reason for his
anxiety, and then led away by his love, confessed the first as well.

She changed colour. "Would it really make you unhappy," she said to
him, "to pass six months far away from me?"

"Infinitely so. It is the only thing in the world which terrifies me."

Mathilde was very happy. Julien had played his part so assiduously that
he had succeeded in making her think that she was the one of the two
who loved the more.

The fatal Tuesday arrived. When the marquis came in at midnight he
found a letter addressed to him, which was only to be opened himself
when no one was there:--

        "My father,

        "All social ties have been broken between us, only those
        of nature remain. Next to my husband, you are and always
        will be the being I shall always hold most dear. My
        eyes are full of tears, I am thinking of the pain that
        I am causing you, but if my shame was to be prevented
        from becoming public, and you were to be given time to
        reflect and act, I could not postpone any longer the
        confession that I owe you. If your affection for me,
        which I know is extremely deep, is good enough to grant
        me a small allowance, I will go and settle with my
        husband anywhere you like, in Switzerland, for instance.
        His name is so obscure that no one would recognize
        in Madame Sorel, the daughter-in-law of a Verrieres
        carpenter, your daughter. That is the name which I have
        so much difficulty in writing. I fear your wrath against
        Julien, it seems so justified. I shall not be a duchess,
        my father; but I knew it when I loved him; for I was
        the one who loved him first, it was I who seduced him.
        I have inherited from you too lofty a soul to fix my
        attention on what either is or appears to be vulgar. It
        is in vain that I thought of M. Croisenois with a view
        to pleasing you. Why did you place real merit under my
        eyes? You told me yourself on my return from Hyeres,
        'that young Sorel is the one person who amuses me,' the
        poor boy is as grieved as I am if it is possible, at the
        pain this letter will give you. I cannot prevent you
        being irritated as a father, but love me as a friend.

        "Julien respected me. If he sometimes spoke to me,
        it was only by reason of his deep gratitude towards
        yourself, for the natural dignity of his character
        induces him to keep to his official capacity in any
        answers he may make to anyone who is so much above
        him. He has a keen and instinctive appreciation of the
        difference of social rank. It was I (I confess it with a
        blush to my best friend, and I shall never make such a
        confession to anyone else) who clasped his arm one day
        in the garden.

        "Why need you be irritated with him, after twenty-four
        hours have elapsed? My own lapse is irreparable. If you
        insist on it, the assurance of his profound respect and
        of his desperate grief at having displeased you, can
        be conveyed to you through me. You need not see him at
        all, but I shall go and join him wherever he wishes.
        It is his right and it is my duty. He is the father of
        my child. If your kindness will go so far as to grant
        us six thousand francs to live on, I will receive it
        with gratitude; if not, Julien reckons on establishing
        himself at Besancon, where he will set up as a Latin and
        literature master. However low may have been the station
        from which he springs, I am certain he will raise
        himself. With him I do not fear obscurity. If there is
        a revolution, I am sure that he will play a prime part.
        Can you say as much for any of those who have asked
        for my hand? They have fine estates, you say. I cannot
        consider that circumstance a reason for admiring them.
        My Julien would attain a high position, even under the
        present regime, if he had a million and my father's
        protection...."

Mathilde, who knew that the marquis was a man who always abandoned
himself to his first impulse, had written eight pages.

"What am I to do?" said Julien to himself while M. de la Mole was
reading this letter. "Where is (first) my duty; (second) my interest?
My debt to him is immense. Without him I should have been a menial
scoundrel, and not even enough of a scoundrel to be hated and
persecuted by the others. He has made me a man of the world. The
villainous acts which I now have to do are (first) less frequent;
(second) less mean. That is more than as if he had given me a million.
I am indebted to him for this cross and the reputation of having
rendered those alleged diplomatic services, which have lifted me out of
the ruck.

"If he himself were writing instructions for my conduct, what would he
prescribe?"

Julien was sharply interrupted by M. de la Mole's old valet. "The
marquis wants to see you at once, dressed or not dressed." The valet
added in a low voice, as he walked by Julien's side, "He is beside
himself: look out!"






Chapters 29-32
Mme. de Fervaques is beginning to respond and finally answers Julien's letters. Ultimately, she is writing him a letter daily, which Julien doesn't open and answers with the letters from Korasov. Mathilde, finding the present state of affairs unbearable, encounters Julien one day in the library. She reproaches him from having neglected her, his wife, then collapses in tears. Julien initiates no action in the way of response. Mathilde then reproaches herself for having forgotten her pride, and finding Mme. de Fervaques' letters to Julien all unopened, she is beside herself with rage, insults him, then confessing her love, begs for mercy, and faints at his feet. Julien has triumphed. Mathilde asks Julien if Mme. de Fervaques has shown him proof of her love. Julien answers no, indirectly and diplomatically. He demands guarantees from Mathilde that she will not continue this cruel game with him. She has nothing but the "intensity of her love and her unhappiness if he no longer loves her." Julien withdraws respectfully, requesting time to reflect. Mathilde has found happiness in renouncing her pride. Julien feels obligated to appear in Mme. de Fervaques' box at the opera. The latter mistakenly believes that the tears in Julien's eyes are shed for her. Julien catches sight of Mathilde in another box, weeping. Going to her box, Julien hears Mathilde murmur tearfully "guarantees." Giving himself over to the expansive joy of his love in the solitude of his room, Julien hits upon a new stratagem to perpetuate Mathilde's love: He must frighten her. The next day, she offers to elope with him. He rejects the offer, reminding her that this mood would soon pass. Walking in the garden with Mathilde, Julien confesses how he used to watch for her there, but he then denies immediately the truth of this avowal. He continues to write to Mme. de Fervaques despite Mathilde's disapproval. Mathilde is now truly in love. She acts recklessly, but Julien maintains caution. She announces triumphantly, to Julien's consternation, that she is pregnant and that this is the guarantee which he demanded. She insists on informing her father but defers to Julien's view that it would be better to delay in writing the letter. In her letter, Mathilde assumes all blame and expresses the hope that her father will forgive both of them. She announces her intention of marrying Julien, and she suggests that their future situation will depend upon how M. de la Mole receives this news.
These chapters narrate the victory that Julien wins over Mathilde as his stratagem succeeds. It is here that the Cornelian nature of their love is most fully exemplified: They are nearest when farthest apart. Julien can force an avowal from Mathilde only by refusing to respond in any way to her successive anger, tears, scorn, then tenderness. Note that Julien does not utter a word in this interview. He must not betray his extreme joy, and they seem condemned to love each other separately. This scene in Chapter 29 is the exact antithesis of a normal love scene. Instead of mutual tenderness and intimacy leading to a reciprocal avowal, there is a progression in hostility and silence leading to an avowal of defeat and submission. Mathilde's initial eruption is spontaneous -- -she reproaches Julien for having neglected her. Her next reaction is equally spontaneous but results from the first -- she has humiliated herself and weeps tears of shame. Julien proves that he has progressed in controlling his sensibility by treating her with impassive coldness. His lack of response intensifies her shame to the point that she explodes in anger. Opening the drawer and finding the letters unopened, Mathilde next resorts, in her uncontrollable rage, to insults. Instantly repenting, however, she avows her love and faints. Julien can only enjoy his love as a triumph when his victim is reduced to unconsciousness as an object. This scene no doubt inspired Proust in his demonstration of the impossibility of possessing another through love. Stendhal's portrayal of Mathilde in this scene is an excellent example of the author's unique character presentation. The reader seems to witness at first hand a process of becoming that is simultaneous with the character's acts. It has been said that the words as Stendhal uses them do more than they say. Mathilde faints because she is one of those superior beings whose emotional makeup is so intense that beyond a certain point, it shuts out reality. Julien reacted similarly in his initial interview with Pirard. Note that Mme. de Fervaques remains hypocritical, even toward herself. She does not admit to herself that she is beginning to love Julien, and since her pride would suffer by addressing letters to him, she is reduced to requesting that he give her self-addressed envelopes. There is a faint glimpse of the role played by Mme. de Renal as confidante to Elise; however, Stendhal chooses not to exploit it. Mme. de Fervaques confides in Mathilde and asks her advice on how to deal with Julien. Stendhal utilizes chapter division to isolate and put into relief a scene, or part of a scene, as is evidenced by the artificial chapter division between 29 and 30. The latter in fact continues the previous scene, but the dramatic effect inherent in 29 would not have been otherwise achieved. Chapter 30 rounds out Julien's victory. He continues to exert incomparable self-control to the point of hypocritically telling Mathilde that he loves Mme. de Fervaques. Finally, he comes to the conscious awareness of the necessity of maintaining a distance in order to continue to be loved by Mathilde. The reader has long since been aware of this fact. The short scene that concludes Chapter 30 represents a different angle of vision from which to see the situation between Julien and Mathilde. They appear at the opera separately, yet in their separateness they are similarly affected. Both are reduced to tears; both are enjoying their love vicariously by association with the spectacle itself. Julien is permitted to maintain the superiority of the unobserved observer. The glance that the eyes bestow is a means of communication between the elect, believes Stendhal. Thus, he gives much importance to the role of Julien's eyes in his adventures. In Chapter 31, Julien hides his eyes as he sits near Mathilde at the opera lest they betray his true feelings. Note in Stendhal's intervention to express approval of Julien's progress the use of the present tense and "may." These are intended to convince the reader of the veracity of the narrative and is a much abused device to which eighteenth- and nineteenth-century novelists resort. The result is the complicity so vehemently denounced by the "new French novelists": The omniscient novelist would pass off fiction as truth; and in this complicity, the public agrees to pretend that what it is reading is indeed fact. It might be argued that Stendhal in particular needs to establish such a complicity since his practice of withholding proof of his hero's superiority might alienate the reader. Stendhal prefers the garden as a setting for amorous adventures. Julien's affair with Mme. de Renal began and progressed in the garden. The garden scene in Chapter 31 evokes Julien's solitary anguish as he watched for Mathilde when he thought he wasn't loved. It is also the setting of the reversal of a previous meeting between them: Mathilde tortured Julien to maintain her ascendancy by telling him of her past loves; now, Julien, momentarily giving way to an expression of his "past" love for her, uses the same stratagem to maintain his present supremacy over Mathilde. He brutally denies the veracity of the words he has just spoken. Julien is testing Mathilde to ascertain to what degree his unchecked sincerity has dampened her love. His own "guarantee" consists of continuing to write the letters. He realizes that he must keep Mathilde in constant doubt as to whether he loves her. Chapter 32 presents at once the culmination of their conflict, the transformation of Mathilde's love, and it puts into motion the subject matter to be fully developed in the next few chapters. Circumstances somewhat beyond Julien's control seem to give a new direction to their relationship. Things are getting out of hand for Julien. Mathilde has accepted him as her master, it is true. Her proud nature requires that she continue the struggle elsewhere, however. First, by her reckless, almost promiscuous conduct with a social inferior, she flouts respectability. Mathilde's pregnancy is the beginning of the end for Julien. For Mathilde, it is the renewal in a different form of her dream of heroism and martyrdom. Her duty, she informs Julien, is to inform her father of this turn of events, and joyfully, she sees this heroic act as a way of proving her merit in Julien's eyes and as a way to compete with him in bravery. Julien has succeeded in convincing Mathilde that her love for him is stronger than his for her. This satisfies Mathilde, giving her a kind of superiority over him. The letter to her father, her "best friend," is certainly consistent with Mathilde's character. Love is for her so intimately associated with the infliction of pain on herself and others that she logically turns to the person she loves best after Julien to initiate a new conflict. A "great soul" requires that others of the elect participate in a kind of ritualistic sacrifice. Fabrice in The Charterhouse of Parma has a similar demanding relationship with the other elect in that novel. The next three chapters recount a struggle of wills between Mathilde and M. de la Mole.