Prefacio · III

Resolved to carry out my purpose, I wished to accomplish it in that very room where so many happy hours had slipped away, measured by the gentle rhythm of our hearts... On entering I forgot my misfortune, and it seemed to me that she, living and smiling, came forward as of old to meet me, lifting the curtain to see me the sooner, her eyes beaming welcome and her cheeks flushed with happiness. There stood the wide sofa where we sat so close as though it were narrow; there the fireplace towards whose flame she stretched her little feet, which I, jealous, disputed with it, warming them in my hands, where they fit easily; there the armchair where she withdrew in those brief moments of childish petulance that doubled the value of reconciliation; there the vase of iridescent Salviati glass, with the last flowers, now dry and faded, which her hand had arranged to grace my coming... And there at last, like a wondrous resurrection of the past, immortalising her adorable form, she herself... that is, her portrait, her full-length portrait, a masterpiece by a celebrated artist, depicting her seated in one of my favourite dresses, the simple white silk morning-gown that enveloped her in a cloud of foam. There was her familiar pose, her green, luminous eyes that fascinated me, her parted lips, as though to utter the tender “How late you come!” of loving impatience; there were her rounded arms, which clasped my neck like waves about a shipwrecked sailor, and there, in sum, the faithful likeness of features and colours through which a soul had captured mine... There, before all that spoke to me of her; there, at the foot of the beloved portrait, kneeling upon the sofa, was I to press the trigger of the double-barrelled English pistol—which bore in its bosom the remedy for all ills and the passage to the haven where she awaited me... Thus her image would not fade from my eyes for a single second: I would close them gazing upon her, and reopen them beholding her not in paint, but in spirit...

Evening was falling; and as I wished to gaze at my ease upon the portrait while pressing the pistol-barrel to my temple, I lit the lamp and all the candles in the candelabra. There was a three-branched one upon the rosewood bureau with inlay, and as I brought the match to the wick, it occurred to me that inside would be my letters, my portrait, the tokens of our long and intimate history. A lively desire to reread those pages prompted me to open the desk.

It must be noted that I possessed no letters of hers: those I received I returned once read, out of precaution, respect, and gentlemanliness. I thought perhaps she had lacked courage to destroy them, and that from the drawers of the bureau her insinuating voice would rise once more, repeating the sweet phrases that had not had time to engrave themselves on my memory. I did not hesitate—does one about to die hesitate?—to force open the dainty piece of furniture. The lid flew into splinters, and I thrust my hand feverishly into the drawers, searching eagerly.

Only in one were there letters. The others were filled with ribbons, jewels, trinkets, fans, and scented handkerchiefs. The packet, wrapped in rich brocade, I took up slowly, feeling it as one feels the head of a beloved being before pressing a kiss upon it, and approaching the light, prepared to read. It was her handwriting: they were her cherished letters. And my heart thanked the dead woman for the delicate refinement of having preserved them there, as testimony of her passion, as a codicil bequeathing me her tenderness.

I untied, unfolded, began to read... At first I fancied I remembered the burning phrases, the passionate vows, and even allusions to intimate details such as only two persons in the world can know. Yet on the second page an indefinable unease, a vague terror crossed my mind, as a bullet crosses the air before striking. I rejected the thought; cursed it; but it returned, returned... and returned supported by the paragraphs of the third page, where swarmed details impossible to relate to myself and the story of my love... By the fourth page not a shadow of doubt remained: the letter had been written to another, recalling other days, other hours, other events unknown to me...

I turned over the rest of the packet; went through the letters one by one, for stubborn hope still tempted me to catch at a straw... Perhaps the other letters were mine, and this one alone had slipped into the group as an isolated memento of an old, forgotten story... But on examining the papers, deciphering a paragraph here and another there, I was forced to conviction: none of the letters in the packet had been addressed to me... Those I had received and religiously returned were probably mingling with the ashes on the hearth; and those which, like a treasure, she had preserved in the secret drawer of the bureau, in the room that witnessed our happiness... pointed, as true as the needle to the pole, to the real direction of the heart I had believed turned towards mine... More grief, more shame! From the terrible paragraphs, from pages lined with handwriting I would have known among all the world, I gathered that perhaps... at the very same time or shortly before... And an ironic voice shouted in my ear: “Now indeed... now indeed must you kill yourself, wretched man!”

Tears of rage scalded my eyes; I took my stand, as I had resolved, before the portrait; grasped the pistol, raised the barrel... and aiming coldly, deliberately, without trembling of the pulse... with both shots... shattered the two green and luminous eyes that had fascinated me.

Don Juan’s Last Illusion

Superficial people, who have never taken the trouble to observe under the microscope the complicated mechanism of the heart, readily suppose that for Don Juan, the precocious libertine and eternal mocker, the senses and at most the fancy suffice for satisfaction, and that he neither requires nor uses the useless luxury of feeling, nor ever opens the gilded casement where the spirit looks out to heaven when the weight of earth oppresses it. And I tell you in truth that those superficial folk are utterly mistaken and unjust to poor Don Juan, whom only we poets have understood, whose souls are flooded with charity and who are discerning... precisely because, simple in appearance, we believe in many things.

In order to set the truth in its proper light, I will tell you the story of how Don Juan nourished his last illusion... and how he came to lose it.

Among Don Juan’s numerous kinsfolk—who, by the way, is a nobleman like the King—are counted some provincial cousins famed for beauty. The youngest, Estrella, was distinguished from her sisters by sweetness of disposition, exalted virtue, and religious fervor, on which account at home they called her the little devotee. Her angelic face belied not the qualities of her soul: she resembled a Murillo Virgin breathing modesty and purity. Whenever Don Juan’s wandering humour prompted him to visit the region where his cousins dwelt, he went to see them and spent endless hours talking with Estrella. If you ask me what magnet drew the rake to the saint, and still more the saint to the rake, I would say it was perhaps the very contrast of their temperaments... and after this explanation, we shall know as much as before.

Certain it is that while Don Juan courted all women on principle, with Estrella he spoke seriously, without allowing himself the slightest bold insinuation; and while Estrella shunned the company of men, she came to Don Juan’s hand like a gentle dove, confident of not soiling her white plumage. The cousins’ conversations might have been heard by the whole world: after hours of harmless, quiet, and sweet talk, they rose masters of themselves, peaceful and happy, and Estrella flew to kitchen or pantry to prepare carefully some dish she knew pleased Don Juan. He relished, more than the delicacies, the fondness with which they were served, and the coolness of his blood did him good, like a refreshing bath to one who has walked long over scorched sands.

When Don Juan took wing, departing for great cities where life is fever and madness, Estrella wrote him long letters, and he replied in a few lines—but always. Returning home at dawn, staggering, dizzy from the bacchanal or his nerves still vibrating with the violent emotions of a profane tryst; shutting himself up to chew the gall of disappointment—for Don Juan has his share; preparing for a duel of honour and steeling his will to face death undaunted; laughing, blaspheming, squandering his youth like a reckless prodigal, Don Juan set apart, as one sets aside money for an offering to Our Lady, ten minutes to devote to Estrella. In his ambition for affection, that chaste devotion of a being so delicate represented the draught of water quaffed in the midst of battle, restoring to the fighter strength to continue. Treasons, falsehoods, and baseness of other women could be borne with patience, while in a corner of the world breathed the loyal love of Estrella the devotee. At each artless letter he received, Don Juan dreamed the same dream; he saw himself walking painfully through dense, cold, palpable darkness, cleft at intervals by lightning; but far away, where the sky cleared a little, he descried a white veiled figure, a woman with downcast eyes, holding in her right hand a lit lamp and shielding it with her left. That light never went out.

Years passed; Don Juan plunged deeper down the slope of his delirium, and the letters continued with unalterable regularity, imbued with the same serene tenderness. So delightful were these letters to Don Juan that he had resolved never to see his cousin again, fearing to find her altered by time, and lacking illusion to sustain the correspondence. At all costs he wished to eternalise his dream, to see Estrella ever with a Murillo face, an angelic virgin of twenty years. Don Juan’s epistles, in truth, expressed a lively desire to pay his cousin a visit; but as no one prevented him, we must believe, since he never made it, that the urge was not very pressing.

Ten years had passed when one day Don Juan received, instead of the accustomed full sheet closely written, a brief note, grave and reserved in style, in which even the handwriting lacked the ease born of spirit guiding hand over paper. O woman, running water, fleeting flame, breath of air! Estrella begged Don Juan neither to be surprised nor angry, confessing that she was to be married soon... An unexceptionable suitor had presented himself, an excellent gentleman, wealthy and honourable, to whom Estrella’s father owed countless favours; and the advice of all had decided the little saint, who hoped, with God’s help, to be happy in her new state and win heaven.

Don Juan remained stunned for a few moments; then he crumpled the paper and tossed it contemptuously into the burning grate. To think that if anyone had told him two hours earlier that Estrella could marry, he would have called him a knavish slanderer! And she announced it herself, unblushing!

From that day Don Juan, the merry libertine, has lost his last illusion; his soul wanders among shadows, never more beholding the soft beam of the lamp sheltered by a maiden’s hand; and he who still had something of man in him is now a wild beast, with fangs to bite and claws to rend without mercy. His confession of faith is a cynical laugh, his love a lash that burns and tears the skin, drawing blood...

You will tell me that the little saint had a right to seek real happiness and purer joys than those tasted by her unbridled idol. And perhaps you speak well, according to vulgar common sense. Much good may that stunted reason do you! In the judgment of poets, it is less evil to be a galley-slave of vice than a deserter from the ideal. The little saint sinned against poetry. Don Juan, believing in her eternal devotion, was the true dreamer.

Tit for Tat

Trifón Liliosa was born rickety and deformed, and had the misfortune not to die in childhood. With years his ugliness grew faster than his body, and there developed in him a combustible imagination, an exalted vanity, and the nervous temperament of an ambitious artist. At fifteen Trifón, motherless from the cradle, had never heard an affectionate word; in return he had endured countless cuffs, continuous mockery, and received the nickname of Freak; at seventeen he ran away from home, and, using what little music he knew, found employment in a street band, and later in an orchestra. His rapid progress opened paradise to him: he hoped to become a composer of genius, a Weber, a Liszt. He foresaw the splendour of glory, and already saw himself applauded, his deformity forgotten, covered by a garland of laurels. Manhood—if thirty years in a toad can be so called—dispelled these chimeras. Trifón was forced to conviction that he was one of the many called and not chosen; of those who see the Promised Land near, but never set foot upon its flowery valleys. The loss of such illusions leaves the soul dark, ulcerated, and venomous. When Trifón resigned himself never to rise above a visiting music-master, he had an attack of jaundice so severe that bile overflowed even through his yellow eyes.