The Dangerous Age Part 15

"Yes, if we had a bathing-hut."

And I, still absent-minded, murmured:

"Yes, if we had a bathing-hut."

Suddenly we went off into fits of laughter. We could not stop ourselves.

Now Jeanne has gone hunting for workmen. We will make them work by the piece, otherwise they will never finish the job. I had some experience this autumn with the youth who was paid by the day to chop wood for us.

When the hut is built I will bathe every day in the suns.h.i.+ne.

They are both master-carpenters, and seem to be very good friends.

Jeanne and I lie in the boat and watch them, and stimulate them with beer from time to time. But it does not seem to have much effect. One has a wife and twelve children who are starving. When they have starved for a while, they take to begging. The man sings like a lark. He has spent two years in America, but he a.s.sures me it is "all tommy-rot" the way they work like steam-engines there. Consequently he soon returned to his native land.

"Denmark," he says, "is such a nice little country, and all this water and the forests make it so pretty...."

Jeanne and I laugh at all this and amuse ourselves royally.

The day before yesterday neither of the men appeared. A child had died on the island, and one of them, who is also a coffin-maker, had to supply a coffin. This seemed a reasonable excuse. But when I inquired whether the coffin was finished, he replied:

"I bought one ready-made in the town ... saved me a lot of bother, that did."

His friend and colleague had been to the town with him to help him in his choice!

The water is clear and the sands are white and firm. I am longing to try the bathing. Jeanne, who rows well, volunteered to take me out in the boat. But to bathe from the boat and near these men! I would rather wait!

Full moon. In the far distance boats go by with their white sails. They glide through the dusk like swans on a lake. The silence is so intense that I can hear when a fish rises or a bird stirs in its nest. The scent of the red roses that blossomed yesterday ascends to my window here....

Joergen Malthe....

When I write his name it is as though I gave him one of those caressing touches for which my fingers yearn and quiver....

Yes, a dip in the sea will calm me.

I will undress in the house and wrap myself in my dressing-gown. Then I can slip through the pine-trees unseen....

It was glorious, glorious! What do I want a bathing-hut for? I go into the sea straight from my own garden, and the sand is soft and firm to my feet like the pine-needles under the trees.

The sea is phosph.o.r.escent; I seemed to be dipping my arms in liquid silver. I longed to splash about and make sparkles all around me. But I was very cautious. I swam only as far as the stakes to which the fishermen fasten their nets. The moon seemed to be suspended just over my head.

I thought of Malthe.

Ah, for one night! Just one night!

Jeanne has given me warning. I asked her why she wished to leave. She only shook her head and made no answer. She was very pale; I did not like to force her to speak.

It will be very difficult to replace her. On the other hand, how can I keep her if she has made up her mind to go? Wages are no attraction to her. If I only knew what she wanted. I have not inquired where she is going.

Ah, now I understand! It is the restlessness of the senses. She wants more life than she can get on this island. She knows I see through her, and casts her eyes downward when I look at her.

JOERGEN MALTHE,

You are the only man I ever loved. And now, by means of this letter, I am digging a fathomless pit between us. I am not the woman you thought me; and my true self you could never love.

I am like a criminal who has had recourse to every deceit to avoid confession, but whose strength gives way at last under the pressure of threats and torture, and who finds unspeakable relief in declaring his guilt.

Joergen Malthe, I have loved you for the last ten years; as long, in fact, as you have loved me. I lied to you when I denied it; but my heart has been faithful all through.

Had I remained any longer in Richard's house, I should have come to you one day and asked you to let me be your mistress. Not your wife. Do not contradict me. I am the stronger and wiser of the two.

To escape from this risk I ran away. I fled from my love--I fled, too, from my age. I am now forty-three, you know it well, and you are only thirty-five.

By this voluntary renunciation, I hoped to escape the curse that advancing age brings to most women. Alas! This year has taught me that we can neither deceive nor escape our destiny, since we carry it in our hearts and temperaments.

Here I am, and here I shall remain, until I have grown to be quite an old woman. Therefore, it is very foolish of me to pour out this confession to you, for it cannot be otherwise than painful reading. But I shall have no peace of mind until it is done.

My life has been poor. I have consumed my own heart.

As far as I am aware, my father, a widower, was a strictly honourable man. Misfortune befell him, and his whole life was ruined in a moment.

An unexpected audit of the accounts of his firm revealed a deficiency.

My father had temporarily borrowed a small sum to save a friend in a pressing emergency. Henceforward he was a marked man, at home and abroad. We left the town where we lived. The retiring pension which was granted to him in spite of what had happened sufficed for our daily needs. He lived lost in his disgrace, and I was left entirely to the care of a maid-servant. From her I gathered that our troubles were in some way connected with a lack of money; and money became the idol of my life.

I sometimes buried a coin that had been given me--as a dog buries his bone. Then I lay awake all night, fearing I should not find it again in the morning.

I was sent to school. A cla.s.smate said to me one day:

"Of course, a prince will marry you, for you are the prettiest girl here."

I carried the words home to the maid, who nodded her approval.

"That's true enough," she said. "A pretty face is worth a pocketful of gold."

"Can one sell a pretty face, then?" I asked.