Damaged Goods Part 4

"They don't want the truth about venereal diseases," exclaimed the other. "If they knew the full truth, they would no longer think that adultery was romantic and interesting."

He went on to give his advice as to the means of avoiding such diseases.

There was really but one rule. It was: To love but one woman, to take her as a virgin, and to love her so much that she would never deceive you. "Take that from me," added the doctor, "and teach it to your son, when you have one."

George's attention was caught by this last sentence.

"You mean that I shall be able to have children?" he cried.

"Certainly," was the reply.

"Healthy children?"

"I repeat it to you; if you take care of yourself properly for a long time, conscientiously, you have little to fear."

"That's certain?"

"Ninety-nine times out of a hundred."

George felt as if he had suddenly emerged from a dungeon. "Why, then,"

he exclaimed, "I shall be able to marry!"

"You will be able to marry," was the reply.

"You are not deceiving me? You would not give me that hope, you would not expose me? How soon will I be able to marry?"

"In three or four years," said the doctor.

"What!" cried George in consternation. "In three or four years? Not before?"

"Not before."

"How is that? Am I going to be sick all that time? Why, you told me just now--"

Said the doctor: "The disease will no longer be dangerous to you, yourself--but you will be dangerous to others."

"But," the young man cried, in despair, "I am to be married a month from now."

"That is impossible."

"But I cannot do any differently. The contract is ready! The banns have been published! I have given my word!"

"Well, you are a great one!" the doctor laughed. "Just now you were looking for your revolver! Now you want to be married within the month."

"But, Doctor, it is necessary!"

"But I forbid it."

"As soon as I knew that the disease is not what I imagined, and that I could be cured, naturally I didn't want to commit suicide. And as soon as I make up my mind not to commit suicide, I have to take up my regular life. I have to keep my engagements; I have to get married."

"No," said the doctor.

"Yes, yes!" persisted George, with blind obstinacy. "Why, Doctor, if I didn't marry it would be a disaster. You are talking about something you don't understand. I, for my part--it is not that I am anxious to be married. As I told you, I had almost a second family. Lizette's little brothers adored me. But it is my aunt, an old maid; and, also, my mother is crazy about the idea. If I were to back out now, she would die of chagrin. My aunt would disinherit me, and she is the one who has the family fortune. Then, too, there is my father-in-law, a regular dragoon for his principles--severe, violent. He never makes a joke of serious things, and I tell you it would cost me dear, terribly dear. And, besides, I have given my word."

"You must take back your word."

"You still insist?" exclaimed George, in despair. "But then, suppose that it were possible, how could I take back my signature which I put at the bottom of the deed? I have pledged myself to pay in two months for the attorney's practice I have purchased!"

"Sir," said the doctor, "all these things--"

"You are going to tell me that I was lacking in prudence, that I should never have disposed of my wife's dowry until after the honeymoon!"

"Sir," said the doctor, again, "all these considerations are foreign to me. I am a physician, and nothing but a physician, and I can only tell you this: If you marry before three or four years, you will be a criminal."

George broke out with a wild exclamation. "No sir, you are not merely a physician! You are also a confessor! You are not merely a scientist; and it is not enough for you that you observe me as you would some lifeless thing in your laboratory, and say, 'You have this; science says that; now go along with you.' All my existence depends upon you. It is your duty to listen to me, because when you know everything you will understand me, and you will find some way to cure me within a month."

"But," protested the doctor, "I wear myself out telling you that such means do not exist. I shall not be certain of your cure, as much as any one can be certain, in less than three or four years."

George was almost beside himself. "I tell you you must find some means!

Listen to me, sir--if I don't get married I don't get the dowry! And will you tell me how I can pay the notes I have signed?"

"Oh," said the doctor, dryly, "if that is the question, it is very simple--I will give you a plan to get out of the affair. You will go and get acquainted with some rich man; you will do everything you can to gain his confidence; and when you have succeeded, you will plunder him."

George shook his head. "I am not in any mood for joking."

"I am not joking," replied his adviser. "Rob that man, a.s.sa.s.sinate him even--that would be no worse crime than you would commit in taking a young girl in good health in order to get a portion of her dowry, when at the same time you would have to expose her to the frightful consequences of the disease which you would give her."

"Frightful consequences?" echoed George.

"Consequences of which death would not be the most frightful."

"But, sir, you were saying to me just now--"

"Just now I did not tell you everything. Even reduced, suppressed a little by our remedies, the disease remains mysterious, menacing, and in its sum, sufficiently grave. So it would be an infamy to expose your fiancee in order to avoid an inconvenience, however great that might be."

But George was still not to be convinced. Was it certain that this misfortune would befall Henriette, even with the best attention?

Said the other: "I do not wish to lie to you. No, it is not absolutely certain, it is probable. And there is another truth which I wish to tell you now: our remedies are not infallible. In a certain number of cases--a very small number, scarcely five per cent--they have remained without effect. You might be one of those exceptions, your wife might be one. What then?"

"I will employ a word you used just now, yourself. We should have to expect the worst catastrophes."

George sat in a state of complete despair.

"Tell me what to do, then," he said.

"I can tell you only one thing: don't marry. You have a most serious blemish. It is as if you owed a debt. Perhaps no one will ever come to claim it; on the other hand, perhaps a pitiless creditor will come all at once, presenting a brutal demand for immediate payment. Come now--you are a business man. Marriage is a contract; to marry without saying anything--that means to enter into a bargain by means of pa.s.sive dissimulation. That's the term, is it not? It is dishonesty, and it ought to come under the law."

George, being a lawyer, could appreciate the argument, and could think of nothing to say to it.

"What shall I do?" he asked.