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I am now sure that, even if the difference in our ages did not exist, I could never marry Malthe. I could do foolish, even mean things for the sake of the one man I have loved with all my heart. I could humble myself to be his mistress; I could die with him. But set up a home with Joergen Malthe never!
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.
You remember that I said to you sometimes in joke: "Plan it as though it were for me"; and I cannot forget what you replied one day: "I hate the idea of a stranger living in the house which I planned with you always in my mind." Judge for yourself, Malthe, how painful it was to leave you in error. But I could not speak out then, for I had to consider my husband.
I carefully strip the bark from each log before throwing it on the flames. The smell of burning birch-bark goes to my head like strong wine. Dreams come and go. Joergen Malthe, what a mere boy you are! The garden looks like a neglected churchyard, forgotten of the living. The virginia creeper falls in blood-red streamers from the verandah.
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.
Sometimes its weight makes me happy; sometimes it fills me with foreboding. Do the words weigh so heavy, or only the paper? Last night I held it close to the candle. But when the flame touched my letter, I drew it quickly away. It is all I have left to me now.... Richard writes to me that Malthe has been commissioned to build a great hospital. Most of our great architects competed for the work.
Now the hours fall one by one in ashes before my eyes. I am myself, yet not myself. There are moments when I envy every living creature that has the right to pair either from hate or from habit. I am alone and shut out. What consolation is it to be able to say: "It was my own choice!" A letter from Malthe. No, I will not open it. I do not wish to know what he writes.... It is a long letter.
His home was not mine, although we lived in it like an ideal couple, at one on all points. My person for his money that was the bargain, crudely but truthfully expressed. Just as one arranges the scenery for a tableau vivant, I prepared my "living grave" in this house, which Malthe built in ignorance of its future occupant.
Joergen Malthe has planned and built a little villa for me without having the least idea I was to be the occupant. The house is on an island, the name of which I will keep to myself for the present. The rooms are fourteen feet high, and the dining-room can hold thirty-six guests. There are only two reception-rooms. But what more could a divorced woman of my age require?
Mr Boyd gave us an instance of their gentlemanly spirit. An old Chevalier de Malthe, of ancient noblesse, but in low circumstances, was in a coffee-house at Paris, where was Julien, the great manufacturer at the Gobelins, of the fine tapestry, so much distinguished both for the figures and the colours. The chevalier's carriage was very old.
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