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Page 111
LADY. To a parting? (Silence.) Yes, a parting!
(The LADY goes on her way. The STRANGER falls on to a chair by the
table. The TEMPTER puts his head in at the window, and rests
himself on his elbows whilst he smokes a cigarette.)
TEMPTER. Ah, yes! C'est l'amour! The most mysterious of all
mysteries, the most inexplicable of all that can't be explained,
the most precarious of all that's insecure.
STRANGER. So you're here?
TEMPTER. I'm always everywhere, where it smells of quarrels. And in
love affairs there are always quarrels.
STRANGER. Always?
TEMPTER. Always! I was invited to a silver wedding yesterday.
Twenty-five years are no trifle--and for twenty-five years they'd
been quarrelling. The whole love affair had been one long shindy,
with many little ones in between! And yet they loved one another,
and were grateful for all the good that had come to them; the evil
was forgotten, wiped out--for a moment's happiness is worth ten
days of blows and pinpricks. Oh yes! Those who won't accept evil
never get anything good. The rind's very bitter, though the
kernel's sweet.
STRANGER. But very small.
TEMPTER. It may be small, but it's good! (Pause.) Tell me, why did
your madonna go her way? No answer; because he doesn't know! Now
we'll have to let the hotel again. Here's a board. I'll hang it out
at once. 'To Let.' One comes, another goes! C'est la vie, quoi?
Rooms for Travellers!
STRANGER. Have you ever been married?
TEMPTER. Oh yes. Of course.
STRANGER. Then why did you part?
TEMPTER. Chiefly--perhaps it's a peculiarity of mine--chiefly
because--well, you know, a man marries to get a home, to get into a
home; and a woman to get out of one. She wanted to get out, and I
wanted to get in! I was so made that I couldn't take her into
company, because I felt as if she were soiled by men's glances. And
in company, my splendid, wonderful wife turned into a little
grimacing monkey I couldn't bear the sight of. So I stayed at home;
and then, she stayed away. And when I met her again, she'd changed
into someone else. She, my pure white notepaper, was scribbled all
over; her clear and lovely features changed in imitation of the
satyr-like looks of strange men. I could see miniature photographs
of bull-fighters and guardsmen in her eyes, and hear the strange
accents of strange men in her voice. On our grand piano, on which
only the harmonies of the great masters used to be heard, she now
played the cabaret songs of strange men; and on our table there lay
nothing but the favourite reading of strange men. In a word, my
whole existence was on the way to becoming an intellectual
concubinage with strange men--and that was contrary to my nature,
which has always longed for women! And--I need hardly say this--the
tastes of these strange men were always the reverse of mine. She
developed a real genius for discovering things I detested! That's
what she called 'saving her personality.' Can you understand that?
STRANGER. I can; but I won't attempt to explain it.
TEMPTER. Yet this woman maintained she loved me, and that I didn't
love her. But I loved her so much I didn't want to speak to any
other human being; because I feared to be untrue to her if I found
pleasure in the company of others, even if they were men. I'd
married for feminine society; and in order to enjoy it I'd left my
friends. I'd married in order to find company, but what I got was
complete solitude! And I was supporting house and home, in order to
provide strange men with feminine companionship. _C'est l'amour_,
my friend!
STRANGER. You should never talk about your wife.
TEMPTER. No! For if you speak well of her, people will laugh; and
if you speak ill, all their sympathy will go out to her; and if, in
the first instance, you ask why they laugh, you get no answer.
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