ALL OVER by: Guy de Maupassant (1850-1893)
ALL OVER by: Guy de Maupassant (1850-1893)
[SIZE=-1]Comte de Lormerin had just finished dressing. He cast a parting [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]glance at the large mirror which occupied an entire panel in his [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]dressing-room and smiled.[/SIZE]
[SIZE=-1]He was really a fine-looking man still, although quite gray. Tall, [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]slight, elegant, with no sign of a paunch, with a small mustache of [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]doubtful shade, which might be called fair, he had a walk, a nobility, [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]a "chic," in short, that indescribable something which establishes a [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]greater difference between two men than would millions of money. He [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]murmured:[/SIZE]
[SIZE=-1]"Lormerin is still alive!"[/SIZE]
[SIZE=-1]And he went into the drawing-room where his correspondence awaited [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]him.[/SIZE]
[SIZE=-1]On his table, where everything had its place, the work table of the [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]gentleman who never works, there were a dozen letters lying beside [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]three newspapers of different opinions. With a single touch he spread [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]out all these letters, like a gambler giving the choice of a card; and [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]he scanned the handwriting, a thing he did each morning before opening [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]the envelopes.[/SIZE]
[SIZE=-1]It was for him a moment of delightful expectancy, of inquiry and vague [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]anxiety. What did these sealed mysterious letters bring him? What did [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]they contain of pleasure, of happiness, or of grief? He surveyed them [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]with a rapid sweep of the eye, recognizing the writing, selecting [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]them, making two or three lots, according to what he expected from [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]them. Here, friends; there, persons to whom he was indifferent; [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]further on, strangers. The last kind always gave him a little [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]uneasiness. What did they want from him? What hand had traced those [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]curious characters full of thoughts, promises, or threats?[/SIZE]
[SIZE=-1]This day one letter in particular caught his eye. It was simple, [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]nevertheless, without seeming to reveal anything; but he looked at it [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]uneasily, with a sort of chill at his heart. He thought: "From whom [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]can it be? I certainly know this writing, and yet I can't identify [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]it."[/SIZE]
[SIZE=-1]He raised it to a level with his face, holding it delicately between [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]two fingers, striving to read through the envelope, without making up [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]his mind to open it.[/SIZE]
[SIZE=-1]Then he smelled it, and snatched up from the table a little magnifying [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]glass which he used in studying all the niceties of handwriting. He [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]suddenly felt unnerved. "Whom is it from? This hand is familiar to me, [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]very familiar. I must have often read its tracings, yes, very often. [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]But this must have been a long, long time ago. Whom the deuce can it [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]be from? Pooh! it's only somebody asking for money."[/SIZE]
[SIZE=-1]And he tore open the letter. Then he read:[/SIZE]
[SIZE=-1]My Dear Friend: You have, without doubt, forgotten me, for it is now [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]twenty-five years since we saw each other. I was young; I am old. When [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]I bade you farewell, I left Paris in order to follow into the [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]provinces my husband, my old husband, whom you used to call "my [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]hospital." Do you remember him? He died five years ago, and now I am [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]returning to Paris to get my daughter married, for I have a daughter, [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]a beautiful girl of eighteen, whom you have never seen. I informed you [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]of her birth, but you certainly did not pay much attention to so [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]trifling an event.[/SIZE]
[SIZE=-1]You are still the handsome Lormerin; so I have been told. Well if you [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]still recollect little Lise, whom you used to call Lison, come and [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]dine with her this evening, with the elderly Baronne de Vance, your [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]ever faithful friend, who, with some emotion, although happy, reaches [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]out to you a devoted hand, which you must clasp, but no longer kiss, [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]my poor Jaquelet.[/SIZE]
[SIZE=-1]Lise de Vance.[/SIZE]
[SIZE=-1]Lormerin's heart began to throb. He remained sunk in his armchair with [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]the letter on his knees, staring straight before him, overcome by a [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]poignant emotion that made the tears mount up to his eyes! If he had [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]ever loved a woman in his life it was this one, little Lise, Lise de [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]Vance, whom he called "Ashflower," on account of the strange color of [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]her hair and the pale gray of her eyes. Oh! what a dainty, pretty, [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]charming creature she was, this frail baronne, the wife of that gouty, [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]pimply baron, who had abruptly carried her off to the provinces, shut [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]her up, kept her in seclusion through jealousy, jealousy of the [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]handsome Lormerin.[/SIZE]
[SIZE=-1]Yes, he had loved her, and he believed that he, too, had been truly [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]loved. She familiarly gave him the name of Jaquelet, and would [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]pronounce that word in a delicious fashion.[/SIZE]
[SIZE=-1]A thousand forgotten memories came back to him, far off and sweet and [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]melancholy now. One evening she had called on him on her way home from [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]a ball, and they went for a stroll in the Bois de Boulogne, she in [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]evening dress, he in his dressing-jacket. It was springtime; the [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]weather was beautiful. The fragrance from her bodice embalmed the warm [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]air--the odor of her bodice, and perhaps, too, the fragrance of her [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]skin. What a divine night! When they reached the lake, as the moon's [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]rays fell across the branches into the water, she began to weep. A [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]little surprised, he asked her why.[/SIZE]
[SIZE=-1]She replied:[/SIZE]
[SIZE=-1]"I don't know. The moon and the water have affected me. Every time I [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]see poetic things I have a tightening at the heart, and I have to [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]cry."[/SIZE]
[SIZE=-1]He smiled, affected himself, considering her feminine emotion [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]charming--the unaffected emotion of a poor little woman whom every [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]sensation overwhelms. And he embraced her passionately, stammering:[/SIZE]
[SIZE=-1]"My little Lise, you are exquisite."[/SIZE]
[SIZE=-1]What a charming love affair, short-lived and dainty, it had been and [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]over all too quickly, cut short in the midst of its ardor by this old [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]brute of a baron, who had carried off his wife, and never let any one [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]see her afterward.[/SIZE]
[SIZE=-1]Lormerin had forgotten, in fact, at the end of two or three months. [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]One woman drives out another so quickly in Paris, when one is a [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]bachelor! No matter; he had kept a little altar for her in his heart, [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]for he had loved her alone! He assured himself now that this was so.[/SIZE]
[SIZE=-1]He rose, and said aloud: "Certainly, I will go and dine with her this [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]evening!"[/SIZE]
[SIZE=-1]And instinctively he turned toward the mirror to inspect himself from [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]head to foot. He reflected: "She must look very old, older than I [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]look." And he felt gratified at the thought of showing himself to her [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]still handsome, still fresh, of astonishing her, perhaps of filling [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]her with emotion, and making her regret those bygone days so far, far [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]distant![/SIZE]
[SIZE=-1]He turned his attention to the other letters. They were of no [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]importance.[/SIZE]
[SIZE=-1]The whole day he kept thinking of this ghost of other days. What was [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]she like now? How strange it was to meet in this way after twenty-five [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]years! But would he recognize her?[/SIZE]
[SIZE=-1]He made his toilet with feminine coquetry, put on a white waistcoat, [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]which suited him better with the coat than a black one, sent for the [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]hairdresser to give him a finishing touch with the curling iron, for [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]he had preserved his hair, and started very early in order to show his [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]eagerness to see her.[/SIZE]
[SIZE=-1]The first thing he saw on entering a pretty drawing-room newly [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]furnished was his own portrait, an old faded photograph, dating from [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]the days when he was a beau, hanging on the wall in an antique silk [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]frame.[/SIZE]
[SIZE=-1]He sat down and waited. A door opened behind him. He rose up abruptly, [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]and, turning round, beheld an old woman with white hair who extended [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]both hands toward him.[/SIZE]