Донасьен Альфонс Франсуа де Сад – Justine (страница 4)

‘Oh, sir!’ I replied, my heart grown heavy with sighs, ‘have honesty and benevolence altogether disappeared from the intentions of men?’

‘Very nearly,’ replied Dubourg; ‘people talk about them a great deal, yet why would you have things so? Don’t you realise that people have recovered from the mania of obliging gratis? – they have discovered that the pleasures of chastity are but the enjoyments of pride; and, as nothing is so rapidly dispersed, have come to prefer more genuine sensations. They realise, for example, that with a child like you, it is infinitely more profitable to reap, as the fruit of their monetary advances, all those pleasures offered by the refinements of lust, rather than the very chilly and unsatisfying ones of handing out alms for nothing. The knowledge of his reputation, enjoyed by a liberal, open-handed, and generous man, never equals in pleasure – even at the instant he enjoys such actions most intensely – the slightest delights of the senses.’

‘Oh, sir! When mankind is ruled by principles such as these, there can be nothing left for the unfortunate except to perish!’

‘What matter? The population of France is much greater than is necessary; providing its machine always has the same elasticity, what does it matter to the State whether its body is composed of a few more or a few less individuals?’

‘But do you believe that children can respect their fathers or their elders when they are ill-treated by them?’

‘What does it matter to a father whether the children who trouble him love him or not?’

‘It would, then, have been far better had we been smothered in our cradles!’

‘Certainly! – Such was once the custom in many countries; amongst the Greeks for instance; and such is the custom of the Chinese: in that country unfortunate children are exposed, or put to death. What is the good of letting such creatures live when they cannot rely on the assistance of their parents – either because these happen to be dead, or because they disclaim their offspring? If such children are allowed to live they only serve to overburden the State by increasing a population which is already too great. Bastards, orphans and deformed children should be condemned to death at birth; the first two classes because they no longer have anyone to watch over them and care for them – and because a childhood endured under such conditions may one day make them dangerous to society; the others because deformed weaklings can be of no use to society. All children coming within these categories are to society what excrescences become to the flesh: they nourish themselves on the sap of the healthy members, and at the same time weaken them causing them to degenerate. They might be compared with those parasitic plants and vegetables which, attaching themselves to healthy growths, completely spoil these by drawing off their nutritious essence. The funds collected to feed such scum are crying abuses; particularly those richly endowed establishments which are built for such creatures, and at such an expense! As if the human species was so exceedingly rare, so infinitely precious, that it becomes necessary to consider the welfare of its lowest segment! But let us leave the discussion of these policies of which you cannot, my child, comprehend a thing; and as for yourself, why complain of your predicament when the remedy lies within yourself?’

‘At what a price, gracious heaven!’

‘At the price of a mere chimera, a thing which has no value at all, other than the one which your pride places on it. Briefly,’ continued this barbarian, whilst rising and opening the door, ‘that is all I can do for you – If you can’t agree to my proposition, get out of my sight! I do not like beggars…’

My tears flowed; I could not hold them back any longer. Would you believe it, Madame? – they served only to increase the irritable temper of this man, instead of softening him. He slammed the door, and seizing me by the collar of my dress brutally told me that he was going to force me into doing that which I would not willingly grant him. At this cruel moment my misfortune lent me courage; I extricated myself from his arms and threw myself towards the door.

‘Loathsome man,’ I shouted as I ran; ‘may heaven, so grievously insulted by you, punish you as you deserve for your execrable cruelty and hardness of heart! You are worthy neither of those riches which you put to so vile a use, nor of the air which you breathe in a world stained by your barbarities.’

Reaching my lodgings I hastened to inform my landlady as to the kind of reception given me by the man to whose house she had sent me. But my surprise passed all bounds when I heard this female wretch load me with reproaches instead of sympathetically sharing my grief!

‘You mean little creature,’ she exclaimed in her rage; ‘do you imagine that men are foolish enough to bestow charity on little girls such as yourself without exacting the interest on their money? Monsieur Dubourg is too kind to have acted as he has done. Had I been in his position you would not have escaped from my room before I had satisfied my desires. However, since you do not wish to profit by the help I have offered, I can only let you dispose of yourself as you wish. You owe me rent – by tomorrow you must either pay me my money or go to prison!’

‘Madame, have pity on me…’

‘People starve through indulging in pity.’

‘But what would you have me do?’

‘You must return to Monsieur Dubourg – you must satisfy him, and bring me back some cash. I shall go and see him and make up, if I can, for your silly behaviour. I shall offer him your apologies. But mind you behave better next time!’

Ashamed and in despair at not knowing which path to take, seeing myself harshly repulsed by everyone, and without any other resource, I told Madame Desroches (that was my landlady’s name) that I was ready for everything in order to placate her. She went off to see the financier, and on her return informed me that she had experienced considerable difficulty in prevailing on him to grant me another chance – that only by dint of repeated entreaties had she persuaded him to see me again the following morning. She ended by warning me that I had better keep an eye on my conduct, for if I disappointed him again, or disobeyed him in the least, he would himself undertake the business of having me locked up for life.

Next day I arrived at the mansion quite excited. Dubourg was alone, and in a more indecent state than on the previous evening. Brutality, libertinism, all the marks of debauchery shone forth from his sullen features.

‘You have la Desroches to thank for my welcome,’ he grumbled in a harsh tone; ‘for it is only on her account that I condescend to grant you my kindness for a space. You should certainly feel undeserving of it after your conduct yesterday! Undress immediately! And if you offer anything like the slightest resistance to my desires, two men who are waiting in my ante-room will take you to a place which you will never leave again while there is life in your body…’

‘Oh, sir!’ I wept, throwing myself at the knees of this despicable man, ‘relent, allow yourself some mercy, I beseech you! I would rather die a thousand deaths than betray the principles I received during my childhood. Do you not realise that you will no sooner have accomplished your crime than the spectacle of my despair will overwhelm you with remorse…’

But the infamies to which Dubourg had abandoned himself whilst I spoke hindered me from proceeding further. I realised the folly of pretending to myself that I could affect a man who found my grief merely a vehicle for the increase of his horrible passions. He became more and more inflamed at my bitter accents, at my weeping and shuddering, relishing them with an inhumanity which frightened me, and further preparing himself for his criminal attempts. He rose to his feet, revealing himself to me in a state in which reason rarely triumphs, and during which the resistance of the object which causes such loss of reason is but an added stimulus to the delirium of the senses. He grasped me brutally; impetuously he tore away those veils which still concealed what he was burning to enjoy; then, in turn, he abused me, flattered me, caressed me, and treated me with contempt…Oh! what a picture! Almighty God, what a strange medley of hardness and mad unbridled lust! It seemed as if the Supreme Being, during the first of such circumstances in my life, wished to imprint eternally on my soul an image of all the horror I ought to feel for the kind of crime, or sin, which so often has its genesis in an abundance of evils similar to those with which I was threatened…But was there necessity for complaint at this hour? Certainly not – for I owed my very safety to his excesses…A little less debauchery and he would have had his will of me; but the fires of Dubourg’s ardour were extinguished by the effervescence of his attempts. Heaven avenged, on my behalf, all the assaults to which the monster tried to abandon himself – for the loss of his force before the sacrifice preserved me from becoming his victim.