THE VICOMTE DE VALMONT TO THE MARQUISE DE MERTEUIL
IT IS VERY NICE of you not to abandon me to my sad fate. The life I lead here is really fatiguing, from the excess of its repose and its insipid monotony. Reading your letter and the details of your charming day, I was tempted a score of times to invent some business, to fly to your feet, and beg of you an infidelity, in my favor, to your Chevalier, who, after all, does not merit his happiness. Do you know that you have made me jealous of him? Why talk to me of an eternal rupture? I abjure that vow, uttered in a moment of frenzy: we should not have been worthy to make it, had we meant to keep it. Ah, that I might one day avenge myself, in your arms, for the involuntary vexation which the happiness of your Chevalier has caused me! I am indignant, I confess, when I think that this man, without reasoning, without giving himself the least trouble, but quite stupidly following the instinct of his heart, should find a felicity to which I cannot attain. Oh, I will trouble it! … Promise me that I shall trouble it. You yourself, are you not humiliated? You take the trouble to deceive him, and he is happier than you. You believe he is in your chains! It is, indeed, you who are in his. He sleeps tranquilly, while you watch over his pleasures. What more would his slave do?
Listen, my lovely friend: so long as you divide yourself among many, I have not the least jealousy; I see then in your lovers only the successors of Alexander,11 incapable of preserving among them all that empire over which I reigned alone. But that you should give yourself entirely to one of them! That another man should exist as fortunate as myself! I will not suffer it; do not hope that I shall suffer it. Either take me back, or, at least, take someone else; and do not betray, by an exclusive caprice, the inviolate bond of friendship which we have sworn.
It is quite enough, no doubt, that I should have to complain of love. You see, I lend myself to your ideas, and confess my errors. In fact, if to be in love is to be unable to live without possessing the object of one’s desire, to sacrifice to it one’s time, one’s pleasures, one’s life, I am very really in love. I am no more advanced for that. I should not even have anything at all to tell you of in this matter, but for an incident which gives me much food for reflection, and as to which I know not yet whether I must hope or fear.
You know my chasseur,az a treasure of intrigue, and a real valet of comedy:12 you can imagine that his instructions bade him to fall in love with the waiting maid, and make the household drunk. The knave is more fortunate than I: he has already succeeded. He has just discovered that Madame de Tourvel has charged one of her people to inform himself as to my behavior, and even to follow me in my morning expeditions, as far as he could without being observed. What is this woman’s pretension? Thus then the most modest of them all yet dares do things which we should hardly venture to permit ourselves. I swear … ! But before I think of avenging myself for this feminine ruse, let us occupy ourselves over methods of turning it to our advantage. Hitherto, these excursions which are suspected have had no object; needs must I give them one. This deserves all my attention, and I take leave of you to ponder upon it. Farewell, my lovely friend.
STILL AT THE CHTEAU DE …, 15TH AUGUST, 17–.