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PRIDE

(Fragments from Penelope's Diary)

Paris, Three Months Later.

It is three months since I wrote this diary, three lonely months since I said good-bye to Christopher, or rather wrote good-bye, for I should never have had the courage to leave him, if I had tried to give him my reasons—face to face. I have never seen him or heard from him since that terrible night at Dr. Leroy's when the evil cloud was lifted from my soul and I knew and remembered—everything!

I have never heard from Seraphine. They do not even know where I am, they must not know—that is part of my plan, but it is frightfully hard. I pray for strength to be reconciled to my life of loneliness and to find comfort in good works; but the strength has not come to me. Every day I think of Christopher and the separation from him grows harder and harder. Life is not worth living.

I am perfectly sane and normal, just as I was before my hallucinations. No more voices, or fears, or wicked dreams. Sometimes I wish I could dream of Christopher; but I never do, I never dream of anything. I suppose I should be grateful for that and glad that my cure is so complete. Oh, dear!

I wear myself out at the dispensary for poor French children and try my best to smile and be cheerful and to interest myself in their pitiful needs and sorrows; but my heart is not in this work and my smiles are forced. Many nights I cry myself to sleep.

And yet I did right. I go over it all in my mind and I see that I did right. There was nothing else for me to do. I had to decide for both of us, and I decided. I thought of those dreadful things that I did, and—meant to do—those things that neither Christopher nor I can possibly forget ... how could Christopher ever have confidence in me as his wife? How could we ever be happy together with those memories between us?

I try to remember the exact words that I wrote to my lover that morning when I went away. I hope I did not make him suffer too much. But of course he suffered—he must have. I told him we could not see each other any more, or write to each other, or—anything. I knew I would have been too weak to resist the call of my love and he would have been too fine, too chivalrous, to let me go. He would have said: “You are cured now, dear” (which I really am) “and there is no reason why we should not be married—” which is true, except that he would always have had the fear, deep down in his heart, that I might relapse into what I had been. How could a high-minded man like Chris bear the thought that the woman he loved, the woman who was to be the mother of his children, had acted like a wanton? He could not bear it. It is evident that I did right.

And yet—

I often wonder what another woman would have done in my place. She loves a man as I loved Christopher—as I love him still. She is proud, she has always been admired, she cannot bear the thought of being pitied. And suddenly she learns that she has disgraced herself, she has violated the sacred traditions of modesty that restrain all women. She has acted like an abandoned woman towards the man she worships. God! It is true she has done this without knowing it, without being responsible for it, but she has done it, and that ineffaceable memory will always shame her, if she becomes his wife. Day after day she will read it in his eyes, in his reticencies, in his efforts to be cheerful—she will know that he remembers—what she was!

NO! She could not bear it, no woman with any pride could bear it.

Pride!

What is pride? Is it a good thing or a bad thing? Would I be a finer woman if I could endure this humiliation and gracefully accept forgiveness? I suppose some women would take it all simply, like a grateful patient cured of an illness. Alas! that is not my nature.

How little we know ourselves! We all wear masks of one kind or another that hide our true personalities even from ourselves. How will a woman act in sudden peril? In a moral crisis? In the face of shattering disgrace? Let the most beautiful wife and mother realize that some painful chapter in her life is to be opened to the world—what price will she not pay to avert this scandal?

Julian had a friend who on a certain night stood before a locked door with an officer of the law. His wife was on the other side of that door—with a companion in dishonor. The husband was armed. He was absolutely within his rights. They broke down the door. And then—

Not one of those tragic three could have told in advance what would happen when that door crashed in. As a matter of fact the woman alone was calm—coldly calm.

“Yes,” she said, “I am guilty. Now shoot! Why don't you shoot? You are afraid to shoot!”

Which was true.

The husband was afraid; and the lover was more afraid; it was the erring wife who cut the best figure. But who could have foreseen this dÉnouement?

After all I only did those abominable things because I was ill—when I was not myself; whereas now I am well, and the evil has passed from me. Besides, I only showed that wicked side of my nature to Christopher, through my love; it is inconceivable that I could ever have acted that way with another man. Christopher knows that. He knows there is no possible doubt about that. How much difference does this knowledge make to him—I wonder.

I am going to leave Paris. I am too unhappy here. It seems there is a great need for nurses at Lourdes—that strange miracle place where pilgrims go to be healed—and I have volunteered for service. If the sick are really cured by miracles I don't see why they need nurses; but never mind that. It will give me a change and I may see some unfortunate men and women who are worse off than I am. Oh, if God would only work a miracle so that I can have Christopher and make him happy! But that can never be. Why not? Why do I say that after what has happened to me? Was it not a miracle that saved me from those hideous evils? Then why not other miracles?

At Lourdes. Two Weeks Later.

Speaking of miracles, I am living among them. I am working in the Bureau de Constatations where the miraculÉs—those who are supposed to have been miraculously healed—are questioned and examined by doctors, Catholics, Protestants, Agnostics, Atheists, who come from all over the world to investigate these cures from the standpoint of a religion or pure science. What sights I have seen! Men and women of all ages and walks of life testifying that the waters of the sacred grotto have freed them from this or that malady, from tumors, lameness, deafness, blindness, tuberculosis, nervous trouble and numerous other afflictions. By thousands and tens of thousands these unfortunates crowd here from the four corners of the earth, an endless procession of believers, and every year sees scores of the incurable cured, instantly cured—even the sceptical admit this, although they interpret the facts differently. Some say it is auto-suggestion, others speak of mass hypnotism, others regard it as a scientific phenomenon not yet understood like the operation of the X-rays. And many wise men are satisfied with the simple explanation that it is the work of God, manifested today for those who have faith exactly as in Bible times.

I was stabbed with poignant memories this afternoon when a tall black-bearded peasant told the doctors that his father, who accompanied him, and who had been insane, a violent neurasthenic, shut up in an asylum for four years, had been restored by the blessed waters to perfect health and had shown no abnormality of body or mind for eight years. These statements were verified by scientists and doctors.

Eight years! If I really believe in the permanent recovery of this poor man, as the doctors do, why am I doubtful about my own permanent recovery? The answer is that I am not doubtful for myself, but for Christopher. He might reason like this, he might say to himself—he is so loyal that he would die rather than say it to me: “I know Penelope has been restored to her normal condition of mind, but that normal condition includes a strong inherited and developed tendency towards—certain things,”—my cheeks burn with shame as I write this. “How do I know that this tendency in her, even if she remains herself, will not make trouble again—for both of us?”

How could Christopher be sure about this?

He could not be sure!

So I did right to leave him.

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