Aphrodite, Pierre Louÿs [top 50 books to read .txt] 📗
- Author: Pierre Louÿs
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Demetrios lost himself in ineffable adoration. He believed in truth that Aphrodite herself was there. He recognized his work no longer, so profound was the abyss between what he had been and what he had become. He held forth his arms and murmured the mysterious words by which the goddess is supplicated in the Phrygian ceremonies.
Supernatural, luminous, impalpable, naked and pure, the softly palpitating vision hovered upon the stone. He fixed his eyes upon her although he feared lest the caress of his look make the delicate hallucination evaporate into the air. He advanced very gently, touched with his finger the rosy toe, as though to assure himself of the existence of the statue, and, incapable of stopping, so much she drew him to her, he ascended until he stood beside her and, placing his hands upon the white shoulders, gazed contemplatively into her eyes.
He trembled, he swooned, he laughed with joy. His hands wandered over the arms, the cold, hard waist, descended, caressed.
[paragraph continues] With all his strength he strained himself to this Immortality. He looked at himself in the mirror, he lifted the necklace of pearls, took it off, swung it, gleaming, in the moonlight, and replaced it timidly. He kissed the curving hand, the round neck, the undulous bosom, the partly opened marble mouth. Then he drew back to the edge of the pedestal and, beholding the divine arms, gazed tenderly at the adorable bowed head.
The hair, dressed in the oriental manner, lightly veiled the forehead. The half-closed eyes elongated, smiling. The lips were parted as though swooning from a kiss.
Silently he disposed the seven rows of round pearls upon the dazzling breast and descended to the floor to see the idol from a distance.
Then it seemed to him that he awoke. He recalled what he had come to do, what he had wished, nearly accomplished; a monstrous thing. He blushed to the temples. The remembrance of Chrysis passed like a gross apparition before his memory. He enumerated everything dubious in the courtesan’s beauty: the thick lips, the puffed hair, the languid gait. He had forgotten her hands, but he imagined them large to add an odious detail to the image he repulsed. His state of mind became like that of a man at dawn who could not explain to himself how he could have permitted himself to be tempted the evening before. He found neither an excuse, nor even a serious reason. Evidently he had been, for a day, victim of a sort of passing madness, a physical unrest, a malady. He felt himself cured, but still dizzy with intoxication.
To complete the return to himself, he leaned back against the wall of the temple and remained a long time standing before the statue. The light of the moon continued to descend through the square opening in the roof; Aphrodite shone resplendent; and, as her eyes were in the shadow, he sought their gaze…
So the night passed. Then the day came and the statue took in turn the glowing rosiness of the dawn and the golden reflection of the sun.
Demetrios had ceased to think. The ivory comb and the silver mirror which he bore in his tunic had passed from his memory. He abandoned himself gently to serene contemplation.
Outside, a tempest of bird cries clamored, piped and sang in the garden. The voices of women talked and laughed at the foot of the walls. The agitation of morning surged up from the awakened earth. Demetrios was filled only with delicious emotions.
The sun was already high and the shadow of the roof had moved when he heard a confused sound of light feet ascending the outer steps.
It was doubtless a sacrifice which they were about to offer the goddess, a procession of young women coming to fulfill vows or pronounce them before the statue for the first day of the Aphrodisian Festivals.
Demetrios wished to avoid them.
The sacred pedestal opened in the rear in a fashion known only to the priests and the sculptor. There the Hierophant stood to dictate to a young girl whose voice was clear and high, the miraculous utterances which issued from the statue on the third day of the festival. Through it, the gardens could be reached. Demetrios entered and paused before the bronze-edged opening which pierced the thick stone.
The two golden doors opened heavily. Then the procession entered.
TOWARD the middle of the night, Chrysis was awakened by three knocks at the door. She had slept the whole day between the two Ephesians; they might have been taken for three sisters together. Rhodis was cuddled against the Galilaean; Myrtocleia slept face down, her eyes upon her arm and her back uncovered.
Chrysis disengaged herself carefully, took three steps upon the bed, descended, and partly opened her door.
A sound of voices came from the entrance.
“Who is it, Djala? who is it?” she asked.
“It is Naucrates who wishes to speak with thee. I am telling him that thou art not free.”
“Oh, how stupid! Certainly I am free. Enter, Naucrates, I am in my room.”
And she returned to the bed.
Naucrates stood for ‘some time on the threshold as though he feared being indiscreet. The two musicians opened sleep-laden eyes but could not tea: themselves from their dreams.
“Seat thyself,” said Chrysis. “I have no coquetries to make between us. I know thou hast not come for me. What wishest thou of me?”
Naucrates was a well-known philosopher who for more than twenty years had been the lover of Bacchis and had never deceived her, more through indolence than by fidelity. His gray hair was trimmed short, his beard pointed after the manner of Demosthenes and his moustache cut even with his lips. He wore a large white garment of seamless wool.
“I have come with an invitation for thee,” he said. “Bacchis gives, tomorrow, a dinner to be followed by a festival. We will be seven, if thou comest. Do not fail us.”
“A festival? What is the occasion?”
“She will free her handsomest slave, Aphrodisia. There will be dancers and auletrides. I believe thy two friends are engaged, and for that reason they should not be here. The others are rehearsing even now at Bacchis’s.”
“Oh! that is true,” cried Rhodis, “we had forgotten it. Arise, Myrto, we are very late.”
But Chrysis protested. “No! Not yet! How wicked thou art to take my women-friends away from me! If I had suspected that, I would not have received thee. Oh! see, they are already prepared!”
“Our robes are not complicated,” said the child. “And we are of beautiful enough to spend a long time dressing.”
“Will I see you at the temple, at least?”
“Yes, tomorrow morning; we will bring doves. I am taking a drachma from thy purse, Chryse; we have nothing with which to buy them. Until tomorrow.”
They ran out. Naucrates looked for some time at the door closed after them; then he folded his arms and, turning toward
[paragraph continues] Chrysis, said in a low voice, “Good. Thou conductest thyself well.”
“How?”
“Dost thou think this can endure for long? If it continues thus, we will be forced to go to Bathyllos…”
“Ah! no!” cried Chrysis, “I will never admit that! I know very well people make that comparison. But it is foolish and I am astonished that thou, who professest to think, should not understand how absurd it is.”
“And what difference dost thou find?”
“There is no question of difference. There is no relation between the one and the other; that is clear.”
“I do not say thou art wrong. I wish to know thy reasons.”
“Oh! they can be given briefly; listen carefully. Woman is, in point of love, a finished instrument. From head to foot, she is made uniquely, marvelously, for love. She alone knows how to love. She alone knows how to be loved. Consequently, love between women is perfect; between man and woman it is not as pure; between men it is mere friendship. That is all,” said Chrysis.
“Thou art hard on Plato, my girl.”
“The great men are not, any more than gods, great in all circumstances. Pallas understands nothing of commerce, Sophocles knew not how to paint, Plato knew not how to love. Philosophers, poets, orators—those who appeal to his name—are no better, and however admirable they may be in their own art, in love they are simpletons. Believe me, Naucrates, I feel I am right.”
The philosopher made a gesture. “Thou art a little irreverent,” he said, “but I by no means feel thou art wrong. My indignation was not real. There is something charming in the friendship of two young women, provided they are both quite willing to remain wholly feminine, to retain their long hair, wear womanly clothing, and refrain from artificial imitation of men, as though, illogically, they envied the gross sex which they despise so prettily. Yes, their alliance is remarkable because their bodies are not mated and their emotion is by so much the more refined. They do not embrace as do men with women; they feel more delicately the. supreme emotion. Their joy is not violent. They know nothing of brutal actions and because of this they are superior to Bathyllos. Human love is distinguished from the stupid heat of animals only by two divine functions: the caress and the kiss. Now these are the only things known to the women of whom we are speaking. They have even brought them to perfection.”
“One can do no better,” said Chrysis, puzzled. “But then why dost thou reproach me?”
“I reproach thee for being an hundred thousand. Already a large number of women do not enjoy themselves except in the company of other women. Soon you will receive us no more, even as a last resort. I am scolding thee from jealousy.”
Here Naucrates found that the conversation had lasted long enough and he arose, simply. “I can tell Bacchis she may count on thee?” he asked.
“I will come,” replied Chrysis.
The philosopher kissed her and went out slowly.
Then she clasped her hands and spoke aloud, although she was alone.
“Bacchis… Bacchis… He comes from her and does not know?… Is the mirror still there, then?… Demetrios has forgotten me… If he has hesitated the first day, I am lost; he will do nothing… But it is possible that all is done! Bacchis has other mirrors which she uses oftener. Perhaps she does not know yet… Gods! Gods! No way of hearing, and perhaps… Ah! Djala! Djala!”
The slave entered.
“Give me my dice,” said Chrysis. “I wish to cast.”
And she threw four little dice into the air.
“Oh!… Oh!… Djala, look; the cast of Aphrodite!”
Thus was called a rather rare throw by which the cubes all presented a different face. There were exactly thirty-five chances to one against this arrangement. It was the best cast of the game.
Djala observed coldly, “What didst thou ask?”
“That is true,” said Chrysis, disappointed, “I forgot to make a wish. I thought, indeed, of something, but I said nothing. Does that count the same?”
“I think not; thou must begin again.”
A second time Chrysis threw the dice. “The cast of Midas, now. What dost thou think of it?”
“It is hard to say. Good and bad. It is a throw which is explained by the following one. Begin again with a single die.”
A third time Chrysis interrogated the play; but as soon as the die had fallen she stammered: “The… the point of Kios!”
And she burst into sobs.
Djala said nothing, herself uneasy. Chrysis wept upon the couch, her hair spread out around her head. At length she turned with a movement of anger. “Why didst thou make me
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