Diary of Marie Bashkirtseff
CZENUKFR

Friday, 17 December 1875

The weather is bad; I stay at home and tell Collignon everything there is to tell of Audiffret, the Sapogenikoffs, and so on.
Barnola comes and recounts the Francia ball.
"Audiffret was sullen," he says — "sad; he seemed bored."
That gladdens my heart.
Was it on account of this absence that he was sad? No matter — he did not enjoy himself, and I am pleased. This evening at the Opera: Le Barbier. Again!
Barnola stays until the second interval, then takes his leave, saying:
"I leave the place to your visitors."
Audiffret and the Comte de Tournon come. The Surprising One asks permission to present his friend M. Bergerault, goes to fetch him, and returns with him. Then he seats himself — in mid-air, as it were — and begins to rattle off a string of nonsense; he speaks of my caricatures, and even of our escapade to the Tower, in a tone that would shake the faith of the most credulous. I tell him he is being very naïve to believe in such an impossibility, that it was all a joke.
"And how should I come to your house, in disguise and without knowing you? Come now — you never really believed that!"
Tournon is beside me and talks to me the whole time.
I looked at him — I looked at Belle-de-Jour — I like Belle-de-Jour better than Bergerault — and then I looked at the Surprising One. Che differenza!
Tournon has black teeth, Belle-de-Jour has a swarthy complexion. Audiffret has everything pretty.
But at this moment Loftus comes back to my mind — his ravishing skin, his complexion, his Hamilton-like expression, that air he has about his mouth that makes him resemble Hamilton and the Apollo Belvedere. To say "I love the Surprising One," I make the face of a knowing woman, indulgent and laughing eyes, pouting lips — but to say "I love Loftus," I close my eyes, tilt my head back, and pressing my heart's beating with my hand, I feel myself no longer alive.
Do you understand the difference? Yes — you understand.
There was a firm pressing of the hand and a slight tremor.
After the lesson act we leave.
I leave enchanted — I have passed a charming evening.
I had a great many things to say — I am a little giddy and forget everything.

Notes

Le Barbier de Séville (The Barber of Seville): opera by Rossini (1816), based on Beaumarchais's comedy; one of the most frequently performed operas at Nice that season. ↩
The Tower (la Tour): Audiffret's residence, the Tour Audiffret in Nice; rumour had circulated that Marie had visited him there in disguise — an incident she consistently denied. ↩
Belle-de-Jour (Day-beauty): Marie's nickname for another young man of her acquaintance, named after the morning glory flower. ↩
Che differenza! (Italian): What a difference! — In Italian in the original. ↩
Hamilton-like expression (expression hamiltonienne): Lord Claud Hamilton, or the Duke of Hamilton — Marie's repeated standard of male beauty, characterised by a particular aristocratic fairness and bearing. ↩
The Apollo Belvedere: the celebrated ancient marble in the Vatican Museums, the canonical ideal of male beauty in Western art. ↩
The lesson act: Act II of Il Barbiere di Siviglia, in which Rosina takes a singing lesson under Almaviva's disguise — one of the most celebrated comic scenes in Italian opera. ↩