Diary of Marie Bashkirtseff
CZENUKFR

Saturday, 19 June 1880

The whole studio expected Tony to kneel before my painting, and he said little more than usual. Yet it is better work — though perhaps he was distracted, and besides I had sent him Russian cigarettes, so he may have been afraid of seeming too effusive.
Here is a short notice from Le Gaulois [Missing] which will prevent me — reflection helping — from giving Saint Matthew to Casimir. I had the idea of giving it to him to leave a sweet memory of myself.
Mme de Fitz-James invites us to dinner this evening, but there is the circus and it is impossible. I would rather dine with that charming old woman than go out. But my aunt would think it is because Soutzo is not accompanying us to the circus. One would need someone to replace Soutzo. So it is not he that I shall miss, but simply a suitor.
Mme Gavini, Saint-Amand, d'Alt, Cerny, Wodzinski. The latter asks what has become of Soutzo. I think he has left. Mme de Bailleul and Cerny stay for dinner — and in walks... Soutzo. The pig has brought him luck; the minor affair is settled. There is something in the poor child — he talks, he laughs, but one senses a broken string. I speak of marrying old General Prince Nursky who is at Poltava, a widower these two years. I go to dress for the circus and Soutzo follows me; we stop in the blue salon. He has something to tell me. He has made a resolution — he is leaving and will not return for six months. He will explain this by letter; there is a campaign plan he cannot disclose, but he will come back more worthy of me. I reproached him for being idle, for being nothing: "Believe me, I will come back more fit." "I am going to work for... my own good, and then — who knows — you will perhaps be ready to give me an answer."
Why not wait in Paris?
"I cannot. I love you. It is beyond my strength — to see you like this... I cannot. I am ill and it grows worse and worse."
His sincerity makes me serious, and it is almost without laughing that I tell him we are too poor. Besides, ever since he asked for me I spend my time telling him, in his presence, that I shall marry only a rich man, and recounting my extravagant expenses. Phew — What... Yes — to have feelings like that, one must be someone.
Then he said something that stirred me. We were in my room; I was standing before the writing table; he took my hands.
"Why not wait in Paris?" I asked.
"Because I love you, I love you, I love you — you cannot understand" — and he pressed my hands and looked at me with two sad eyes, on the verge of tears.
But I have no dowry.
"What does that matter — I love you. I would spend everything."
"Listen," he said, "we could marry — my fortune will suffice for two years."
And after?
"And after, when there is nothing left, you will divorce and marry a millionaire."
"Or else you will give me back my freedom by killing yourself," I said, laughing.
"Or that, as you wish."
You will sign the divorce in advance?
"Yes."
You are mad!
"Well, no — I was joking."
That does not surprise me — you are not capable of having feelings like that in earnest.
What!...
Yes — to have feelings like that, one must be someone.
"Listen to me — well, yes, it is serious. I will give you back your freedom after two years of marriage if you wish it. Divorce exists in our religion, and it is in accordance with your own principles — do you agree?"
I answered these follies with a smile. It would be unkind to be harsh when someone loves you and is so miserable.
Ah! To leave and to part from what one loves — there is a heavy grief. I feel and understand all of it by intuition; it suffices for me to imagine a story, events, feelings, to feel them as if they had truly happened — to the point of laughing wholeheartedly, or being happy, or shedding real tears.
I have lived so many lives in this fashion!
"I am going, I am going," Soutzo kept repeating without stirring from his place. "You will think of me a little — I love you. Say it — you will think of me." And then disjointed words, such as when one is in a hurry to leave and no longer believes there is time to say a whole sentence — yet one does not go, one stands there repeating twenty times over: goodbye, I am going, I love you, think of me.
Hurried words, then silences as if everything was forgotten. "I am leaving tonight — tonight, do you hear — goodbye, farewell, farewell, farewell, I love you, farewell." He tried to put his arms around me, but I held out my hand; he pressed it and brought his face so close it barely grazed my cheek.
Come then — farewell.
I dressed, a little stirred, and he accompanied us to the circus, where we found Baron d'Alt and Saint-Amand.
During that short journey — he accompanied us to the circus in the carriage — his faded smile and his voice with its broken string caused me pain.
Having settled us and said goodnight to my aunt, we shook hands very firmly but without pumping them — before 3,000 people. He looked at me as he said farewell — that word had a particular meaning for us. As for me: I could not bring myself to leave; I would always wish to watch over my treasure; I would be jealous... But did I not say the other day that one cannot even be jealous when one truly loves? I cannot explain it, but it is very true.
True feelings lend a singular greatness to the most ordinary of beings.
This fellow has risen to a considerable height in his sadness, in his grief.
And when I told Rosalie that he was leaving this evening, that girl who does not like him said to me — completely taken aback, in an altered voice: "What — tonight, at night!" Well, that does something to me.