Fear of De Sade

by Bernardo Carvalho

  VOICE: Then why didn’t they disappear, leaving you alone with the body?

  BARON: Because, if they’d fled, they’d have aroused suspicion.

  VOICE: But, since they stayed, why didn’t they serve as prosecution witnesses? All they needed to say was that they’d seen you killing the maid for your head to be marked for the chop.

  BARON: They couldn’t, because they’d be accomplices. If they were there, why didn’t they stop me? It was two against one, they could have stopped me. They used the same pretext: they said they were unconscious because of the pastilles, and hadn’t seen anything.

  VOICE: The same pretext? Is that the way you want to escape from the court’s examination? The same pretext as yours? You mean to say that the sleep brought on by the aniseed pastilles was a pretext?

  BARON: It was a manner of speaking. I put it badly.

  VOICE: Very badly. We’ll not get anywhere that way. When it comes down to it, do you want to know the truth or not? Sometimes, it seems to me that it would be better to leave things as they are, in ignorance.

  BARON: I’m saying it wasn’t me!

  VOICE: I think you must have understood by now that that phrase means absolutely nothing. You can’t speak for yourself. There’s nothing more fragile than words spoken in a waking state, all the more when people act when they’re asleep.

  BARON: Fine. Then what’s to be done?

  VOICE: You must doubt all certainties. Even the most basic ones. You have to hand yourself over to me, dear sir. Answer my questions, take me as a guide, and don’t resist. I’ll tell you all I heard in the refectory. Together we’ll try to reach a conclusion. But you’ll have to listen to me first. You’ll have to submit to me.

  BARON: Sorry, but I think I’m seeing things again. It’s horrible! I’ve the impression I glimpsed you in the shadows. And again, in my vision you . . . are black as pitch, as well as . . .

  VOICE: I’ve already said it’s impossible to see anything here! At the beginning, you seemed an intelligent man to me. This isn’t the moment to despair, but to focus your mind on what’s most important. You spoke to me of the revenge in the eyes of the maid when you met her, when you invited her to visit you in the château. Revenge for what?

  BARON: For her status, of course. Probably on the count.

  VOICE: Well, the count must have had some reason to kill her, according to your hypothesis, and jealousy, what you suggested, doesn’t seem enough. You said you need the opinion of someone who doesn’t believe in feelings. Everything is a convention. Only pleasure and the instincts are real. The count didn’t kill the maid out of jealousy. In the refectory, while the baroness was saying over and over: ‘What a nightmare! What a nightmare!’, if that woman with the fiery hair is really the baroness, he, the count, was trying to convince her that they had no choice. ‘She did it on purpose. You saw the countess’s clothes. She had one of the countess’s dresses on!’ And, at that moment, the baroness stopped repeating her mantra to ask him, in an irritated voice, to shut his mouth. She said, sharply: ‘You’d better think twice before you make your comments, if you still think you can escape the guillotine with your contacts.’ Probably you’re right when you say they must have used the pretext that they were unconscious, under the effect of the pastilles. Only you can’t repeat that to the court, because your own alibi would be useless. They know that the best thing for them is not to have seen anything. It wouldn’t shock me if they’d also said to the court, like you, that they didn’t know who the victim was, and that’s why they too were committed. We have to know what motive they had to kill her.

  BARON: Martine! I can hear her voice telling me: ‘I want to be with you. I want to prove that God doesn’t exist’ in the carriage on the way to what was left of the château. The same thing as the baroness. The same thing all the men and all the women in the world say. Even if it’s only once in their lives. When they are more alive than ever. She couldn’t know that the count was expecting her. And I had no way of warning her. But I wasn’t to blame. I can hear her voice saying ‘I want to submit myself to your pleasures’, as she watched me leave the count’s lands. She was for me. The worst thing is her having died without experiencing pleasure.

  VOICE: Who said that’s so?

  BARON: I didn’t have time to deflower her.

  VOICE: Who can swear to that? You don’t remember anything. And who can swear the count didn’t rape her before he killed her?

  BARON: No! Martine! I hear her voice saying ‘I’m on my way. I want to give myself’, in the carriage, with the countess’s dress, without knowing that the count was waiting there to punish her. It’s as if I’d set a trap for her! As if I’d betrayed her!

  VOICE: Doesn’t it seem strange to you that the count and the baroness have taken all the trouble to come all the way from wherever it was . . .

  BARON: From Bordeaux.

  VOICE: . . . from Bordeaux to punish a maid?

  BARON: You can see how strong her desire for vengeance for her condition was. For them, it was unthinkable that a maid . . .

  VOICE: A maid . . .

  BARON: That she should give herself to me, and dressed as the countess to boot. You should have seen when she came into what was left of the salons in the château, after the count, and with her head lowered. She was even more beautiful when she was punished. The count robbed me of that pleasure, and that’s unpardonable too.

  VOICE: It seems you’re getting closer to the truth. They came all the way from Bordeaux not to participate in one of your orgies, but because they were determined not to let you punish the maid. They sent you to sleep so you couldn’t deflower her. Are you following me, baron? They came all the way from Bordeaux because they were worried about her. By that logic, they had no reason to kill her. That would be a contradiction. So, you’re the guilty one. You killed her!

  BARON: No! How could I have killed her if I was asleep?

  VOICE: And who said you were?

  BARON: I’m telling you!

  VOICE: That’s not enough.

  BARON: They’re lying! They didn’t come all the way from Bordeaux to the château to save her from me. They couldn’t have cared less. Aristocrats, even when they’re reformed, don’t care about maids!

  VOICE: Ah, now you’ve got where I wanted.

  BARON: What are you talking about?

  VOICE: Aristocrats don’t care about maids.

  BARON: But I swear to you I was in love. With me, she would discover pleasure.

  VOICE: Aristocrats don’t care about maids. They’ve got other things to do.

  BARON: What are you suggesting? I’ve told you I loved her.

  VOICE: I can say the same about the count and the baroness.

  BARON: What do you mean?

  VOICE: Why couldn’t they love the maid too?

  BARON: Come on, where are you trying to take me with your syllogisms? You know very well they couldn’t love her as I did.

  VOICE. Why not?

  BARON: You want to tell me . . . You’re insinuating that the two of them, my cousin and my own chaste wife . . . that the two of them subjected the maid to bacchanalian orgies?

  The Voice lets out an immense guffaw. The baron, embarrassed, puts on an unconvincing laugh, trying to go along with him.

  BARON: Sorry, master, but I’ve had that vision again . . .

  VOICE: How can you have visions if you can’t see beyond your nose? How many times am I going to have to repeat your own phrase, that nobles don’t concern themselves with maids, to make you understand at last? Nobles only concern themselves with other nobles. How many times must I repeat that to make you understand?

  BARON: Understand what? The count was always on my side. It was he who introduced the baroness to me. They were friends. What are you hinting at now? Are you trying to say that the count and the baroness . . . ? Is that it?

  VOICE: By the looks of things, you’re halfway there. I’m sorry to have to confirm that, from what I could see in the refectory, they r
eally are together, the count and the baroness, together as man and wife, and probably they always have been. Why did the count introduce you to the baroness? Because it suited him. And her too.

  BARON: What are you trying to say?

  VOICE: Why did she disappear for seven months straight after she knew you, if she was in love as you say?

  BARON: It was a way of seducing me!

  VOICE: A way of seducing me! A way of seducing me!

  BARON: She knew of my libertine past. She knew she had no chance with me unless she had a strategy. I wasn’t going to get married just like that, after so many years refusing marriage. It was an excuse she invented to convince me.

  VOICE: Exactly. An excuse. Try to think of anything a woman might hide for seven months.

  BARON: What are you trying to tell me now?

  VOICE: The obvious. The thing only you don’t want to see.

  BARON: But that’s not possible!

  VOICE: Do the sums yourself.

  BARON: It’s not possible!

  VOICE: Fifteen years.

  BARON: My God! Fifteen years!

  VOICE: That’s what always happens. When things get tight, they appeal to God.

  BARON: A child!

  VOICE: Seven months and then fifteen years.

  BARON: How didn’t I see it?

  VOICE: Everyone sees what he wants.

  BARON: How is it I never saw the same features, the same little breasts pressed into the silver corset?

  VOICE: Not only the little breasts, but the two-months-gone stomach pressed in by the baroness’s silver corset. It was no accident the count presented you to her. She was already two months pregnant. You were useful to both of them. You were the alibi they needed to stay together after the child was born. They could get rid of the child of their adultery, they could give her to a convent, but they needed to prevent suspicion with a marriage.

  BARON: I’ve played the role of a clown! I didn’t see a thing when I met her.

  VOICE: You still don’t. You’re a slave to your feelings. You were their last chance. From then on it would be more difficult to trick even a blind man. She wasn’t just getting too old. She had to get married for other reasons. Like most people, she needed a façade to hide what her instincts had forced her to do.

  BARON: I can’t see anything anywhere.

  VOICE: Of course you can’t, in this darkness. And perhaps it’s better that way.

  BARON: You’re saying that to console me.

  VOICE: To spare you. Sometimes, sight is a terrible thing. If you could see me, you probably wouldn’t be able to bear my presence. Some even go mad.

  BARON: How could I have been so blind? Seven months were enough. She never emigrated, minx! She’d have gone to the guillotine if she’d returned. She never left France. She hid her pregnancy in some convent or other, just as she did the child, who ended up escaping before the mother superior could use her. And if it hadn’t been for that sudden refusal of sex after the marriage, I’d have found out.

  VOICE: They hid the girl for fifteen years.

  BARON: The same little breasts pressed together by the silver corset.

  VOICE: You weren’t that blind, in the end.

  BARON: What a nightmare!

  VOICE: That’s the same thing I heard the mother say in the refectory.

  BARON: The minx!

  VOICE: You also saw the revenge in the girl’s eyes.

  BARON: No wonder!

  VOICE: That’s right. Fifteen years.

  BARON: Why didn’t I see it before?

  VOICE: It was better that way. There were other things too you didn’t understand.

  BARON: I’ve understood everything. I’ve been used by the count. He saved me from the Revolution because he needed me. Now I know why they appeared at the château.

  VOICE: Do you understand?

  BARON: But of course. They couldn’t let the revenge be carried out. When she submitted to me, Martine would avenge us both at the same time. How is it I didn’t understand at the time that she’s decided to give herself up as a sacrifice for such a valiant cause? What pleasure it would have been to deflower her for a cause like that! She wanted to avenge herself for the humiliation that they’d imposed on the two of us for the fifteen years when they kept her hidden with the nuns and then as a maid, and kept me as a blind clown. And all because of a rotten morality. Everything’s beginning to make sense.

  VOICE: Everything?

  BARON: Everything the count did for me. All the advice he gave me. Why he was never with the countess and why the baroness was never with me in those fifteen years. Why I never knew of Martine’s existence until that day. Why she accepted my proposal so promptly. Why she wanted to come to the château. To avenge herself. And why they appeared so soon after. Why the baroness wanted to take part in one of my orgies for the first time. Why she wouldn’t allow any prostitute to take part. Why the count persuaded me to obey the baroness’s sudden whims. Why they brought what they called an aphrodisiac!

  VOICE: Why?

  BARON: They wanted to get rid of the two of us at the same time, accusing me of the murder. That’s what they call the love of a father and mother? They’re monsters! They’ve killed their own daughter! My God!

  VOICE: How many times must I repeat that the name of God only serves lazy people who end up getting lost on that shortcut to unreason?

  BARON: And aren’t they monstrous assassins?

  VOICE: Certainly.

  BARON: Their own daughter!

  VOICE: In the refectory, I heard the count say to the baroness that now the girl was a long way away, there was no way back. It’d be better to forget!

  BARON: She’s in heaven! She’s an angel!

  VOICE: Everyone sees what they want to.

  BARON: What are you hinting at this time? Let’s have a minimum of respect for the dead! She was a virgin. And then there’s the scandal of her revenge. If I’d deflowered her, she’d have given me the chance to revenge myself for everything they’ve done to me. How they’ve used me. (horrified) Master!

  VOICE: I’ve already asked you not to call me that. Now what is it?

  BARON: The vision, again.

  VOICE: And what do you want me to tell you?

  BARON: That it’s not true.

  VOICE: What?

  BARON: What I thought I saw.

  VOICE: Everyone sees what they want to.

  BARON: I must be hallucinating. It must be normal. After all, they killed their own daughter just to incriminate me. And how can anyone fail to react to that? They’re capable of anything. They couldn’t allow her to take her revenge on them, the more so in the way she’d thought up, using me as an accomplice. Their pride is greater than their love. They had no pity. How horrible!

  VOICE: They had no pity. That’s the least you can say.

  BARON: And she had to pay for what they’d done, for the responsibility they’d never admitted to!

  VOICE: She must be feeling very lonely.

  BARON: What do you mean?

  VOICE: Wasn’t it you who said just now that she’s in heaven? And that she was an angel? An angel among so many sinners?

  BARON: This is no time for irony.

  VOICE: It seems you still haven’t realised that you don’t set the time here.

  BARON: How could I be so stupid? Why did I accept the pastilles? I could have saved the girl. How did I fall into such a simple trap? I should have suspected as soon as they appeared at the château. They wouldn’t have come all the way from Bordeaux for nothing.

  VOICE: Everyone sees what they want to.

  BARON: (yelling) But I can’t see anything here! I want to get out of here at once! Where are they? They’ll pay for what they’ve done! For the first time in their lives, they’ll pay! Get me out of here at once! Get me out of here!

  VOICE: Don’t be silly. There’s no point in shouting. I’m here at your side; I can hear you.

  BARON: But someone needs to do something! I need to t
ell the court what happened.

  VOICE: They already know.

  BARON: And why? Why don’t they let me out of here?

  VOICE: Because they can’t.

  BARON: But I’m innocent!

  VOICE: That’s what they all say.

  BARON: I want to see them!

  VOICE: You can’t, I’ve already said.

  BARON: I know, I know! They’re under observation. Waiting for what?

  VOICE: What everyone’s waiting for.

  BARON: Will they be executed, then?

  VOICE: I wouldn’t go that far.

  BARON: But that’s what they deserve for killing their own daughter. And if the baroness says it’s a nightmare, it’s maybe because she’s repentant. Perhaps she’ll confess the crime. And then they’ll have to free me.

  VOICE: I doubt it.

  BARON: And they’re going to leave me here for the rest of my life?

  VOICE: I wouldn’t necessarily put it that way.

  BARON: And how would you put it if you were in my place? Come on! How?

  VOICE: There are things you still haven’t understood.

  BARON: Don’t be condescending. I might have been stupid and blind once, but now everything’s quite clear.

  VOICE: Really?

  BARON: And anyway, what does it matter, now that she’s dead?

  VOICE: Dead?

  BARON: I could have saved Martine.

  VOICE: Now, she’s far away. It’s irreversible.

  BARON: Like the angels in heaven.

  VOICE: I’m trying to be patient, but your blindness is irritating.

  BARON: If at least there was a little light in here. I’m tired.

  VOICE: Tired? But it’s only the beginning.

  BARON: Nothing makes any sense now that she’s dead. Perhaps if I went the same way she has. And left behind the unjust, petty world of men. You might be able to help me. All I need is a rope. Could you get hold of a rope for me, since you have access to every wing of the asylum?

  VOICE: It’s no use. There’s no escape from here.