An Adventure in Paris

"An Adventure in Paris" by Guy de Maupassant is a short story that follows the unexpected escapades of a young man wandering through the streets of Paris. As he navigates the vibrant city, he encounters a series of delightful and whimsical events that highlight the charm and unpredictability of urban life. Maupassant's keen observations and rich descriptions capture the essence of Parisian culture, while also exploring themes of love, chance, and the fleeting nature of happiness. Through its engaging narrative and relatable characters, the story invites readers to embrace the spontaneity of life and the adventures that await in the bustling city.

• Short story

								
Is there any stronger feeling than curiosity in a woman? Oh! Fancy
seeing, knowing, touching what one has dreamt about! What would a woman
not do for that? When once a woman's eager curiosity is aroused, she
will be guilty of any folly, commit any imprudence, venture upon
anything, and recoil from nothing. I am speaking of women who are really
women, who are endowed with that triple-bottomed disposition, which
appears to be reasonable and cold on the surface, but whose three secret
compartments are filled. The first, with female uneasiness, which is
always in a state of flutter; the next, with sly tricks which are
colored in imitation of good faith, with those sophistical and
formidable tricks of apparently devout women; and the last, with all
those charming, improper acts, with that delightful deceit, exquisite
perfidy, and all those wayward qualities, which drive lovers who are
stupidly credulous, to suicide; but which delight others.

The woman whose adventure I am about to relate, was a little person from
the provinces, who had been insipidly chaste till then. Her life, which
was apparently so calm, was spent at home, with a busy husband and two
children, whom she brought up like an irreproachable woman. But her
heart beat with unsatisfied curiosity, and some unknown longing. She was
continually thinking of Paris, and read the fashionable papers eagerly.
The accounts of parties, of the dresses and various entertainments,
excited her longing; but, above all, she was strangely agitated by those
paragraphs which were full of double meaning, by those veils which were
half raised by clever phrases, and which gave her a glimpse of culpable
and ravishing delights, and from her country home, she saw Paris in an
apotheosis of magnificent and corrupt luxury.

And during the long nights, when she dreamt, lulled by the regular
snores of her husband, who was sleeping on his back by her side, with a
silk handkerchief tied round his head, she saw in her sleep those
well-known men whose names appeared on the first page of the newspapers
as great stars in the dark skies; and she pictured to herself their life
of continual excitement, of constant debauches, of orgies such as they
indulged in in ancient Rome, which were horridly voluptuous, with
refinements of sensuality which were so complicated that she could not
even picture them to herself.

The boulevards seemed to her to be a kind of abyss of human passions,
and there could be no doubt that the houses there concealed mysteries of
prodigious love. But she felt that she was growing old, and this,
without having known life, except in those regular, horridly monotonous,
everyday occupations, which constitute the happiness of the home. She
was still pretty, for she was well preserved in her tranquil existence,
like some winter fruit in a closed cupboard; but she was agitated and
devoured by her secret ardor. She used to ask herself whether she should
die without having experienced any of those damning, intoxicating joys,
without having plunged once, just once into that flood of Parisian
voluptuousness.

By dint of much perseverance, she paved the way for a journey to Paris,
found a pretext, got some relations to invite her, and as her husband
could not go with her, she went alone, and as soon as she arrived, she
invented a reason for remaining for two days, or rather for two nights,
if necessary, as she told him that she had met some friends who lived a
little way out of town.

And then she set out on a voyage of discovery. She went up and down the
boulevards, without seeing anything except roving and numbered vice. She
looked into the large cafés, and read the Agony Column of the
Figaro, which every morning seemed to her like a tocsin, a summons to
love. But nothing put her on the track of those orgies of actors and
actresses; nothing revealed to her those temples of debauchery which she
imagined opened at some magic word, like the cave in the Arabian
Nights, or those catacombs in Rome, where the mysteries of a persecuted
religion were secretly celebrated.

Her relations, who were quite middle-class people, could not introduce
her to any of those well-known men with whose names her head was full,
and in despair she was thinking of returning, when chance came to her
aid. One day, as she was going along the Rue de la Chaussee d'Antin,
she stopped to look into a shop full of those colored Japanese
knick-knacks, which strike the eye on account of their color. She was
looking at the little ivory buffoons, the tall vases of flaming enamel,
and the curious bronzes, when she heard the shop-keeper dilating, with
many bows, on the value of an enormous, pot-bellied, comical figure,
which was quite unique, he said, to a little, bald-headed, gray-bearded
man.

Every moment, the shop-keeper repeated his customer's name, which was a
celebrated one, in a voice like a trumpet. The other customers, young
women and well-dressed gentlemen, gave a swift and furtive, but
respectful glance at the celebrated writer, who was looking admiringly
at the china figure. They were both equally ugly, as ugly as two
brothers who had sprung from the same mother.

"I will let you have it for a thousand francs, Monsieur Varin, and that
is exactly what it cost me. I should ask anybody else fifteen hundred,
but I think a great deal of literary and artistic customers, and have
special prices for them. They all come to me, Monsieur Varin. Yesterday,
Monsieur Busnach bought a large, antique goblet of me, and the other day
I sold two candelabra like this (is it not handsome?) to Monsieur
Alexander Dumas. If Monsieur Zola were to see that Japanese figure, he
would buy it immediately, Monsieur Varin."

The author hesitated in perplexity, as he wanted to have the figure, but
the price was above him, and he thought no more about her looking at him
than if he had been alone in the desert. She came in trembling, with her
eyes fixed shamelessly upon him, and she did not even ask herself
whether he were good-looking, elegant or young. It was Jean Varin
himself, Jean Varin. After a long struggle, and painful hesitation, he
put the figure down onto the table. "No, it is too dear," he said. The
shop-keeper's eloquence redoubled. "Oh! Monsieur Varin, too dear? It is
worth two thousand francs, if it is worth a son." But the man of letters
replied sadly, still looking at the figure with the enameled eyes: "I do
not say it is not; but it is too dear for me." And thereupon, she,
seized by a kind of mad audacity, came forward and said: "What shall you
charge me for the figure?" The shop-keeper, in surprise, replied:
"Fifteen hundred francs, Madame." "I will take it."

The writer, who had not even noticed her till that moment, turned round
suddenly; he looked at her from head to foot, with half-closed eyes,
observantly, and then he took in the details, as a connoisseur. She was
charming, suddenly animated by that flame which had hitherto been

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