THE SISTERS RONDOLI
AND
OTHER STORIES
BY
GUY DE MAUPASSANT
Translated and Edited
By Ernest Boyd
New York, Alfred A. Knopf, 1923
THE SISTERS RONDOLI
MY LANDLADY
THE LITTLE CASK
ANDRÉ'S DISEASE
HE?
MY UNCLE SOSTHÈNE
THE ACCURSED BREAD
MADAME LUNEAU'S CASE
A WISE MAN
THE UMBRELLA
A MEETING
DECORATED!
CHÂLI
THE LEGACY
THE SISTERS RONDOLI
I
"No," said Pierre Jouvent, "I do not know Italy. I started to gothere twice, but each time I was stopped at the frontier and couldnot manage to get any further. And yet my two attempts gave me charmingideas of the manners of that beautiful country. Some time or other Imust visit its cities, as well as the museums and works of art with whichit abounds. I shall make another attempt as soon as possible to crossthat impregnable border.
"You don't understand me, so I will explain myself. In 1874 I wasseized with desire to see Venice, Florence, Rome, and Naples. I got thiswhim about the middle of June, then the powerful fever of spring stirsthe desire for love and adventure. I am not, as you know, a greattraveller; it appears to me a useless and tiresome business. Nights spentin a train, the disturbed slumbers of the railway carriage, with theattendant headache and stiffness in every limb, the sudden waking inthat rolling box, the unwashed feeling, the flying dust and smuts thatfill your eyes and hair, the taste of coal in your mouth, and the baddinners in draughty refreshment rooms, are, in my opinion, a horribleway of beginning a pleasure trip.
"After this introduction by the express, we have the miseries of thehotel; of some great hotel full of people, and yet so empty; the strangeroom, and the dubious bed! I am most particular about my bed; it is thesanctuary of life. We intrust our nude and fatigued bodies to it thatthey may be refreshed and rested between soft sheets and feathers.
"There we spend the most delightful hours of our existence, the hours oflove and of sleep. The bed is sacred, and should be respected, venerated,and loved by us as the best and most delightful of our earthlypossessions.
"I cannot lift up the sheets of a hotel bed without a shiver ofdisgust. What took place there the night before? What dirty, odiouspeople have slept in it! I begin, then, to think of all the horriblepeople with whom one rubs shoulders every day, hideous hunchbacks, peoplewith flabby bodies, with dirty hands that make you wonder what their feetand the rest of their bodies are like. I think of those who exhale a smellof garlic and dirt that is loathsome. I think of the deformed andpurulent, of the perspiration emanating from the sick, and of everythingthat is ugly in man. And al