The Necklace by Guy de Maupassant - Essay Example

A day after you brought it, my neighbor, Madame Angel, also asked for the necklace, but oh, her poor child lost the necklace, I don’t have it anymore.” Mathilde held an immediate grudge against herself; she was lost for words and talked with her eyes and nodes more than her mouth. She blamed herself for deceiving herself with quite unreal life, but remembered now it has been ten years, “what is done is done, be it a punishment or a lesson, I have learned it the hard way.” Said Mathilde.
            At home, Mathilde battled with the thoughts of either telling her husband the truth or not, ultimately she felt she had lived with so much deception and desired a new life. She told the husband about her encounter with Madame Forestier, the value of the original necklace, and how ashamed she was of herself. Yearning for a new truthful life after ten years, she decided to open the box where she kept the four hundred franc dress, and wear it in this time of disappointment as a means of being honest with herself. From a dusty box, she lifted the dress, wondering if it would fit, carefully, touching through the lining, she thought she felt something. And again, she touched, a hole in the lining of the dress, between the outer material of the dress and the lining…holy God! She shouted…her husband came in a hurry. Holding it in her hand, Mathilde retrieved the necklace. Ten years, her husband said, and now this necklace shall revive them. They looked at each other and laughed, wept maybe, but Mathilde believed she had learned. Read More