_A Search and a Discovery_
|M. ADOLPHE LECAMUS and Marceline thought M. Théophraste’s actions
strange, but they were too much occupied with an affair of their own to
attach very great importance to them. However, M. Théophraste concealed
his anxiety and pretended that the visit to the Conciergerie was quite
a natural occurrence. He had gone down in the cellars just to satisfy
a natural curiosity, not being one of those who make a superficial
inspection of things of interest.
The following day, M. Théophraste, under the pretext of putting his
affairs in order, shut himself up in his office and gave instructions
for nobody to disturb him. Leaning over the balcony he looked out
upon the little square of Anvers and reflected over the happenings
of yesterday. There was nothing in the view to distract him. He was
accustomed to the scene below: nurses pushing perambulators gossiping
over the latest news, and a few professors walking towards the Rollie
College. The Avenue Touraine rang with the shouts of college students
who had come before the lecture hour.
Nothing had changed; the world was just the same. To-day, like
yesterday, or like the day before yesterday. The people were going
to their business just the same. Even Nidine Petito, the wife of the
Italian professor, who lived in the apartment below, was the same. She
began to play the “Carnival of Venice” on the piano just as she did
every day.
Nothing had changed; thus he reflected. On turning round he could see
amongst his papers on the desk, the document. Did it really exist?
He had passed a restless night and was now attributing his strange
adventure to a bad dream—but no, it could not be that, for there was
the paper on his desk, in his own handwriting, and written in blood.
Good God! perhaps it was his own blood. What thoughts, what thoughts!
Théophraste passed his hand over his forehead. He was perspiring and
restless. Suddenly breathing a sigh and slapping his thigh with his
hand, he appeared to have come to a definite resolution, and put the
paper carefully away in his portfolio.
He remembered that Signor Petito, the Italian professor, was an expert
in handwriting and that he had had experience in engraving. He would
take the document to him and ask his opinion. His friend Adolphe was
also interested in graphology, but only in a spiritual way, and so he
would not confide in him. There was already too much mystery in the
affair without mixing it up with spiritualism and mediums.
He had only known the professor to bow to on the stairs, and so
in presenting himself he was introduced. The professor greeted him
cordially, and after the usual formalities, Théophraste broached the
subject of his visit. He produced the paper, and a letter which he
had written some time previously. “Signor Petito,” he commenced,
“having heard of your renown as an expert in handwriting, I would be
grateful to you if you would examine this letter, and this document,
and give me the result of your observations. I may say that there is no
connection between the two papers.”
Théophraste was not in the habit of lying, and blushed redder than a
peony. But Signor Petito was already deeply engrossed in the examining
of the two papers. His scholarly eye looked over one, then the other.
He placed them together, held them up to the light, passed his hand
over the writing, and measured them. Then he laughed, showing his white
teeth.
“Monsieur Longuet,” said he, “it is not necessary for me to keep
you waiting long for a reply. This document is in a very bad condition,
but the specimen of handwriting can still be read. They are in every way
similar to the letter, and I would swear before any tribunal that those
two handwritings have been traced by the same hand.”
Then he entered into details. “A child,” he said, “could not be
mistaken about it.” He pointed out how this duplicate writing was
identically angular. “We call a handwriting angular, Monsieur, when
the hair-strokes which join the bottom of the letters and the separate
letters are at an acute angle to the down-strokes of the letters. Do
you understand? Compare this hook and that one, those hair-strokes
with these others, and all those letters getting larger, larger in both
writing and in equal measure. But what a clear writing, Monsieur; I
have never seen such clear writing before. As clear as if cut with a
knife.”
By this time Théophraste had become white with nervousness. Signor
Petito thought that he was going to faint. However, he arose, picked up
the document and the letter, and having thanked Signor Petito, he went
out.
He wandered the streets for a long time, and at last turning down
a small street, he stood in front of an old door in the Rue Inger.
Entering, he found himself in a narrow, dark passage. A man came out of
a back room, and on recognizing Théophraste, greeted him in a friendly
way. He was wearing a square paper cap, and had on a black gown which
reached down to his feet.
“Good-day, Théophraste, good-day. What happy chance has brought you
here?”
As it had been two years since they had last seen each other they at
first spoke of family matters and other generalities. Ambrose spoke of
his trade of engraving visiting cards. He had been a printer. He had
been a printer in the province, but having put all he had into an
invention for a new paper, he had failed. He was a distant cousin to
Marceline, and when he was deep in financial troubles, Théophraste had
come to his rescue.
Théophraste seated himself on the wicker chair in the small room which
served as a workshop. This room was lighted by a large window reaching
from floor to ceiling.
“Ambrose, you are an expert. No one can approach you in the knowledge
of papers, eh?” “That is not quite true,” said Ambrose, “but I
can judge a good paper.”
“You understand all kinds?”
“All kinds.”
“If some one showed you a piece of paper, could you tell the age of
it?”
“Yes,” said Ambrose, “I could. I have published a treatise on the
water-marks of papers used in France in the seventeenth and eighteenth
centuries. That study was accepted by the Academy.” “I know, and I
have great respect for your knowledge.”
“Well, the thing is simple. The oldest paper showed a plain, glossy
surface, but soon there appeared wide lines crossed at intervals by
perpendicular lines, both giving the impression of a metal trellis over
which the paste had been spread. From the fourteenth century they used
these as a maker’s mark, and in the end they designed figures in
brass wire, initials, words, emblems of all sorts —these are the
water-marks. Every sheet of water-marked paper tells its tale, and the
year of its make can be detected, but the difficulty is to decipher
it. This necessitates a little practice.” Théophraste opened his
portfolio and took out the paper.
“Can you tell me the exact date of this?” Ambrose put on his
eyeglass and took the paper to the daylight.
“There is the date,” he said, “172--, the last figure is rubbed
out. It must be of the eighteenth century.”
“Oh,” said Théophraste, “I saw that date quite well, but do you
really think that the paper is-of that century? Does not the date lie?
That is what I want to know.”
Ambrose showed him the center of the paper. “See?”
Théophraste said nothing. Then Ambrose lit a small lamp and held the
paper up before it. In illuminating the document one could detect in the
thickness of the paper the design of a crown.
“Théophraste,” said Ambrose excitedly, “that paper is exceedingly
rare. That mark is almost unknown, for a very little paper was made
with that sign, which is called the Crown of Thorns. That paper, my dear
Théophraste, was made in 1721.”
“You are sure?”
“Yes, but tell me,” cried Ambrose, who could not conceal his
surprise, “how is it that this document, dated 1721, could be by all
visible marks in your handwriting?”
Théophraste said nothing, but getting up and putting the document back
into the portfolio, he hastened out of the house.
And so here was proof enough. He could doubt it no longer. This paper,
dated in the beginning of the eighteenth century, in the time of the
Regents, this sheet that he had sought for in the prison, distinctly
bore his own handwriting. He had written on that sheet, he, Théophraste
Longuet, late maker of rubber stamps, who retired last week at the age
of 41—he wrote on that sheet of paper these incomprehensible words in
1721. However, it did not want Signor Petito or Ambrose to prove it to
him. He knew it himself. Everything within him cried out, “It is your
paper!” And so instead of being Théophraste Longuet, son of John
Longuet, master gardener to the Ferte sous Jonaise, he had been in the
past some one he did not know, but who had been reborn in him. Yes,
that was it, and he now had the great desire to recall having lived 200
years.
Who was he? What was his name? In which body had his immortal soul
elected momentarily to live? He felt certain that these questions would
not remain long unanswered. Was it true that some of the things ignored
in his present existence constituted part of his past life? What was
meant by certain expressions spoken in the Conciergerie? Who, then, was
Simon de Anvergust, whose name had been twice repeated by his burning
lips?
“Yes, yes, the name, in former times my own, his also,” wrote
Théophraste in his journal, “arose from my awakened brain, and
knowing who I was, I recalled the whole life lived in former years, and
I read in a flash from that piece of paper all the details of a past
life.”
Monsieur Théophraste Longuet, to state the matter frankly, had not
arrived at the conclusion without having, in these incoherent lines,
wandered before. The happenings of these days were too unusual. Imagine,
he was simple-minded, a little heavy, a little foppish, he had never
invented anything in his life. He was just an amiable, honest citizen,
stupid and headstrong. He had no religion. He left that to the women,
and without declaring his atheism, used to say: “When one dies, it is
forever.” However, now he had discovered by an extraordinary incident,
that one never dies. He had to support this, and in doing so declared
that not even those in the business, in occult science, frequenting
spirits daily, could have such palpable proof. In the end Théophraste
made his resolution quickly.
This anterior existence could no longer be denied, although he knew
nothing about it. In the uncertainty of his mind he could not associate
the date 1721 with his visit to the Conciergerie.
However, he came to this final conclusion. In 1721 he had been confined
in the Conciergerie Prison, probably as a prisoner of state. He could
not admit for a second that he, Théophraste Longuet, had been shut up,
even under Louis XV, as a common criminal. In a solemn moment, perhaps
before being put to torture, he had drawn up this document and hidden
the paper between the stones in the dungeon, and passing by there two
centuries later, had found it again. This was simple enough and not
the result of any supernatural inspiration. The facts themselves were
enough.
Certain words of the document were in themselves quite natural and of
the most momentous importance. These were “Treasure... treachery of
the first of April.”
It was with these words that he hoped to discover his identity. First,
he had been rich and powerful. The words about the treasure showed
conclusively that the man had been rich and that he had buried his
treasure. He had been powerful and had been betrayed. Théophraste
had in his mind that the treason had been a memorable treason, perhaps
historic—the treachery of the first of April.
Yes, all the oddities and all the mysteries of the document left
at least a glimpse of something certain: that he had been a great
personage, that he had buried his treasures; and that after having
buried them mysteriously, more mysteriously still revealed their
existence, at the price of much cunning; perhaps at the price of his own
blood. Without doubt those tinted words had been written with blood.
Later he proposed to ask a distinguished chemist to examine it. The
treasures belonged to him, and if necessary he would use this document
to establish his right to them.
Théophraste was not rich. He had retired from business with a modest
little income. He had a comfortable little house with a garden and
bowling alley. However, this was little, with the somewhat extravagant
tastes of Marceline, and so the treasure would be most acceptable. He
therefore applied himself diligently to the research.
It must be said, though, to his credit, that he was much more puzzled by
the mystery of his personality than by the mystery of the treasure, and
that he resolved to temporarily suspend his research until the time
when he could at least give a name to this personage that he had
been—Théophraste Longuet in 1721. That discovery which interested him
most came to be in his mind the key of all the others.
That which astonished him most was the sudden development of what
he called his “historical instinct,” the instinct which had been
deficient in him all his life, but which had been revealed to him with
the suddenness and force of a clap of thunder in the depths of the
Conciergerie. In one moment, the Other, as he used to say in conversing
of this great 18th-century personage, had possessed him. It was the
Other who had found the document; it was the Other who had cried out
in the Conciergerie; it was the Other who had called to Simon
l’Anvergust, and since the Other had disappeared, Théophraste did not
know what had become of him. He sought him in vain; he examined himself;
he searched his very soul.
Before this adventure Théophraste had no curiosity about the
beginning or ending of things, he had not wasted time in wondering
over philosophical mysteries; in his vanity he had always shrugged his
shoulders at such things. However, now things were different; here was a
quiet citizen, with little scientific knowledge, who had to prove that
a manufacturer of India rubber in the year 1899 had been shut up in a
dungeon after having buried treasures in 1721. But the revelation of
this extraordinary fact had come to him spontaneously and remained so
fixed in his mind that he resolved to probe the matter to the bottom.
His instinct abandoned him momentarily and he would search books and
discover who this powerful, rich person was who had been betrayed on
April 1st; which April 1st? This remained to be determined. He haunted
the libraries from that time on. He marshaled before him the Premiers of
the Kingdom. He found nothing to give him a clue. Some dukes and peers,
some illustrious generals, some great financiers, a few princes of
the blood. He stopped an instant at Law, but he was too dissipated; at
Maurice de Saxe, who ought to have won the Battle of Fontenoy; at the
Count du Barry, who had had the most beautiful mistress in Paris.
He feared that perhaps he had been the Count de Charolais, who
distinguished himself by his debauches, and killed the thatchers on
the roofs by shooting at them. He was forty-eight hours the Cardinal of
Palegria, but was disgusted when he learned that his Eminence had been
a farm hand for the Duchess of Maine. It was refreshing to find in some
corner of history a sympathetic count or lord that the writers of the
epoch had adorned in engaging colors and on whom they had bestowed
some virtues. But Théophraste soon saw that all these would have to be
abandoned. For none of them had the principal qualifications of having
been shut up in the Conciergerie in 1721, or having been betrayed on an
April 1st.
However, in the Journal of the Barber, he discovered a bastard of the
Regent, about whom were some startling facts which precipitated him into
a state of great excitement.
Before entering into the details, however, of this discovery, we will
return to the doings of Marceline and M. Adolphe Lecamus.