Renardet covered his chin with a white lather while he looked at himself
in the glass. Then he sharpened his razor on the strop and continued:
“The principal inhabitant of Carvelin bears the name of Joseph Renardet,
mayor, a rich landowner, a rough man who beats guards and coachmen--”
The examining magistrate burst out laughing.
“That's enough. Let us pass on to the next.”
“The second in importance is Pelledent, his deputy, a cattle breeder, an
equally rich landowner, a crafty peasant, very sly, very close-fisted
on every question of money, but incapable in my opinion of having
perpetrated such a crime.”
“Continue,” said M. Putoin.
Renardet, while proceeding with his toilet, reviewed the characters
of all the inhabitants of Carvelin. After two hours' discussion their
suspicions were fixed on three individuals who had hitherto borne a
shady reputation--a poacher named Cavalle, a fisherman named Paquet, who
caught trout and crabs, and a cattle drover named Clovis II.
The search for the perpetrator of the crime lasted all summer, but he
was not discovered. Those who were suspected and arrested easily proved
their innocence, and the authorities were compelled to abandon the
attempt to capture the criminal.
But this murder seemed to have moved the entire country in a singular
manner. There remained in every one's mind a disquietude, a vague
fear, a sensation of mysterious terror, springing not merely from the
impossibility of discovering any trace of the assassin, but also and
above all from that strange finding of the wooden shoes in front of La
Roque's door the day after the crime. The certainty that the murderer
had assisted at the investigation, that he was still, doubtless,
living in the village, possessed all minds and seemed to brood over the
neighborhood like a constant menace.
The wood had also become a dreaded spot, a place to be avoided and
supposed to be haunted.
Formerly the inhabitants went there to spend every Sunday afternoon.
They used to sit down on the moss at the feet of the huge tall trees or
walk along the water's edge watching the trout gliding among the weeds.
The boy's used to play bowls, hide-and-seek and other games where the
ground had been cleared and levelled, and the girls, in rows of four or
five, would trip along, holding one another by the arms and screaming
songs with their shrill voices. Now nobody ventured there for fear of
finding some corpse lying on the ground.
Autumn arrived, the leaves began to fall from the tall trees, whirling
round and round to the ground, and the sky could be seen through the
bare branches. Sometimes, when a gust of wind swept over the tree tops,
the slow, continuous rain suddenly grew heavier and became a rough storm
that covered the moss with a thick yellow carpet that made a kind of
creaking sound beneath one's feet.
And the sound of the falling leaves seemed like a wail and the leaves
themselves like tears shed by these great, sorrowful trees, that wept in
the silence of the bare and empty wood, this dreaded and deserted wood
where wandered lonely the soul, the little soul of little Louise Roque.
The Brindille, swollen by the storms, rushed on more quickly, yellow and
angry, between its dry banks, bordered by two thin, bare, willow hedges.
And here was Renardet suddenly resuming his walks under the trees. Every
day, at sunset, he came out of his house, descended the front steps
slowly and entered the wood in a dreamy fashion, with his hands in his
pockets, and paced over the damp soft moss, while a legion of rooks from
all the neighboring haunts came thither to rest in the tall trees and
then flew off like a black cloud uttering loud, discordant cries.
Night came on, and Renardet was still strolling slowly under the trees;
then, when the darkness prevented him from walking any longer, he would
go back to the house and sink into his armchair in front of the glowing
hearth, stretching his damp feet toward the fire.
One morning an important bit of news was circulated through the
district; the mayor was having his wood cut down.
Twenty woodcutters were already at work. They had commenced at the
corner nearest to the house and worked rapidly in the master's presence.
And each day the wood grew thinner, losing its trees, which fell down
one by one, as an army loses its soldiers.
Renardet no longer walked up, and down. He remained from morning till
night, contemplating, motionless, with his hands behind his back, the
slow destruction of his wood. When a tree fell he placed his foot on it
as if it were a corpse. Then he raised his eyes to the next with a kind
of secret, calm impatience, as if he expected, hoped for something at
the end of this slaughter.
Meanwhile they were approaching the place where little Louise Roque had
been found. They came to it one evening in the twilight.
As it was dark, the sky being overcast, the woodcutters wanted to stop
their work, putting off till next day the fall of an enormous beech
tree, but the mayor objected to this and insisted that they should at
once lop and cut down this giant, which had sheltered the crime.
When the lopper had laid it bare and the woodcutters had sapped its
base, five men commenced hauling at the rope attached to the top.
The tree resisted; its powerful trunk, although notched to the centre,
was as rigid as iron. The workmen, all together, with a sort of
simultaneous motion,' strained at the rope, bending backward and
uttering a cry which timed and regulated their efforts.
Two woodcutters standing close to the giant remained with axes in their
grip, like two executioners ready to strike once more, and Renardet,
motionless, with his hand on the trunk, awaited the fall with an uneasy,
nervous feeling.
One of the men said to him:
“You are too near, Monsieur le Maire. When it falls it may hurt you.”
He did not reply and did not move away. He seemed ready to catch
the beech tree in his open arms and to cast it on the ground like a
wrestler.
All at once, at the base of the tall column of wood there was a rent
which seemed to run to the top, like a painful shock; it bent slightly,
ready to fall, but still resisting. The men, in a state of excitement,
stiffened their arms, renewed their efforts with greater vigor, and,
just as the tree came crashing down, Renardet suddenly made a forward
step, then stopped, his shoulders raised to receive the irresistible
shock, the mortal shock which would crush him to the earth.
But the beech tree, having deviated a little, only rubbed against his
loins, throwing him on his face, five metres away.
The workmen dashed forward to lift him up. He had already arisen to his
knees, stupefied, with bewildered eyes and passing his hand across his
forehead, as if he were awaking from an attack of madness.
When he had got to his feet once more the men, astonished, questioned
him, not being able to understand what he had done. He replied in
faltering tones that he had been dazed for a moment, or, rather, he had
been thinking of his childhood days; that he thought he would have time
to run under the tree, just as street boys rush in front of vehicles
driving rapidly past; that he had played at danger; that for the past
eight days he felt this desire growing stronger within him, asking
himself each time a tree began to fall whether he could pass beneath it
without being touched. It was a piece of stupidity, he confessed, but
every one has these moments of insanity and these temptations to boyish
folly.
He made this explanation in a slow tone, searching for his words, and
speaking in a colorless tone.
Then he went off, saying:
“Till to-morrow, my friends-till to-morrow.”
As soon as he got back to his room he sat down at his table which his
lamp lighted up brightly, and, burying his head in his hands, he began
to cry.
He remained thus for a long time, then wiped his eyes, raised his head
and looked at the clock. It was not yet six o'clock.
He thought:
“I have time before dinner.”
And he went to the door and locked it. He then came back, and, sitting
down at his table, pulled out the middle drawer. Taking from it a
revolver, he laid it down on his papers in full view. The barrel of the
firearm glittered, giving out gleams of light.
Renardet gazed at it for some time with the uneasy glance of a drunken
man. Then he rose and began to pace up and down the room.
He walked from one end of the apartment to the other, stopping from time
to time, only to pace up and down again a moment afterward. Suddenly
he opened the door of his dressing-room, steeped a towel in the water
pitcher and moistened his forehead, as he had done on the morning of the
crime.
Then he, began walking up and down again. Each time he passed the table
the gleaming revolver attracted his glance, tempted his hand, but he
kept watching the clock and reflected:
“I have still time.”
It struck half-past six. Then he took up the revolver, opened his mouth
wide with a frightful grimace and stuck the barrel into it as if he
wanted to swallow it. He remained in this position for some seconds
without moving, his finger on the trigger. Then, suddenly seized with a
shudder of horror, he dropped the pistol on the carpet.
He fell back on his armchair, sobbing:
“I cannot. I dare not! My God! my God! How can I have the courage to
kill myself?'”
There was a knock at the door. He rose up, bewildered. A servant said:
“Monsieur's dinner is ready.”
He replied:
“All right. I'm coming down.”
Then he picked up the revolver, locked it up again in the drawer and
looked at himself in the mirror over the mantelpiece to see whether his
face did not look too much troubled. It was as red as usual, a little
redder perhaps. That was all. He went down and seated himself at table.
He ate slowly, like a man who wants to prolong the meal, who does not
want to be alone.
Then he smoked several pipes in the hall while the table was being
cleared. After that he went back to his room.
As soon as he had locked himself in he looked, under the bed, opened all
the closets, explored every corner, rummaged through all the furniture.
Then he lighted the candles on the mantelpiece, and, turning round
several times, ran his eye all over the apartment with an anguish of
terror that distorted his face, for he knew well that he would see
her, as he did every night--little Louise Roque, the little girl he had
attacked and afterward strangled.
Every night the odious vision came back again. First he seemed to hear
a kind of roaring sound, such as is made by a threshing machine or the
distant passage of a train over a bridge. Then he commenced to gasp,
to suffocate, and he had to unbutton his collar and his belt. He moved
about to make his blood circulate, he tried to read, he attempted to
sing. It was in vain. His thoughts, in spite of himself, went back to
the day of the murder and made him begin it all over again in all its
most secret details, with all the violent emotions he had experienced
from the first minute to the last.
He had felt on rising that morning, the morning of the horrible day, a
little dizziness and headache, which he attributed to the heat, so that
he remained in his room until breakfast time.
After the meal he had taken a siesta, then, toward the close of the
afternoon, he had gone out to breathe the fresh, soothing breeze under
the trees in the wood.
But, as soon as he was outside, the heavy, scorching air of the plain
oppressed him still more. The sun, still high in the heavens, poured
down on the parched soil waves of burning light. Not a breath of wind
stirred the leaves. Every beast and bird, even the grasshoppers, were
silent. Renardet reached the tall trees and began to walk over the moss
where the Brindille produced a slight freshness of the air beneath the
immense roof of branches. But he felt ill at ease. It seemed to him that
an unknown, invisible hand was strangling him, and he scarcely thought
of anything, having usually few ideas in his head. For the last three
months only one thought haunted him, the thought of marrying again. He
suffered from living alone, suffered from it morally and physically.
Accustomed for ten years past to feeling a woman near him, habituated to
her presence every moment, he had need, an imperious and perplexing
need of such association. Since Madame Renardet's death he had suffered
continually without knowing why, he had suffered at not feeling her
dress brushing past him, and, above all, from no longer being able to
calm and rest himself in her arms. He had been scarcely six months a
widower and he was already looking about in the district for some young
girl or some widow he might marry when his period of mourning was at an
end.
He had a chaste soul, but it was lodged in a powerful, herculean body,
and carnal imaginings began to disturb his sleep and his vigils. He
drove them away; they came back again; and he murmured from time to
time, smiling at himself:
“Here I am, like St. Anthony.”
Having this special morning had several of these visions, the desire
suddenly came into his breast to bathe in the Brindille in order to
refresh himself and cool his blood.
He knew of a large deep pool, a little farther down, where the people of
the neighborhood came sometimes to take a dip in summer. He went there.
Thick willow trees hid this clear body of water where the current
rested and went to sleep for a while before starting on its way again.
Renardet, as he appeared, thought he heard a light sound, a faint
plashing which was not that of the stream on the banks. He softly
put aside the leaves and looked. A little girl, quite naked in the
transparent water, was beating the water with both hands, dancing about
in it and dipping herself with pretty movements. She was not a child nor
was she yet a woman. She was plump and developed, while preserving an
air of youthful precocity, as of one who had grown rapidly. He no longer
moved, overcome with surprise, with desire, holding his breath with a
strange, poignant emotion. He remained there, his heart beating as if
one of his sensuous dreams had just been realized, as if an impure
fairy had conjured up before him this young creature, this little rustic
Venus, rising from the eddies of the stream as the real Venus rose from
the waves of the sea.
Suddenly the little girl came out of the water, and, without seeing him,
came over to where he stood, looking for her clothes in order to dress
herself. As she approached gingerly, on account of the sharp-pointed
stones, he felt himself pushed toward her by an irresistible force, by
a bestial transport of passion, which stirred his flesh, bewildered his
mind and made him tremble from head to foot.
She remained standing some seconds behind the willow tree which
concealed him from view. Then, losing his reason entirely, he pushed
aside the branches, rushed on her and seized her in his arms. She fell,
too terrified to offer any resistance, too terror-stricken to cry out.
He seemed possessed, not understanding what he was doing.
He woke from his crime as one wakes from a nightmare. The child burst
out weeping.
“Hold your tongue! Hold your tongue!” he said. “I'll give you money.”
But she did not hear him and went on sobbing.
“Come now, hold your tongue! Do hold your tongue! Keep quiet!” he
continued.
She kept shrieking as she tried to free herself. He suddenly realized
that he was ruined, and he caught her by the neck to stop her mouth
from uttering these heartrending, dreadful screams. As she continued to
struggle with the desperate strength of a being who is seeking to fly
from death, he pressed his enormous hands on the little throat swollen
with screaming, and in a few seconds he had strangled her, so furiously
did he grip her. He had not intended to kill her, but only to make her
keep quiet.
Then he stood up, overwhelmed with horror.
She lay before him, her face bleeding and blackened. He was about to
rush away when there sprang up in his agitated soul the mysterious and
undefined instinct that guides all beings in the hour of danger.
He was going to throw the body into the water, but another impulse drove
him toward the clothes, which he made into a small package. Then, as he
had a piece of twine in his pocket, he tied it up and hid it in a deep
portion of the stream, beneath the trunk of a tree that overhung the
Brindille.
Then he went off at a rapid pace, reached the meadows, took a wide turn
in order to show himself to some peasants who dwelt some distance away
at the opposite side of the district, and came back to dine at the usual
hour, telling his servants all that was supposed to have happened during
his walk.
He slept, however, that night; he slept with a heavy, brutish sleep like
the sleep of certain persons condemned to death. He did not open his
eyes until the first glimmer of dawn, and he waited till his usual hour
for riding, so as to excite no suspicion.
Then he had to be present at the inquiry as to the cause of death. He
did so like a somnambulist, in a kind of vision which showed him men
and things as in a dream, in a cloud of intoxication, with that sense
of unreality which perplexes the mind at the time of the greatest
catastrophes.
But the agonized cry of Mother Roque pierced his heart. At that moment
he had felt inclined to cast himself at the old woman's feet and to
exclaim:
“I am the guilty one!”
But he had restrained himself. He went back, however, during the night
to fish up the dead girl's wooden shoes, in order to place them on her
mother's threshold.
As long as the inquiry lasted, as long as it was necessary to lead
justice astray he was calm, master of himself, crafty and smiling. He
discussed quietly with the magistrates all the suppositions that passed
through their minds, combated their opinions and demolished their
arguments. He even took a keen and mournful pleasure in disturbing their
investigations, in embroiling their ideas, in showing the innocence of
those whom they suspected.
But as soon as the inquiry was abandoned he became gradually nervous,
more excitable than he had been before, although he mastered his
irritability. Sudden noises made him start with fear; he shuddered at
the slightest thing and trembled sometimes from head to foot when a fly
alighted on his forehead. Then he was seized with an imperious desire
for motion, which impelled him to take long walks and to remain up whole
nights pacing up and down his room.
It was not that he was goaded by remorse. His brutal nature did not lend
itself to any shade of sentiment or of moral terror. A man of energy and
even of violence, born to make war, to ravage conquered countries and to
massacre the vanquished, full of the savage instincts of the hunter and
the fighter, he scarcely took count of human life. Though he respected
the Church outwardly, from policy, he believed neither in God nor the
devil, expecting neither chastisement nor recompense for his acts in
another life. His sole belief was a vague philosophy drawn from all
the ideas of the encyclopedists of the last century, and he regarded
religion as a moral sanction of the law, the one and the other having
been invented by men to regulate social relations. To kill any one in
a duel, or in war, or in a quarrel, or by accident, or for the sake of
revenge, or even through bravado would have seemed to him an amusing and
clever thing and would not have left more impression on his mind than a
shot fired at a hare; but he had experienced a profound emotion at the
murder of this child. He had, in the first place, perpetrated it in the
heat of an irresistible gust of passion, in a sort of tempest of the
senses that had overpowered his reason. And he had cherished in his
heart, in his flesh, on his lips, even to the very tips of his murderous
fingers a kind of bestial love, as well as a feeling of terrified
horror, toward this little girl surprised by him and basely killed.
Every moment his thoughts returned to that horrible scene, and, though
he endeavored to drive this picture from his mind, though he put it
aside with terror, with disgust, he felt it surging through his soul,
moving about in him, waiting incessantly for the moment to reappear.
Then, as evening approached, he was afraid of the shadow falling around
him. He did not yet know why the darkness seemed frightful to him, but
he instinctively feared it, he felt that it was peopled with terrors.
The bright daylight did not lend itself to fears. Things and beings
were visible then, and only natural things and beings could exhibit
themselves in the light of day. But the night, the impenetrable night,
thicker than walls and empty; the infinite night, so black, so vast,
in which one might brush against frightful things; the night, when one
feels that a mysterious terror is wandering, prowling about, appeared to
him to conceal an unknown threatening danger, close beside him.
What was it?
He knew ere long. As he sat in his armchair, rather late one evening
when he could not sleep, he thought he saw the curtain of his window
move. He waited, uneasily, with beating heart. The drapery did not stir;
then, all of a sudden, it moved once more. He did not venture to rise;
he no longer ventured to breathe, and yet he was brave. He had often
fought, and he would have liked to catch thieves in his house.
Was it true that this curtain did move? he asked himself, fearing that
his eyes had deceived him. It was, moreover, such a slight thing, a
gentle flutter of drapery, a kind of trembling in its folds, less than
an undulation caused by the wind.
Renardet sat still, with staring eyes and outstretched neck. He sprang
to his feet abruptly, ashamed of his fear, took four steps, seized
the drapery with both hands and pulled it wide apart. At first he saw
nothing but darkened glass, resembling plates of glittering ink. The
night, the vast, impenetrable night, stretched beyond as far as the
invisible horizon. He remained standing in front of this illimitable
shadow, and suddenly he perceived a light, a moving light, which seemed
some distance away.
Then he put his face close to the window pane, thinking that a person
looking for crabs might be poaching in the Brindille, for it was past
midnight, and this light rose up at the edge of the stream, under the
trees. As he was not yet able to see clearly, Renardet placed his hands
over his eyes, and suddenly this light became an illumination, and he
beheld little Louise Roque naked and bleeding on the moss. He recoiled,
frozen with horror, knocked over his chair and fell over on his back. He
remained there some minutes in anguish of mind; then he sat up and began
to reflect. He had had a hallucination--that was all, a hallucination
due to the fact that a night marauder was walking with a lantern in his
hand near the water's edge. What was there astonishing, besides, in the
circumstance that the recollection of his crime should sometimes bring
before him the vision of the dead girl?
He rose from the ground, swallowed a glass of wine and sat down again.
He was thinking:
“What am I to do if this occurs again?”
And it would occur; he felt it; he was sure of it. Already his glance
was drawn toward the window; it called him; it attracted him. In order
to avoid looking at it, he turned his chair round. Then he took a
book and tried to read, but it seemed to him that he presently heard
something stirring behind him, and he swung round his armchair on one
foot.
The curtain was moving again; unquestionably, it moved this time. He
could no longer have any doubt about it.
He rushed forward and grasped it so violently that he pulled it down
with its pole. Then he eagerly glued his face to the glass. He saw
nothing. All was black outside, and he breathed with the joy of a man
whose life has just been saved.
Then he went back to his chair and sat down again, but almost
immediately he felt a longing to look out once more through the window.
Since the curtain had fallen down, the window made a sort of gap,
fascinating and terrible, on the dark landscape. In order not to yield
to this dangerous temptation, he undressed, blew out the light and
closed his eyes.
Lying on his back motionless, his skin warm and moist, he awaited sleep.
Suddenly a great gleam of light flashed across his eyelids. He opened
them, believing that his dwelling was on fire. All was black as before,
and he leaned on his elbow to try to distinguish the window which had
still for him an unconquerable attraction. By dint of, straining his
eyes he could perceive some stars, and he rose, groped his way across
the room, discovered the panes with his outstretched hands, and placed
his forehead close to them. There below, under the trees, lay the body
of the little girl gleaming like phosphorus, lighting up the surrounding
darkness.
Renardet uttered a cry and rushed toward his bed, where he lay till
morning, his head hidden under the pillow.
From that moment his life became intolerable. He passed his days in
apprehension of each succeeding night, and each night the vision came
back again. As soon as he had locked himself up in his room he strove to
resist it, but in vain. An irresistible force lifted him up and pushed
him against the window, as if to call the phantom, and he saw it at
once, lying first in the spot where the crime was committed in the
position in which it had been found.
Then the dead girl rose up and came toward him with little steps just as
the child had done when she came out of the river. She advanced quietly,
passing straight across the grass and over the bed of withered flowers.
Then she rose up in the air toward Renardet's window. She came toward
him as she had come on the day of the crime. And the man recoiled before
the apparition--he retreated to his bed and sank down upon it, knowing
well that the little one had entered the room and that she now was
standing behind the curtain, which presently moved. And until daybreak
he kept staring at this curtain with a fixed glance, ever waiting to see
his victim depart.
But she did not show herself any more; she remained there behind the
curtain, which quivered tremulously now and then.
And Renardet, his fingers clutching the clothes, squeezed them as he had
squeezed the throat of little Louise Roque.
He heard the clock striking the hours, and in the stillness the
pendulum kept ticking in time with the loud beating of his heart. And he
suffered, the wretched man, more than any man had ever suffered before.
Then, as soon as a white streak of light on the ceiling announced the
approaching day, he felt himself free, alone at last, alone in his room;
and he went to sleep. He slept several hours--a restless, feverish sleep
in which he retraced in dreams the horrible vision of the past night.
When he went down to the late breakfast he felt exhausted as after
unusual exertion, and he scarcely ate anything, still haunted as he was
by the fear of what he had seen the night before.
He knew well, however, that it was not an apparition, that the dead do
not come back, and that his sick soul, his soul possessed by one thought
alone, by an indelible remembrance, was the only cause of his torture,
was what brought the dead girl back to life and raised her form before
his eyes, on which it was ineffaceably imprinted. But he knew, too,
that there was no cure, that he would never escape from the savage
persecution of his memory, and he resolved to die rather than to endure
these tortures any longer.
Then he thought of how he would kill himself, It must be something
simple and natural, which would preclude the idea of suicide. For he
clung to his reputation, to the name bequeathed to him by his ancestors;
and if his death awakened any suspicion people's thoughts might be,
perhaps, directed toward the mysterious crime, toward the murderer who
could not be found, and they would not hesitate to accuse him of the
crime.
A strange idea came into his head, that of allowing himself to be
crushed by the tree at the foot of which he had assassinated little
Louise Roque. So he determined to have the wood cut down and to simulate
an accident. But the beech tree refused to crush his ribs.
Returning to his house, a prey to utter despair, he had snatched up his
revolver, and then did not dare to fire it.
The dinner bell summoned him. He could eat nothing, and he went upstairs
again. And he did not know what to do. Now that he had escaped the first
time, he felt himself a coward. Presently he would be ready, brave,
decided, master of his courage and of his resolution; now he was weak
and feared death as much as he did the dead girl.
He faltered:
“I dare not venture it again--I dare not venture it.”
Then he glanced with terror, first at the revolver on the table and next
at the curtain which hid his window. It seemed to him, moreover, that
something horrible would occur as soon as his life was ended. Something?
What? A meeting with her, perhaps. She was watching for him; she was
waiting for him; she was calling him; and it was in order to seize him
in her turn, to draw him toward the doom that would avenge her, and to
lead him to die, that she appeared thus every night.
He began to cry like a child, repeating:
“I will not venture it again--I will not venture it.”
Then he fell on his knees and murmured:
“My God! my God!” without believing, nevertheless, in God. And he
no longer dared, in fact, to look at his window, where he knew the
apparition was hiding, nor at his table, where his revolver gleamed.
When he had risen up he said:
“This cannot last; there must be an end of it.”
The sound of his voice in the silent room made a chill of fear pass
through his limbs, but as he could not bring himself to come to a
determination, as he felt certain that his finger would always refuse to
pull the trigger of his revolver, he turned round to hide his head under
the bedclothes and began to reflect.
He would have to find some way in which he could force himself to die,
to play some trick on himself which would not permit of any hesitation
on his part, any delay, any possible regrets. He envied condemned
criminals who are led to the scaffold surrounded by soldiers. Oh! if he
could only beg of some one to shoot him; if after confessing his crime
to a true friend who would never divulge it he could procure death at
his hand. But from whom could he ask this terrible service? From whom?
He thought of all the people he knew. The doctor? No, he would talk
about it afterward, most probably. And suddenly a fantastic idea entered
his mind. He would write to the magistrate, who was on terms of close
friendship with him, and would denounce himself as the perpetrator of
the crime. He would in this letter confess everything, revealing how his
soul had been tortured, how he had resolved to die, how he had hesitated
about carrying out his resolution and what means he had employed to
strengthen his failing courage. And in the name of their old friendship
he would implore of the other to destroy the letter as soon as he had
ascertained that the culprit had inflicted justice on himself. Renardet
could rely on this magistrate; he knew him to be true, discreet,
incapable of even an idle word. He was one of those men who have an
inflexible conscience, governed, directed, regulated by their reason
alone.
Scarcely had he formed this project when a strange feeling of joy took
possession of his heart. He was calm now. He would write his letter
slowly, then at daybreak he would deposit it in the box nailed to the
outside wall of his office; then he would ascend his tower to watch
for the postman's arrival; and when the man in the blue blouse had gone
away, he would cast himself head foremost on the rocks on which the
foundations rested, He would take care to be seen first by the workmen
who had cut down his wood. He could climb to the projecting stone which
bore the flagstaff displayed on festivals, He would smash this pole with
a shake and carry it along with him as he fell.
Who would suspect that it was not an accident? And he would be killed
outright, owing to his weight and the height of the tower.
Presently he got out of bed, went over to the table and began to write.
He omitted nothing, not a single detail of the crime, not a single
detail of the torments of his heart, and he ended by announcing that
he had passed sentence on himself, that he was going to execute the
criminal, and begged his friend, his old friend, to be careful that
there should never be any stain on his memory.
When he had finished this letter he saw that the day had dawned.
He closed, sealed it and wrote the address. Then he descended with light
steps, hurried toward the little white box fastened to the outside wall
in the corner of the farmhouse, and when he had thrown into it this
letter, which made his hand tremble, he came back quickly, drew the
bolts of the great door and climbed up to his tower to wait for the
passing of the postman, who was to bear away his death sentence.
He felt self-possessed now. Liberated! Saved!
A cold dry wind, an icy wind passed across his face. He inhaled it
eagerly with open mouth, drinking in its chilling kiss. The sky was red,
a wintry red, and all the plain, whitened with frost, glistened under
the first rays of the sun, as if it were covered with powdered glass.
Renardet, standing up, his head bare, gazed at the vast tract of country
before him, the meadows to the left and to the right the village whose
chimneys were beginning to smoke in preparation for the morning meal.
At his feet he saw the Brindille flowing amid the rocks, where he would
soon be crushed to death. He felt new life on that beautiful frosty
morning. The light bathed him, entered his being like a new-born hope. A
thousand recollections assailed him, recollections of similar mornings,
of rapid walks on the hard earth which rang beneath his footsteps, of
happy days of shooting on the edges of pools where wild ducks sleep. All
the good things that he loved, the good things of existence, rushed to
his memory, penetrated him with fresh desires, awakened all the vigorous
appetites of his active, powerful body.
And he was about to die! Why? He was going to kill himself stupidly
because he was afraid of a shadow-afraid of nothing! He was still rich
and in the prime of life. What folly! All he needed was distraction,
absence, a voyage in order to forget.
This night even he had not seen the little girl because his mind was
preoccupied and had wandered toward some other subject. Perhaps he would
not see her any more? And even if she still haunted him in this house,
certainly she would not follow him elsewhere! The earth was wide, the
future was long.
Why should he die?
His glance travelled across the meadows, and he perceived a blue spot in
the path which wound alongside the Brindille. It was Mederic coming to
bring letters from the town and to carry away those of the village.
Renardet gave a start, a sensation of pain shot through his breast, and
he rushed down the winding staircase to get back his letter, to demand
it back from the postman. Little did it matter to him now whether he
was seen, He hurried across the grass damp from the light frost of the
previous night and arrived in front of the box in the corner of the
farmhouse exactly at the same time as the letter carrier.
The latter had opened the little wooden door and drew forth the four
papers deposited there by the inhabitants of the locality.
Renardet said to him:
“Good-morrow, Mederic.”
“Good-morrow, Monsieur le Maire.”
“I say, Mederic, I threw a letter into the box that I want back again. I
came to ask you to give it back to me.”
“That's all right, Monsieur le Maire--you'll get it.”
And the postman raised his eyes. He stood petrified at the sight of
Renardet's face. The mayor's cheeks were purple, his eyes were anxious
and sunken, with black circles round them, his hair was unbrushed, his
beard untrimmed, his necktie unfastened. It was evident that he had not
been in bed.
The postman asked:
“Are you ill, Monsieur le Maire?”
The other, suddenly comprehending that his appearance must be unusual,
lost countenance and faltered:
“Oh! no-oh! no. Only I jumped out of bed to ask you for this letter. I
was asleep. You understand?”
He said in reply:
“What letter?”
“The one you are going to give back to me.”
Mederic now began to hesitate. The mayor's attitude did not strike
him as natural. There was perhaps a secret in that letter, a political
secret. He knew Renardet was not a Republican, and he knew all the
tricks and chicanery employed at elections.
He asked:
“To whom is it addressed, this letter of yours?”
“To Monsieur Putoin, the magistrate--you know, my friend, Monsieur
Putoin!”
The postman searched through the papers and found the one asked for.
Then he began looking at it, turning it round and round between his
fingers, much perplexed, much troubled by the fear of either committing
a grave offence or of making an enemy of the mayor.
Seeing his hesitation, Renardet made a movement for the purpose of
seizing the letter and snatching it away from him. This abrupt action
convinced Mederic that some important secret was at stake and made him
resolve to do his duty, cost what it may.
So he flung the letter into his bag and fastened it up, with the reply:
“No, I can't, Monsieur le Maire. As long as it is for the magistrate, I
can't.”
A dreadful pang wrung Renardet's heart and he murmured:
“Why, you know me well. You are even able to recognize my handwriting. I
tell you I want that paper.”
“I can't.”
“Look here, Mederic, you know that I'm incapable of deceiving you--I
tell you I want it.”
“No, I can't.”
A tremor of rage passed through Renardet's soul.
“Damn it all, take care! You know that I never trifle and that I could
get you out of your job, my good fellow, and without much delay, either,
And then, I am the mayor of the district, after all; and I now order you
to give me back that paper.”
The postman answered firmly:
“No, I can't, Monsieur le Maire.”
Thereupon Renardet, losing his head, caught hold of the postman's arms
in order to take away his bag; but, freeing himself by a strong effort,
and springing backward, the letter carrier raised his big holly stick.
Without losing his temper, he said emphatically:
“Don't touch me, Monsieur le Maire, or I'll strike. Take care, I'm only
doing my duty!”
Feeling that he was lost, Renardet suddenly became humble, gentle,
appealing to him like a whimpering child:
“Look here, look here, my friend, give me back that letter and I'll
recompense you--I'll give you money. Stop! stop! I'll give you a hundred
francs, you understand--a hundred francs!”
The postman turned on his heel and started on his journey.
Renardet followed him, out of breath, stammering:
“Mederic, Mederic, listen! I'll give you a thousand francs, you
understand--a thousand francs.”
The postman still went on without giving any answer.
Renardet went on:
“I'll make your fortune, you understand--whatever you wish--fifty
thousand francs--fifty thousand francs for that letter! What does it
matter to you? You won't? Well, a hundred thousand--I say--a hundred
thousand francs. Do you understand? A hundred thousand francs--a hundred
thousand francs.”
The postman turned back, his face hard, his eye severe:
“Enough of this, or else I'll repeat to the magistrate everything you
have just said to me.”
Renardet stopped abruptly. It was all over. He turned back and rushed
toward his house, running like a hunted animal.
Then, in his turn, Mederic stopped and watched his flight with
stupefaction. He saw the mayor reenter his house, and he waited still,
as if something astonishing were about to happen.
In fact, presently the tall form of Renardet appeared on the summit of
the Fox's tower. He ran round the platform like a madman. Then he seized
the flagstaff and shook it furiously without succeeding in breaking it;
then, all of a sudden, like a diver, with his two hands before him, he
plunged into space.
Mederic rushed forward to his assistance. He saw the woodcutters going
to work and called out to them, telling them an accident had occurred.
At the foot of the walls they found a bleeding body, its head crushed
on a rock. The Brindille surrounded this rock, and over its clear, calm
waters could be seen a long red thread of mingled brains and blood.