Silence again. The tempest shakes the windows with a furious hand. The
room is faintly illuminated by a candle which has St. Vitus' dance.
Rousselot, our little orderly, knits away industriously in the circle
of light. I smoke a pipe at once acrid and consoling, like this minute
itself in the midst of the infernal adventure.
Before going away, I think of Croquelet, the silent, whose long
silhouette I see at the end of the room. "He sleeps all the time," says
Mulet, "he sleeps all day." I approach the stretcher, I bend over it,
and I see two large open eyes, which look at me gravely and steadily in
the gloom. And this look is so sad, so poignant, that I am filled with
impotent distress.
"You sleep too much, my poor Croquelet."
He answers me with his rugged accent, but in a feeble voice:
"Don't listen to him; it's not true. You know quite well that I can't
sleep, and that you won't give me a draught to let me get a real nap.
This afternoon, I read a little.... But it wasn't very interesting....
If I could have another book...."
"Show me your book, Croquelet."
He thrusts out his chin towards a little tract. I strike a match, and I
read on the grey cover: "Of the Quality of Prayers addressed to God."
"All right, Croquelet, I'll try to get you a book with pictures in it.
How do you feel this evening?"
"Ah! bad! very bad! They're thawing now...."
He has had frost-bite in his feet, and is beginning to suffer so much
from them that he forgets the wound in his side, which is mortal, but
less active.