THE LAST VISIT
O Cordélia, you died by my hand! If I still live, be assured that it is
by way of atonement. How often have I conjured up your image before the
mortal remains of your heart! How often have I called to you! But you
have never come to me!
For many days I was unable to add a word to these lines, and I
remained, as it were, paralyzed by the inscrutable mystery of life and
death, when one day the door of my cell was opened, and a man came in.
It was Patrick. He was but the shadow of his former self.
I thrust myself before the urn which contained my beloved’s heart. He
understood me and gave a bitter smile.
“Have no fear,” he said, “I leave it to you. What is her earthly heart
to me? I possess her heart which is in Heaven.”
I rose to my feet staggering like a drunken man under his words which
filled me with an agony of jealousy.
“What do you mean?” I asked hoarsely. “Do you still see Cordélia?”
He shook his head.
“Calm yourself, I do not see her,” he made answer. “She is too remote
from us, and I have never believed in spirits of the dead revisiting
this world. When I say that I possess her heart which is in Heaven, I
mean that I did possess it. Death has deprived me of it,” he went on in
somber, intense tones, “but death will restore it to me.”
“No more of that,” I exclaimed. “What has all this to do with me?”
“Well, if you look upon it in that light I don’t know why I am here.”
“Nor I.”
“I came to you, monsieur,” he said in a voice of wonderful dignity,
“to ask you if you have any message for her, for she loved you
sincerely—you too!”
“She loved me only,” I asserted, yet strangely perturbed by his manner
and words.
He sighed and shook his head once more.
“You thought so, but that was impossible,” he objected gently,
“otherwise she would still be of this world.”
“So it was you who killed her, or at least were responsible for her
death? I always thought so!”
“It was you and I. It was both of us,” he declared in a tone of great
dejection. “Yes, I, on my side, was to blame. I was too eager in my
frenzy, in my longing for her spirit, in the love which consumed me
for her ego, to separate her mind from her body, but you—you were too
eager to separate her body from her mind. We were marching toward an
inevitable catastrophe.”
His words struck me like a sword, and I did not interrupt him.
“It shows,” he went on, turning toward the door, “that we can only give
happiness to a being of this world if we bring to her a well-balanced
mind which we were unable to do. Had Cordélia met a little of you and
a little of me, in one and the same man, she would have been happy; at
least I like to think so. But where she is now her spirit needs only
her mind. I am going to her!... Farewell, monsieur!”
* * * * *
I read this morning in the newspapers the announcement of Patrick’s
death. It shall not be said that I allowed him to pursue Cordélia at
his will. I hear her calling me: “Save me, Hector! Save me!”
I, too, intend to become a pure spirit, and the sooner to achieve my
purpose, I shall make the same journey as Cordélia, and by the same
route. Though Patrick set out first he will arrive too late. He will
be deceived. The heart of Cordélia points the way that lies before me.
The bullet will enter my heart at the same spot at which it pierced
Cordélia’s heart. I shall breathe the same sigh which will lead me to
the same point in space where she awaits me.... I am persuaded of it!...
Dear, dear, dear Cordélia!
A TERRIBLE TALE
Captain Michel had but one arm, which he found useful when he lit his
pipe. He was an old sea dog whose acquaintance, with that of four
other old salts, I made one evening on the open front of a café in the
Vieille Darse, Toulon, where I was taking an appetizer. And in this way
we fell into the habit of foregathering over a glass within a stone’s
throw of the rippling waves and the swinging dingeys, about the hour
when the sun sinks behind Tamaris.
The four old marines were known as Zinzin, Dorat—Captain
Dorat—Bagatelle, and Chanlieu—that old fellow Chanlieu. They had, of
course, sailed every sea and met with a thousand adventures; and now
that they were retired on their pensions, they spent their time telling
each other terrible tales.
Captain Michel alone never indulged in any reminiscences. And as he
seemed in no way surprised by anything he heard, his old comrades in
the end grew exasperated with him.
“Look here, Captain Michel, hasn’t anything out of the way ever
happened to you?”
“Oh, yes,” the captain made answer, taking his pipe from his mouth.
“Yes, something happened to me once—just once.”
“Well, let’s have it.”
“No.”
“Why not?”
“Because it’s too awful. You might not be able to stand it. I’ve often
tried to tell the story but people have slipped away before I finished
it.”
The four sea dogs vied with each other in the loudness of their
guffaws, declaring that Captain Michel was trying to find some excuse,
because in reality, nothing extraordinary had ever happened to him.
The old fellow stared at them a moment, and then suddenly accepting
the situation, laid his pipe on the table. This unusual gesture was in
itself startling!
“Messieurs, I’ll tell you how I lost my arm,” he began.
“In those days—some twenty years ago—I owned a small villa, in the
suburb of Le Mourillon, which had been left to me, for my family were
long settled in these parts and I myself was born here.
“It suited me to take a little rest after a long voyage and before
setting sail again. For that matter, I rather liked the place, and
lived quite peaceably among sea-faring men and colonials who troubled
me very little, and whom I rarely saw, occupied as they were as a rule
in opium-smoking with their lady friends, or with other business which
did not concern me. Of course there is no accounting for tastes, but as
long as they didn’t interfere with me, I was satisfied....
“It so happened that one night they did interfere with my habit of
going to sleep. I was awakened with a start by an extraordinary uproar,
the meaning of which I couldn’t possibly make out. I had left my window
open as usual. I listened in a state of bewilderment to a tremendous
din, which was a cross between the rumbling of thunder and the roll
of a drum, but such a drum! It was as though a couple of hundred
drumsticks were being madly beaten, not on ordinary drum-skin, but on a
wooden drum.
“The disturbance came from the villa opposite, which had been empty for
some five years, and on which I had noticed, the previous evening, a
board bearing the announcement: ‘To be sold.’
“I let my gaze stray from the window of my bedroom, on the first floor,
beyond the small garden in which the house stood, and my eye took in
every door and window, even the doors and windows on the ground floor.
They were still closed as I had seen them during the day; but I caught
sight of gleams of light through the chinks in the shutters on the
ground floor. Who and what were these people? How had they found their
way into this solitary house at the far end of Le Mourillon? What
sort of company was it that had obtained admission into this deserted
dwelling, and why were they kicking up such a shindy?
“The extraordinary din, like the thunderous beating of a wooden drum,
continued. It went on for another hour, and then as dawn was breaking,
the front door opened, and there appeared in the doorway the most
radiant creature that I have ever beheld. She was clad in a low-necked
dress, and held with perfect grace a lamp whose beams fell over the
shoulders of a goddess. I distinctly heard her say in the echoing
night, while a kind and quiet smile flickered across her face:
“‘Good-bye, dear friend, till next year.’
“To whom was she speaking? It was impossible for me to tell for I could
see no one standing beside her. She remained at the entrance holding
the lamp for some minutes, until the garden gate opened by itself and
closed by itself. Then the front door of the house was shut in its
turn, and I saw nothing more.
“It seemed to me that I was either losing my head or was the sport of a
dream, for I knew that it was out of the question for any one to pass
through the garden without my perceiving him.
“I was still planted at the window, incapable of the least movement or
thought, when the door of the house opened a second time, and the same
vision of beauty appeared still carrying a lamp and still alone.
“‘Hush,’ she said, ‘don’t make a noise, any of you. We mustn’t disturb
our neighbor opposite. I’ll come with you.’
“And silently and alone she crossed the garden and stopped at the gate
on which the full rays of the lamp shone; so much so, indeed, that I
clearly saw the knob of the gate turn of its own accord without any
hand being placed upon it. And the gate opened once again by itself in
the presence of this woman who, moreover, did not evince any surprise.
Need I explain that from where I was posted, I could see both in front
and behind the gate; in other words, that I saw it sideways?
“This ‘splendid apparition’ made a charming movement of her head toward
the empty darkness which the glare of the lamp made visible; then she
smiled and said:
“‘Well, good-bye until next year. My husband is very pleased. Not a
single one of you failed to answer the call. Good-bye, messieurs.’
“And I heard several voices in unison:
“‘Good-bye, madame, good-bye, dear madame, until next year.’
“And as the mysterious hostess was preparing to close the door herself,
I heard a voice:
“‘Oh, please, don’t trouble.’
“And the door was once more closed.
“The next moment the air was filled with a curious sound; it was like
the chirping of a flock of birds, and it seemed as if this beautiful
woman had opened the cage of a whole brood of house sparrows.
“She quietly walked back to the house. The lights on the ground floor
were then out, but I noticed a glimmer in the windows of the first
floor.
“When she reached the house she said:
“‘Are you upstairs, Gérard?’
“I could not hear the answer, but the front door was again closed, and
a few minutes later the light on the first floor went out.
“I was still standing at my window at eight o’clock in the morning,
staring in blank amazement at the house and garden which had revealed
such strange happenings in darkness, and which now in the full light
of day assumed their familiar aspect. The garden was a waste, and the
house itself seemed as desolate as it was the day before.
“So much so, indeed, that when I told my old charwoman who had just
come, of the queer events which I had witnessed, she tapped my forehead
with her dirty forefinger and muttered that I had smoked one pipe too
many. Now I have never been a smoker of opium, and her answer gave me
a good opportunity of sacking the old sloven whom I had for some time
wanted to get rid of, and who came for a couple of hours each day to
‘clean up’ the place for me. For that matter I did not need any one, as
I was setting sail again next day.
“I barely had time to put my things together, make a few purchases, say
farewell to my friends, and catch the train for Havre. I had fixed up
an appointment with the Transatlantic company which would keep me away
from Toulon for some eleven or twelve months.
“In due course I returned to Toulon, but though I had refrained from
mentioning my adventure to a soul, I still continued to think of it.
The vision of the lady of the lamp obsessed me wherever I went, and
the last words which she uttered to her unseen friends still rang in my
ears:
“‘Well, good-bye until next year.’
“And I never ceased to think of the meeting. I, too, was determined to
be there and to discover, at whatever cost, the solution of a mystery
which was intensely perplexing to a sensible man like myself, who did
not believe in ghosts or phantom vessels.
“Unfortunately I was soon to learn that neither heaven nor hell was
concerned in the terrible story.
“It was six o’clock in the evening when I set foot again in my house
at Toulon; and it was two days before the anniversary of the wonderful
night.
“The first thing that I did on going inside was to run up to my room
and open the window. It was summer and broad daylight, and my eyes at
once fell upon a lady of great beauty who was placidly walking about
gathering flowers in the garden of the house opposite. At the noise
made by the opening window she looked up.
“It was the lady of the lamp. I recognized her, and she seemed not less
beautiful by day than by night. Her skin was as white as the teeth of
an African nigger, her eyes bluer than the waters at Tamaris, her hair
as soft and fair as the finest flax.
“Why should I not make the confession? When I beheld this woman of whom
I had been dreaming for a year, a strange feeling came over me. She
was no illusion of a diseased imagination. She stood before me in the
flesh; and every window of the house was open and flower-bedecked by
her hands. There was nothing fantastic in all this.
“She caught sight of me and at once displayed some degree of annoyance.
She walked a few steps farther in the center path of the garden, and
then shrugging her shoulders as though she were disconcerted said:
“‘Let’s go in, Gérard. I’m beginning to feel the coolness of the night.’
“I let my gaze stray round the garden. I could perceive no one. To whom
was she speaking?... Nobody there!
“Then was she mad? It scarcely seemed so.
“I watched her return to the house. She passed into it, the door was
closed, and she at once shut the windows.
“I did not see or hear anything worth noticing that night. Next morning
at ten o’clock I observed my neighbor leaving the garden attired as if
for a walk. She locked the gate after her and set out in the direction
of Toulon.
“I started off in my turn. Pointing to the fashionably dressed figure
in front of me I asked the first tradesman whom I met if he knew the
lady’s name.
“‘Why, of course. She’s your neighbor. She is living with her husband
at the Villa Makoko. They moved in about a year ago, just as you went
away. They are regular boors. They never speak to anybody, unless it’s
absolutely necessary, but every one in Le Mourillon, as you know,
goes his own way, and is never surprised at anything. The captain for
one....’
“‘What captain?’
“‘Captain Gérard. It seems he is an ex-captain of marines. Well, no
one ever sees him.... Sometimes when food has to be delivered at the
house, and the lady is not in, some person shouts out an order from
behind the door to leave the stuff on the step, and waits until you are
a good distance away before taking it in.’
“You can imagine that I was growing more and more puzzled. I went to
Toulon in order to ask the agent who let the villa a few questions
about these people. He, likewise, had never seen the husband, but he
told me that his name was Gérard Beauvisage.
“When I heard the name I uttered a cry: ‘Gérard Beauvisage! Why I know
him!’
“I had an old friend of that name whom I had not seen for twenty-five
years. He was an officer in the marines and had left Toulon for Tonkin
about that period. How could I doubt that it was he? At all events, I
had a straightforward reason for calling on him, that very evening,
though he was expecting a visit from his friends, for it was the
anniversary of the famous night. I made up my mind to renew my old
friendship with him.
“When I got back to Le Mourillon I espied in front of me, in the sunk
road leading to the Villa Makoko, the figure of my neighbor. I did not
hesitate, but hastened to overtake her.
“‘Have I the honor of speaking to Madame Beauvisage, the wife of
Captain Gérard Beauvisage?’ I asked with a bow.
“She colored and tried to pass on without answering me.
“‘Madame, I am your neighbor, Captain Michel Alban,’ I persisted.
“‘Oh, please forgive me, monsieur,’ she returned, ‘my husband has often
spoken of you ... Captain Michel Alban....’
“She seemed terribly ill at ease, and yet in her confusion she was more
beautiful than ever, if that were possible. In spite of her obvious
desire to elude me I went on:
“‘How comes it that Captain Beauvisage has returned to France without
letting his old friend know? I shall be particularly obliged if you
will tell Gérard that I’m coming to shake hands with him this very
evening.’
“And observing that she was hastening her steps, I bowed, but as I was
speaking she turned round, betraying an agitation which was more and
more difficult to comprehend.
“‘Impossible to-night.... I promise to tell Gérard of our meeting.
That’s the most I can do. Gérard doesn’t wish to see any one—any one.
He lives alone.... We live alone.... And we took the house because we
were told that the next house was occupied only for a few days once or
twice a year by some one who is never seen!...’
“And she added in a voice tinged with sadness:
“‘You must forgive Gérard, monsieur. We do not receive any one—any one.
Good day, monsieur.’
“‘Madame, the Captain and you receive friends occasionally,’ I returned
with some impatience. ‘For instance, to-night you are expecting friends
with whom you made an appointment a year ago.’
“She flushed scarlet.
“‘Oh, but that’s an exceptional case ... that’s an absolutely
exceptional case.... They are our very particular friends.’
“Having said which she made her escape, but at once stopped her
retreat and turned back.
“‘Whatever you do, don’t call to-night,’ she entreated, and disappeared
into the garden.
“I returned to my house and began to keep watch on my neighbors. They
did not show themselves, and long before it was dark I saw the shutters
being closed and lights gleaming through the openings, such as I had
seen on that amazing night a year ago. But I did not hear the same
extraordinary din like the thunderous beating of a wooden drum.
“At seven o’clock I began to dress for I called to mind the low-necked
robe worn by the lady of the lamp. Madame Beauvisage’s last words had
but strengthened my determination. The captain was seeing some of his
friends that evening; he dared not refuse me admission. After dressing
it crossed my mind, before I went downstairs, to put my revolver in my
pocket, but in the end I left it in its place, considering that to take
it would be an act of stupidity.
“The stupidity lay in not taking it with me.
“On reaching the entrance to the Villa Makoko I turned the handle of
the gate on the off chance—the handle which last year I had seen turn
by itself. And to my intense surprise the door opened. Therefore my
neighbors were expecting visitors. I walked up to the house and knocked
at the door.
“‘Come in!’ a voice cried.
“I recognized Gérard’s voice. I walked gaily into the house. I passed
first through the hall, and then as the door of a small drawing-room
stood open, and the room was lit up, I entered it.
“‘Gérard it’s me,’ I exclaimed, ‘your old pal Michel Alban.’
“‘Oh, really, so you made up your mind to come, my dear old Michel! I
told my wife only just now that you would come and I should be glad
to see you.... But you are the only one, apart from our particular
friends.... Do you know, my dear Michel, you haven’t altered much....’
“It would be impossible for me to describe my stupefaction. I heard
Gérard, but I could not see him. His voice rang in my ears, but no one
was near me, no one was in the drawing-room. The Voice went on:
“‘Sit down, won’t you? My wife will soon be here, for she will remember
that she left me on the mantelpiece!’
“I looked up, and then discovered above me ... above me resting on a
high mantelpiece—a bust.
“It was this bust which had been speaking. It resembled Gérard. It was
Gérard’s body. It had been placed there as people are wont to place
busts on mantelpieces. It was a bust like those carved by sculptors,
that is to say, it was without arms.
“‘I can’t shake hands with you, my dear Michel,’ the voice went on,
‘for as you see I have no hands, but if you raise yourself on tiptoe
you will be able to take me in your arms and place me on the table. My
wife put me up here in a moment of temper, because she said I was in
the way when she swept the room. She’s a funny thing is my wife.’
“And the bust burst out laughing.
“It seemed to me that I was the victim of an optical illusion as
happens in those entertainments where you behold living heads and
shoulders suspended in mid-air, the result of tricks with mirrors; but
after setting down my friend on the table, as he requested, I had to
admit that this head and body without arms or legs was indeed all that
remained of the excellent officer whom I had known in days gone by.
His body was resting on a small wheeled platform, such as are used by
cripples without legs, but Gérard did not possess even the stumps of
legs which can be seen in the case of most cripples. To think that my
old friend was nothing but a bust!
“Small hooks took the place of arms, and language fails me to describe
how, leaning for support on a hook here, or on another there, he set to
work to hop, skip and jump and perform a hundred swift movements which
shot him from the table to a chair, from a chair to the floor, and then
suddenly made him appear on the table once more, where he indulged in
the gayest chatter.
“Myself, I was in a state of consternation. I was rendered speechless.
I watched this freak perform his antics and say with a chuckle which
alarmed me:
“‘I have greatly changed I daresay. You must admit, my dear Michel,
that you hardly recognize me. You did quite right to call this evening.
We shall see some sport. We have a few very special friends, and, you
know, apart from them I don’t care to meet any one—merely as a matter
of pride. We don’t even keep a servant. Wait for me here. I must get
into my smoking jacket.’
“He went off, and almost at once the lady of the lamp appeared. She
wore the same low-necked dress of the year before. As soon as her eyes
fell upon me, she seemed strangely perturbed, and said in a strained
voice:
“‘Oh, so you are here! You’ve made a mistake, Captain Michel. I gave
your message to my husband, but I forbade you to call this evening.
I may tell you that when he learnt that you were in this place, he
asked me to invite you this evening, but I did no such thing because,’
she went on, ill at ease, ‘I had good reasons. We have certain very
particular friends who are rather a worry—they are very fond of
noise—uproar. You must have heard them last year,’ she added, giving me
a look out of the corner of her eye. ‘Well, promise me to leave early.’
“‘I promise to leave early, madame,’ I returned, and yet a vague
misgiving took possession of me at this conversation, the meaning of
which I was far from understanding. ‘I promise you faithfully, but can
you tell me how it is that I find my old friend in such a state? What
terrible accident happened to him?’
“‘None at all, monsieur, none.’
“‘What do you mean, “none at all”? Don’t you know anything about the
accident which deprived him of arms and legs? Yet he must have met with
it since your marriage.’
“‘No, monsieur, no. I married the captain as he is now.... But excuse
me, our guests will be here presently, and I must help my husband to
put on his smoking jacket.’
“She left me to myself, dazed by the one stupefying thought: ‘She
married the captain as he is now!’ and almost at once I heard sounds in
the hall, the curious sounds which had accompanied the lady of the lamp
to the garden gate and baffled me last year. This noise was followed
by the appearance, on their wheeled platforms, of four cripples without
arms or legs who stared at me in wonder. They were all attired in
perfectly-fitting evening dress with snow-white shirt fronts.
“One wore gold-rimmed pince-nez, another, an old man, spectacles, the
third a single eyeglass, and the fourth was content to gaze at me out
of his own proud, shrewd eyes with an expression of boredom. All four,
however, saluted me with their little hooks, and asked after Captain
Beauvisage. I told them that he was dressing, and Madame Beauvisage was
quite well. When I took the liberty of speaking of Madame Beauvisage,
I caught an exchange of glances between them which seemed to embody a
certain raillery.
“‘Haw, haw, I presume you are a great friend of our good old captain,’
drawled the cripple with the monocle.
“The others smiled with a look which was by no means pleasant, and then
they all started to talk in the same breath:
“‘Sorry, sorry, monsieur.... We are quite naturally surprised to meet
you at the house of the good old captain, who swore on his wedding day
to shut himself up in the country with his wife, and not to receive any
one—any one but his very special friends, you understand. When one is
so thoroughly a cripple as the captain consented to be, and is married
to such a beautiful woman, it is quite natural—quite natural. But,
after all, if in the course of his life he met a man of honor who does
not happen to be a cripple, we’re glad of it.... We congratulate you.’
“And they repeated: ‘We’re glad of it.... We congratulate you.’
“Lord how odd they were, these dwarfs! I watched them and held my
peace. Others arrived in twos and threes and so on. And they all
contemplated me with a look of surprise or uneasiness or irony. For my
part I was rendered speechless by the spectacle of so many cripples
without arms or legs; for after all I was beginning to see through most
of the extraordinary happenings which had so greatly stirred my mind;
and though the cripples, by their presence, explained many things,
the presence of the cripples still required explanation, as also did
the monstrous union of that splendid woman with that awful shred of
humanity.
“True, I realized now that these little ambulating trunks were bound to
pass unperceived by me in the narrow garden path lined with verbena,
and the road running between two low hedges; and, truth to tell, when
at the time I said to myself that it was impossible to avoid seeing
any person going down those paths, I had in mind persons who would be
standing upright on their two legs.
“The handle of the garden gate itself no longer puzzled me, and in my
mind’s eye I saw the invisible hook which had turned it.
“The peculiar noise which I heard was but the creaking made by the
small badly oiled wheels of these cars for freaks. Finally, the
extraordinary sound like the thunderous beating of a wooden drum, was
obviously caused by the many cars and hooks striking the floor when,
after an excellent dinner, our friends the cripples indulged in a dance.
“Yes, all this was capable of explanation, but I was conscious as I
caught a curious eager gleam in their eyes, and heard the peculiar
sound of their nippers, that something terrible still remained to be
cleared up, and that all else which had surprised me was of no account.
“Meanwhile Madame Beauvisage promptly appeared, accompanied by her
husband. They were greeted with shouts of delight. The little hooks
‘applauded’ them with an infernal din. I was deafened by it. Then I was
introduced. Cripples were all over the place: on the tables, chairs,
stools, on stands usually occupied by vases, on the sideboard. One of
them sat on the shelf of a dresser like a Buddha in his recess. And
each one politely held out his hook to me. They seemed for the most
part people of good position, with titles and names indicating their
relationship to aristocratic families, but I learned afterwards that
these were false names given to me for reasons which will be obvious.
Lord Wilmer certainly maintained the best front of them all, with
his fine golden beard and no less fine mustache which he continually
stroked with his hook. He did not leap from chair to table like the
others, nor did he have the air of a huge bat taking wing from wall to
wall.
* * * * *
“‘We are only waiting for the doctor,’ said the mistress of the house,
who every now and then gave me a look of obvious gloom, but quickly
resumed her smile for her guests.
“The doctor arrived. He was a cripple but he possessed both arms.
“He offered one of them to Madame Beauvisage and led her to the
dining-room. I mean that she touched his arm with the tips of her
fingers.
“Covers were laid in the room with the closed shutters. The table,
which was laden with flowers and _hors d’œuvre_, was illuminated by a
large candelabrum. There was no fruit. The dozen cripples at once leapt
upon their chairs and began to pick greedily from the dishes with their
hooks. It was not a pleasant sight, and I marveled at the voracity with
which these trunks of men, who seemed just before so well-mannered,
devoured their food.
“And then suddenly they quietened down; their hooks kept still, and
it seemed to me that they lapsed into what is usually described as a
‘painful silence.’
“Every eye was turned on Madame Beauvisage, whose husband sat by her
side, and I noticed that she buried her face in her napkin, looking
very uncomfortable. Then my friend Gérard, clapping one hook against
the other with a flourish, said:
“‘Well, my dear old friends, it can’t be helped. One doesn’t meet the
luck of last year every day. But don’t distress yourselves. With the
exercise of a little imagination we shall succeed in being as merry as
we were then....’
“And turning to me as he lifted the small handle of the glass which
stood on the table before him:
“‘Your health my dear Michel. To us all!’
“And each man raised his glass by its handle with the end of his hook.
The glasses swung over the table in the quaintest fashion.
“My host went on:
“‘You don’t seem to be equal to the occasion, my dear Michel. I have
known you in merrier mood, more up to the mark. Is it because we are
“like this” that you are so gloomy? What do you expect? We are what we
are. But let us have some amusement. We are met together here, all of
us very special friends, to celebrate the time when we became “like
this.” Is that not true my friends of the _Daphné_?...’
“Then my old comrade,” Captain Michel went on to explain, heaving a
deep sigh, “told us how the _Daphné_, which sailed between France and
the Far East, was wrecked; how the crew escaped in the boats, and how
these miserable people took refuge on a chance raft.
“Miss Madge, a beautiful young girl who lost her parents in the
catastrophe, was also picked up by the raft. Some thirteen persons
in all were on it, and at the end of three days the victuals were
consumed, and at the end of a week the survivors were dying of hunger.
It was then that, as the old song says, they agreed to draw lots as to
‘which should be eaten.’
“Messieurs,” added Captain Michel, in a serious voice, “such things
have happened more often perhaps than they have been talked about, for
the great blue waters close over these peculiar feats of digestion.
“They were on the point, therefore, of drawing lots on the raft when
the doctor’s voice was heard: ‘Mesdames and Messieurs,’ said the
doctor, ‘you have lost all your belongings in the wreck of the ship,
but I have saved my case of instruments and my forceps for arresting
hemorrhage. This is my suggestion: There is no object in any one of us
running the risk of being eaten as a whole. Let us, to begin with, draw
lots for an arm or leg at will, and we will then see to-morrow what the
day brings forth, and perhaps a sail may appear on the horizon.’”
At this point in Captain Michel’s story the four old salts, who up to
this had not interrupted, cried:
“Well done!”
“What do you mean ‘well done’?” asked Captain Michel with a frown.
“Yes, ‘well done!’ Your story is a good joke. These people were ready
to lose an arm or leg in turn.... That’s a good joke, but there’s
nothing frightful about it.”
“So you really find it a good joke!” growled the Captain, bristling
with annoyance. “Well, I swear that if you had been seated among all
those cripples whose eyes were bulging like live coal, and heard the
story, you wouldn’t have found it such a good joke.... And if you had
noticed how restless they were in their chairs! And how vigorously they
clasped hooks across the table with an obvious delight which I couldn’t
make out, but which was none the less frightful for all that.”
“No, no,” broke in Chanlieu once more—that old fellow Chanlieu—“your
story is not in the least frightful. It is funny simply because it is
logical. Would you like me to tell you the end of the story? You shall
say whether I am right or not. The people on the raft drew lots. The
lot fell to Miss Madge who was to lose one of her beautiful limbs.
Your friend the captain, who is a gentleman, offered his own instead,
and he had his four limbs amputated so that Miss Madge should remain
unscathed.”
“Yes, old man, you’ve got it. That is so,” exclaimed Captain Michel,
who felt a longing to break the heads of these imbeciles who treated
his story as a good joke. “Yes, and what’s more, when it was a question
of cutting off Miss Madge’s limbs after the survivors, except the young
lady and the doctor—who had been left with both arms because they were
wanted—had lost all their limbs, Captain Beauvisage had the pluck to
have the poor stumps left from the first operation, cut off on a level
with his body.”
“And the young lady could do no other than offer the Captain her hand
which he had so heroically saved,” interposed Zinzin.
“Why, of course,” growled the Captain in his beard. “And you consider
it a good joke!”
“Did they eat all those limbs quite raw?” inquired that ass of a
Bagatelle.
Captain Michel struck the table such a resounding blow that the glasses
danced like rubber balls.
“That’ll do, shut up,” he exclaimed. “All that I’ve told you is
nothing. Now comes the frightful part of it.”
The four friends looked at each other smiling, and Captain Michel grew
pale, whereupon seeing that they had carried matters too far they hung
their heads.
“Yes, the frightful part of it,” went on Michel with his gloomiest air,
“was that these people who were only rescued a month later by a Chinese
sailing vessel which landed them somewhere on the Yang-Tse-Kiang where
they separated—the frightful part of it was that these people retained
a taste for human flesh, and when they returned to Europe arranged to
meet together once a year to renew as far as possible the abominable
banquet. Well, messieurs, it did not take me long to find that out!
First of all there was the scarcely enthusiastic reception accorded to
certain dishes, which Madame Beauvisage herself brought to the table.
Though she ventured to claim, but with no great assurance, that they
were pretty nearly the same thing, the guests were of one mind in
abstaining from congratulating her. Only certain slices of tunny-fish
were received with any sort of favor, because they were, to use the
doctor’s terrible expression, ‘well cut,’ and, ‘if the flavor was not
entirely satisfactory at all events the eye was deceived.’ But the
cripple with the spectacles met with general approval when he declared
that ‘it was not equal to the plumber.’
“When I heard those words I felt my blood run cold,” growled Captain
Michel huskily, “for I remembered that about this time the year before
a plumber had fallen from a roof near the Arsenal and was killed, and
his body was picked up minus an arm.
“Then ... O then ... I could not help thinking of the part which my
beautiful neighbor must, of necessity, have played in this horrible,
culinary drama, I turned my eyes to her and I noticed that she had put
on her gloves again, gloves which covered her arms to the shoulder, and
also hastily thrown a wrap over her shoulders which wholly concealed
them. The guest on my right, who was the doctor, and, as I have said,
was the only man among the cripples with both arms intact, had also put
on his gloves.
“Instead of bothering my head in vain to discover the reason of this
fresh eccentricity, I should have done better to follow the advice
which Madame Beauvisage gave me at the beginning of this infernal
party, namely, to leave the place early—advice which she did not repeat.
“After showing an interest in me during the first part of this amazing
feast in which I seemed to discern—I don’t know why—a sort of pity,
Madame Beauvisage now avoided looking at me and took a part which
greatly grieved me in the most frightful conversation which I have
ever heard. These little people with a vigorous clatter of nippers
and clinking of glasses indulged in bitter recriminations or warm
congratulations with regard to their peculiar appetite.
“To my horror Lord Wilmer, who until then had been most correct, nearly
‘came to hooks’ with the cripple with the monocle, because the latter
had once on the raft complained of the former being tough, and the
mistress of the house had the greatest difficulty in putting things in
their true light by retorting to the monocled bust, who was obviously
at the time of the shipwreck a good-looking stripling, that neither was
it particularly agreeable to have to put up with ‘an animal that was
too young.’”
“That’s also funny,” the old salt Dorat could not help interjecting.
It looked as if Captain Michel would fly at his throat, particularly as
the three other mariners seemed to be shaking with inward joy and gave
vent to queer little clucks. It was as much as the Captain could do to
control himself. After puffing like a seal he turned to the foolhardy
Dorat:
“Monsieur you have two arms still, and I have no wish for you to lose
one of them, as I did on that particular night, to make you see the
frightful part of the story. The cripples had drunk a great deal. Some
of them jumped on the table round me, and were gazing at my arms in a
very embarrassing manner and I ended by hiding them from sight as far
as possible by thrusting my hands deep into my pockets.
“I realized then, and it was a startling thought, why Madame Beauvisage
and the doctor, the two persons who still had arms and hands, did not
show them. I grasped the meaning of the sudden ferocity which blazed in
the eyes of some of them. And at that very moment, as luck would have
it, I wanted to use my pocket handkerchief, and instinctively I made a
movement which revealed the whiteness of my skin under my sleeve, and
three terrible hooks swooped down at once on my wrist and entered my
flesh. I uttered a fearful shriek.”
“That’ll do, Captain, that’ll do,” I exclaimed, interrupting Captain
Michel’s story. “You were quite right. I’m off. I can’t stand any more.”
“Stay, monsieur,” said the Captain in a peremptory tone. “Stay,
monsieur, for I shall soon finish this frightful story which has made
four imbeciles laugh. When a man has Phocean blood in his veins,”
he added with an accent of unspeakable contempt turning to the four
ancient mariners who were obviously choking in their efforts to keep
back their laughter, “when a man has Phocean blood in his veins, he
can’t get over it.
“And when a man lives in Marseilles he is doomed never to believe in
anything. So it is for you, for you alone, monsieur, that I am telling
this story, and, be assured, I will pass over the most loathsome
details, knowing as I do how much the mind of a gentleman can bear. The
tragedy of my martyrdom proceeded so quickly that I can call to mind
only their inhuman cries, the protests of some and the rush of others
while Madame Beauvisage stood up and murmured:
“‘Be careful not to hurt him!’
“I tried to leap to my feet, but by this time a posse of mad cripples
was round me who tripped me up and I crashed to the floor. And I felt
their awful hooks hold my flesh captive just as the meat in a butcher’s
shop is held captive on its hooks.
“Yes, monsieur, I will spare you the details. I pledged you my word;
all the more so as I couldn’t give them to you, for I did not see
the operation. The doctor clapped a plug of cotton wool steeped in
chloroform on my mouth by way of a gag.
“When I came to myself I was in the kitchen, and I had lost an arm.
The cripples were all around me. They had ceased their wrangling. They
seemed to be united in the most touching harmony; in reality they were
in a state of dazed intoxication which caused them to sway their heads
like children who feel the need to go and lie down after eating their
fill, and I had not a doubt but that they were beginning, alas! to
digest me.... I was stretched at full length on the floor, securely
bound, and deprived of all power of movement, but I could both see and
hear them. My old comrade, Gérard Beauvisage, had tears of joy in his
eyes as he exclaimed:
“‘I should never have thought you would be so tender!’
“Madame Beauvisage was not present, but she, too, must have taken part
in the feast, for I heard some one ask Gérard how ‘she liked her share.’
“Yes, monsieur, I have finished my story. I have finished my story.
Those loathsome cripples having satisfied their weakness, must have at
last realized the full extent of their iniquity. They made themselves
scarce, and Madame Beauvisage, of course, escaped with them. They left
the doors wide open but no one came to set me free until four days
afterwards, when I was pretty well dead with hunger....
“Those miserable wretches had not even left the bone behind!”
THE GOLD AXE
Many years ago I was at Gersau, a small health resort on the Lake of
the Four Forest Cantons, a few miles from Lucerne. I wanted to complete
certain work, and I had arranged to spend the autumn in the quiet of
this delightful village whose ancient pointed roofs were reflected in
the romantic waters of the lake on which William Tell sailed in days of
old.
It was the end of autumn, and tourists had scattered, while the many
hideous Tartarins who had descended upon us from Germany with their
alpenstocks, their puttees and their little round hats decked with
the indispensable feather, had returned to their lager beer, their
sauerkraut and their “big concerts,” leaving the country between
Pilatus, the Mythen and the Rigi free to us at last.
Not more than half-a-dozen of us foregathered in the hotel at meal
time, and when evening came related our experiences of the day or
indulged in a little music.
An old lady, always enveloped in deep mourning, who when the little
hotel was swarming with noisy visitors had never addressed a word to
any one, and seemed the embodiment of woe, stood revealed as a pianist
of the first rank, and without waiting to be pressed, played Chopin to
us and, in particular, a certain lullaby by Schumann which she rendered
with such exquisite tenderness that she brought tears to our eyes.
We were all so grateful to her for the pleasant hours which she enabled
us to pass, that we joined together to present her, at the moment of
her departure, with a slight souvenir of our stay at Gersau.
One of us who went that day to Lucerne undertook to buy the gift. He
returned in the evening with a gold brooch in the form of a small axe.
Neither on that evening nor the following one did the old lady make her
appearance; and the visitors who were leaving entrusted the gold brooch
to my care.
Her luggage was still in the hotel, and I was prepared to see her
return, sooner or later, reassured as to her well-being by the
proprietor who told me that she was in the habit of disappearing for a
day or two, and he had no reason to feel anxious about her.
As a matter of fact the day before my departure, as I was making a
final tour of the lake and had pulled up a few steps from Tell’s
Chapel, I saw the old lady standing at the entrance of the building.
Never until then had I been impressed by the unspeakable distress
depicted on her face down which the tears were coursing, and never had
I so clearly observed the traces, which were still manifest, of her
former beauty. She caught sight of me, lowered her veil, and walked
toward the lake. Nevertheless, I did not hesitate to overtake her, and
bowing, expressed the visitors’ regret that we were about to lose her;
and then, as I had the gift on me, I presented her with the small case
containing the gold axe.
She opened it with a sweet, far-away smile, but no sooner did she
perceive the jewel inside than she began to tremble with emotion, and
drew back some distance from me, as though she had something to fear
from my presence, and with an insensate gesture threw the brooch into
the lake.
I displayed so much amazement at this unaccountable reception that she
begged my forgiveness and burst into a fit of sobbing. A seat stood in
this secluded spot, and we both sat down. And after a few lamentations
against the decrees of fate which left me quite at a loss, she confided
to me her strange, melancholy story which I was never to forget. For,
in truth, I know of no more terrible destiny than that which befell the
old lady in the black veil, who had played Schumann’s lullaby to us
with such exquisite emotion.
* * * * *
“I will tell you the whole story,” she said, “for I am about to leave
for ever this country which I determined to visit for the last time.
And then you will understand why it was that I threw the little gold
axe into the lake.
“I was born in Geneva, monsieur. We belonged to one of the leading
families and were rich, but some unfortunate speculations on the stock
exchange ruined my father, who died from the shock. When I was eighteen
I was a beautiful girl without a dowry. My mother gave up all hope of
marrying me. And yet she yearned to make sure of my future before she
went to join my father.
“I was twenty-four when a suitor whom every one looked upon as an
unhoped-for chance appeared.
“A young man from Briesgau who was accustomed to spend the summer in
Switzerland and whose acquaintance we made in the casino at Evian,
fell in love with me, and I liked him. Herbert Gutmann was a tall
young fellow, kindly, unobtrusive and good-natured. He seemed to unite
qualities alike of heart and mind. He possessed a certain affluence
without being actually wealthy. His father was still engaged in
business, and made him an allowance in order that he might travel until
the time came for him to succeed him in his business. We were all
intending to visit the elder Gutmann at his place in Todtnau, in the
Black Forest, when the state of my mother’s health greatly hastened
the course of events.
“Conscious that she no longer possessed the physical strength to
travel, my mother hurriedly returned to Geneva, where she received
from the civil authorities of Todtnau, to whom she had written, the
most satisfactory information in respect of Herbert and his family.
Herbert’s father had begun life as an ordinary woodcutter, and then
had left the district, returning to it with a small fortune which he
had ‘made in timber.’ That was all, at least, that was known of him in
Todtnau.
“This was enough to induce my mother to press forward the formalities
of my marriage, which took place a week before her death. She died with
her mind at rest for, as she said, she felt ‘reassured about my future.’
“My husband helped me to overcome the grief which this sore trial
caused me by his constant goodness and solicitude. Before we set out
for Todtnau we came here to Gersau to spend a week, and then to my
great surprise we undertook a long journey instead of making our visit
to Herbert’s father. My sorrow would have gradually been dispelled if,
as the days sped by, I had not noticed, almost with dismay, that my
husband was more and more becoming a prey to melancholy.
“I was more surprised than I can express, because Herbert had seemed to
me of a humorous disposition, open, unrestrained and extremely frank.
Was I to discover that the liveliness which he used to display was
forced, and veiled some deep mortification? Alas, his sighs when he
thought himself alone, and the agitation which sometimes disturbed his
night’s rest, scarcely left room for doubt, and I made up my mind to
question him.
“At the first word that I ventured to speak on the subject he made
answer by bursting into laughter, treating me as a silly little goose
and kissing me passionately, which merely served to strengthen my
conviction that I was in the presence of some painful mystery.
“I could not hide from myself that there was something in Herbert’s
demeanor which was very like ‘remorse.’ And yet I could have sworn that
he was incapable of committing, I will not say a low or mean action,
but even one lacking in propriety.
“It was then that the fate which had dogged my footsteps, struck us
another blow in the person of my father-in-law of whose death we learnt
whilst we were in Scotland. This grievous piece of news depressed
my husband more than I can say. He remained the whole night without
uttering a word, nor did he shed tears nor appear to listen to the
words of consolation by which I, in my turn, endeavored to rouse his
spirit. He seemed to be overwhelmed. At last, when the light was
beginning to dawn, he rose from the arm-chair in which he had sat
huddled, and turning toward me a face terribly distorted by suffering,
said in a harrowing voice:
“‘Come, Elizabeth, we shall have to go back. We shall have to go back.’
“These words seemed to possess a significance from the tone in which
they were spoken which I failed to understand. A return to the land of
his father’s was quite natural at a moment like that, and I could not
see why he should fight against the necessity of going home. From that
day onward Herbert changed completely; he grew extraordinarily silent,
and more than once I came upon him sobbing wildly.
“The grief which the loss of a beloved father might occasion could not
entirely explain the horror of our position, for there is nothing more
terrible than mystery, the deep mystery which steals in between two
beings who are devoted to each other, and separates them from their
happiness....
“We reached Todtnau in time to breathe a prayer over the newly made
grave.
“This little town in the Black Forest, at no great distance from
Höllenthal, was a dreary spot; and there was scarcely any society in it
for me. The Gutmann’s house, in which we took up our abode, lay on the
borders of a forest.
“It was a gloomy chalet standing in its own grounds, and our one
visitor was an old clockmaker in the place, who was said to be rich and
had been the elder Gutmann’s friend. He appeared from time to time at
the lunch or dinner hour, in order to get himself invited.
“I had no liking for this manufacturer of cuckoo-clocks, this petty
usurer, for though he was rich, he was a miser and incapable of the
least nicety of feeling. Nor did Herbert care for Frantz Basckler,
though he continued out of respect for the memory of his father to keep
on friendly terms with him.
“Basckler, who had no children, had told the elder Gutmann times out of
number that Herbert was his only heir. Herbert spoke to me about it one
day with the most sincere aversion, and I had once more an opportunity
of appreciating the strictness of his conscience.
“‘Would you like to be the heir of this sordid old miser who made his
fortune by ruining all the clockmakers in Höllenthal?’
“‘Certainly not,’ I returned. ‘Your father left us a certain amount of
property, and with what you can honestly earn we shall have enough to
live on even if Heaven chooses to send us a child.’
“I had no sooner uttered these words than I saw my Herbert turn as
white as a sheet. I put my arms round him, for I thought that he was
about to faint, but the blood returned to his face, and he exclaimed in
forcible tones:
“‘Yes, yes, the only true thing is to have the approbation of one’s
conscience.’
“And so saying he rushed wildly from the room.
“Sometimes he was away for a day or two on business, which consisted,
he told me, of buying plantations of standing trees and selling them
again to contractors. He did not work the whole thing himself but left
to others the task of turning the trees into sleepers for railways,
if the wood was of inferior quality, and posts and ships’ masts if it
was of the best quality. The essential thing was to display expert
judgment; and he had acquired his knowledge of timber from his father.
“He never took me away with him on any of his journeys. He left me
alone in the house with an old maid-servant who had received me with
ill-disguised hostility. I kept out of her way and wept in secret, for
I was not happy. I felt convinced that Herbert was hiding something
from me, something which was obsessing his mind, and which I too who
knew nothing, was never able to dismiss from my thoughts.
“And then the great forest frightened me. And the servant frightened
me. And old Basckler frightened me. And the old house! It was very
large with staircases everywhere leading to passages into which I dared
not venture. At the end of one of them in particular, stood a small
room. I had seen my husband enter it two or three times, but I myself
had never set foot in it.
“I could not pass the door of this room, which was always closed,
without a tremor. It was to this study that Herbert was wont to retire,
so he told me, to make up his accounts and balance his books, but it
was also to this room that he retired alone to bewail his secret.
“One night after he had set out on one of his journeys and I was vainly
endeavoring to sleep, my attention was attracted by a slight sound
under my window which I had left partly open on account of the extreme
heat. I got out of bed with every precaution. The sky was overcast and
great clouds hid the stars from sight. It was as much as I could do to
discern the threatening shadows of the nearest trees which faced the
house.
“I could not clearly distinguish my husband and the maid-servant until
they passed under my window, walking on the lawn with infinite caution
so that I should not hear the sound of their footsteps and carrying
between them a sort of long, somewhat narrow trunk which I had never
before seen. They entered the chalet and I did not hear nor see them
again for the next ten minutes.
“My anguish exceeded anything that it is possible to conceive. Why
were they hiding themselves from me? How was it that I had not heard
the coming of the chaise which usually brought Herbert home? Just then
I seemed to catch in the distance the neighing of a horse, and the
maid-servant appeared, crossed the lawn, vanished into the darkness,
and soon returned leading our mare unharnessed over the soft ground.
Never had they taken so many precautions to prevent me from waking up!
“Growing more and more surprised that Herbert did not come to our
room as was his custom after his return at night, I hastily slipped
on a dressing-gown and wandered into the darkness of the passage. My
steps turned quite naturally toward the little study of which I stood
in so much fear. And I had only just entered the corridor which led
to it when I heard my husband say in a rough, muffled voice to the
maid-servant who was mounting the stairs:
“‘Water! Bring me some water. Hot water of course. It won’t come off.’
“I stopped short and held my breath. Besides I could not breathe. I
was stifling. I was filled with the presentiment that some dreadful
misfortune had befallen us. Suddenly I was once more startled by my
husband’s voice:
“‘Ah, at last! That’s done it. It’s come off.’
“My husband and the old woman were still talking in low tones and I
heard his step. That brought me to myself and I fled to my bedroom and
locked myself in. Soon he knocked at the door and I went through the
form of pretending to be asleep and to wake up, and at last I opened
the door. I held a candle in my hand which fell to the floor when I
caught sight of the look on his face.
“‘What’s the matter?’ he asked. ‘Are you still asleep? Do go back to
bed.’
“I made a movement to light the candle again, but he stopped me and I
threw myself on the bed. I spent a cruel night.
“Herbert turned and tossed and sighed beside me and could not sleep. He
did not speak a word. At daybreak he rose, pressed an icy kiss on my
brow and left the room. When I got downstairs the old woman gave me a
note from him in which he stated that he was obliged to go away again
for a couple of days.
“At eight o’clock that morning I learned from workmen on their way
to Neustadt, that old Basckler had been found murdered in a small
cottage which he possessed at Höllenthal, where he sometimes spent
the night when his business of money-lending kept him too long among
his peasant-debtors. Basckler had received a terrible blow with an
axe which had split his head in two. It was undoubtedly the work of a
woodman.
“I returned to the house as best I could. And once more my feet led me
toward the little study. I could not explain exactly what was passing
in my mind, but after the words which I had overheard during the night
and the look on Herbert’s face, I felt a need to see what that room
contained. Just then the servant observed me and exclaimed maliciously:
“‘Leave that room alone. You know quite well that M. Gutmann has
forbidden you to touch it. A lot of good it would do you to know what’s
inside.’
“And she walked away with a fiendish laugh.
“I took my bed, suffering from high fever. I was ill for a fortnight.
Herbert looked after me with maternal solicitude. It seemed to me that
I had been the sport of some evil dream, and it was enough now to see
his good-natured face to confirm my impression that I was not in a
normal condition on the night when I fancied that I had seen and heard
so many extraordinary things. Moreover the murderer of Basckler had
been arrested. He was a woodman belonging to Bergen whom the old miser
had ‘bled’ too freely and who had taken his revenge by ‘bleeding’ his
persecutor in his turn.
“This woodman, a man named Mathis Müller, never ceased to protest his
innocence, but though not a single trace of blood was found on his
clothes and his axe was almost like new steel, there was, it seems,
sufficient evidence of his guilt to bring him to justice.
“Our circumstances were in no way affected, as we imagined they might
be, by old Basckler’s death, and Herbert looked in vain for a will
which did not exist.
“To my surprise its absence considerably upset him, and one day when I
questioned him about it he answered irritably:
“‘Well, yes, if you want to know, I was relying a great deal on that
will—a great deal.’
“And as he spoke a black look came over his face, and the terrible face
which I had seen on the mysterious night rose up before me, and after
that never left me. It was like a mask which I was always ready to
place over Herbert’s face even when it was naturally kind and sad.
“During Mathis Müller’s trial at Freiburg I eagerly read the
newspapers; and certain words which fell from the counsel for the
defense haunted me day and night:
“‘Until you have discovered the axe with which the deed was done and
the murderer’s blood-stained clothes, you cannot convict Mathis Müller.’
“Nevertheless Mathis Müller was found guilty and sentenced to death,
and I am bound to say that the verdict strangely affected my husband.
At night he dreamt of nothing but Mathis Müller. I was terrified of him
and my thoughts also terrified me.
“Oh, I longed to know the truth! I was determined to know the truth.
What was the meaning of those words ‘It won’t come off?’
“What was the nature of the work upon which he was engaged in the
mysterious little study during the night?
“One night I rose and groping in the dark stole his keys from him. I
crept into the corridors. I went to the kitchen to fetch a lantern.
With chattering teeth I reached the forbidden room ... I opened the
door and my eyes at once fell on the trunk—the oblong trunk which had
so greatly perplexed me.
“It was locked, but I had no difficulty in finding the small key on the
bunch ... I unlocked it and raised the lid. I went down on my knees in
order to see better, and the sight that met my eyes forced a cry of
horror from me....
“The trunk contained blood-stained clothes and the axe which had struck
the blow still spotted with rust....
* * * * *
“How I managed, after what I had seen, to live with Herbert through the
few weeks which preceded the convicted man’s execution I cannot tell....
“I was afraid that he might kill me....
“How was it that my attitude, the dread that possessed me, failed to
enlighten him? The fact is that at that time his mind was wholly a prey
to fears not less great than my own. The thought of Mathis Müller never
left him.
“To enable him to escape the obsession, apparently, he now shut himself
up in the little study, and I sometimes heard him delivering tremendous
blows, which made the floor and walls resound, as if he were fighting
with his axe against the ghosts and phantoms which beset him.
“Strange to say, and it seemed at first impossible to understand,
Herbert recovered his calmness a couple of days before Müller’s
execution—the calmness of marble, the calmness of a statue. That
evening he said:
“‘I am going away to-morrow morning early. I have some important
business to do near Freiburg. I shall probably be away for a couple of
days. Don’t worry.’
“It was at Freiburg that the execution was to take place, and I had the
impression that Herbert’s composure was the result of the resolution
that he had taken.
“He was going to give himself up!
“The thought was so much of a relief to me that for the first time for
many a night I fell into a sound sleep. It was broad daylight when I
awoke. My husband had already left the house.
“I dressed in haste and without saying a word to the old servant I
started for Todtnau. Here, I took a conveyance and drove to Freiburg.
I reached Freiburg when the light had begun to wane. I went at once to
the Court House, and the first person whom I saw entering the building
was my husband. I stood rooted to the spot. And as Herbert did not come
out again I felt sure that he had surrendered and was being held there
at the disposal of the authorities.
“The prison at that time was next the Court House. I walked round
it like a mad-woman. All that night I wandered about the streets,
returning every now and then to this gloomy building, and the first
gleams of day were beginning to break when my eyes encountered two men
clad in black frock-coats mounting the front steps of the Court.
“I ran up to them and said that I wanted to see the public prosecutor
as soon as possible, as I had a communication of the utmost gravity to
make to him about the Basckler murder.
“As it happened, one of the gentlemen was the public prosecutor, and he
invited me to accompany him to his office. Here I explained who I was
and said that he must have received a visit from my husband the night
before. He told me that he had in fact seen him, and then as he took
refuge in silence I threw myself on my knees before him beseeching him
to have pity on me and tell me whether Herbert had confessed his crime.
He seemed surprised, helped me to rise to my feet, and questioned me.
“Slowly I told him the story of my life, such as I have told it to
you, and at last I described the awful discovery which I had made in
the little study in the chalet at Todtnau. I ended by declaring that I
should never have allowed an innocent man to be executed, and that had
not my husband given himself up, I should not have hesitated to inform
the police. And then I asked him as a final act of mercy, to be allowed
to see Herbert.
“‘Yes, you shall see him, madame,’ he returned. ‘Please come with me.’
“He took me, more dead than alive, to the prison, through the corridors
and up a staircase. Here he stood me before a small barred window which
jutted over a large hall and left me, telling me to have patience. A
number of other persons soon took up their positions at this window,
and looked into the hall without speaking.
“I did as they did. It was as though I was fastened to the bars, and I
had the feeling that I was about to witness some monstrous spectacle.
“The hall was gradually lined with a number of persons all of whom
maintained a mournful silence. Daylight now rendered the scene more
visible. In the center of the hall we could clearly discern a heavy
block of wood, and some one behind me exclaimed:
“‘That’s the headman’s block!’
“So Müller was to be executed! An icy perspiration began to trickle
down my forehead, and I cannot say even now how it was that I did not
fall into a dead faint. A door opened, and a procession appeared headed
by the condemned man, quivering in his shirt which was cut low and
showed his bare neck. His hands were bound behind his back, and he was
supported by two warders. A minister of religion was murmuring in his
ear.
“The wretched man began to speak. In a few trembling words he confessed
his crime and asked forgiveness of God and man. A civic officer took
note of the confession and read out the sentence of the Court; and then
the two warders thrust the convict on his knees and placed his head on
the block.
“Mathis Müller might have already been dead for all the sign of life
he gave, when a man with bare arms carrying an axe on his shoulder,
stepped forward from the side where he had hitherto remained in the
background.
“This man placed his hand upon the prisoner’s head, waved the two
warders aside, lifted the axe and struck a terrible blow. Nevertheless
he had to strike a second time before the head fell. Then he picked it
up by the hair and stood erect.
“How was it that I was able to watch the unspeakably horrible sight
until the end? Yet I could not remove my eyes from this scene of blood,
and it seemed as though there was still something for me to see, and
indeed my eyes did see ... they saw, when holding in his shaking hand
the abominable trophy the executioner drew himself up and raised his
eyes.
“I uttered a piercing shriek, ‘Herbert!’ and fell unconscious.
* * * * *
“Now, monsieur, you know my story. I had married the public
executioner. The axe which I had discovered in the little study was the
executioner’s axe; the blood-stained clothes were the executioner’s
clothes.
“Next day I fled to the house of an old relative, and I very nearly
lost my reason; and I don’t know how it is that I am still in this
world.
“As for my husband, who could not live without me, for he loved me more
than anything on earth, he was found two months later hanging in our
room. I received a last letter from him:
“‘Forgive me, Elizabeth. I have tried every sort of occupation. I
was dismissed as soon as it was discovered that I was the son of my
father. I was forced at an early age to make up my mind to take up the
succession of his work. You will understand now how it is that the
office of public executioner descends from father to son. I was born
an honest man, and the only crime that I have ever committed in my life
was to conceal the truth from you.... Farewell!’”
* * * * *
While I stood gazing in dumb amazement at the spot in the lake where
the lady in black had thrown the little gold axe, she disappeared in
the distance.
THE END
Transcriber’s Notes:
• Text enclosed by underscores is in italics (_italics_).
• Text enclosed by pluses is in small caps (+small caps+).
• Obvious typographical errors have been silently corrected.