"Yes, sir."
"All alone in the wood?"
"Yes, sir."
The wish to kill him intoxicated me like wine. I approached him quite
softly, persuaded that he was going to run away. And suddenly I seized
him by the throat. He held my wrists in his little hands, and his body
writhed like a feather on the fire. Then he moved no more. I threw the
body in the ditch, then some weeds on top of it. I returned home and
dined well. What a little thing it was! In the evening I was very gay,
light, rejuvenated, and passed the evening at the Prefect's. They found
me witty. But I have not seen blood! I am not tranquil.
August 31. The body has been discovered. They are hunting for the
assassin. Ah!
September 1. Two tramps have been arrested. Proofs are lacking.
September 2. The parents have been to see me. They wept! Ah!
October 6. Nothing has been discovered. Some strolling vagabond must
have done the deed. Ah! If I had seen the blood flow it seems to me I
should be tranquil now!
October 10. Yet another. I was walking by the river, after breakfast.
And I saw, under a willow, a fisherman asleep. It was noon. A spade, as
if expressly put there for me, was standing in a potato-field near by.
I took it. I returned; I raised it like a club, and with one blow of
the edge I cleft the fisherman's head. Oh! he bled, this
one!--rose-colored blood. It flowed into the water quite gently. And I
went away with a grave step. If I had been seen! Ah! I should have made
an excellent assassin.
October 25. The affair of the fisherman makes a great noise. His
nephew, who fished with him, is charged with the murder.
October 26. The examining magistrate affirms that the nephew is guilty.
Everybody in town believes it. Ah! ah!
October 27. The nephew defends himself badly. He had gone to the
village to buy bread and cheese, he declares. He swears that his uncle
had been killed in his absence! Who would believe him?
October 28. The nephew has all but confessed, so much have they made
him lose his head! Ah! Justice!
November 15. There are overwheming proofs against the nephew, who was
his uncle's heir. I shall preside at the sessions.
January 25, 1852. To death! to death! to death! I have had him
condemned to death! The advocate-general spoke like an angel! Ah! Yet
another! I shall go to see him executed!
March 10. It is done. They guillotined him this morning. He died very
well! very well! That gave me pleasure! How fine it is to see a man's
head cut off!
Now, I shall wait, I can wait. It would take such a little thing to let
myself be caught.
* * * * *
The manuscript contained more pages, but told of no new crime.
Alienist physicians to whom the awful story has been submitted declare
that there are in the world many unknown madmen; as adroit and as
terrible as this monstrous lunatic.