The banker recalled all this, and thought:
"To-morrow at twelve o'clock he receives his freedom. Under the
agreement, I shall have to pay him two millions. If I pay, it's all
over with me. I am ruined for ever ..."
Fifteen years before he had too many millions to count, but now he was
afraid to ask himself which he had more of, money or debts. Gambling
on the Stock-Exchange, risky speculation, and the recklessness of
which he could not rid himself even in old age, had gradually brought
his business to decay; and the fearless, self-confident, proud man of
business had become an ordinary banker, trembling at every rise and
fall in the market.
"That cursed bet," murmured the old man clutching his head in
despair... "Why didn't the man die? He's only forty years old. He will
take away my last farthing, marry, enjoy life, gamble on the Exchange,
and I will look on like an envious beggar and hear the same words from
him every day: 'I'm obliged to you for the happiness of my life. Let
me help you.' No, it's too much! The only escape from bankruptcy and
disgrace--is that the man should die."
The clock had just struck three. The banker was listening. In the
house every one was asleep, and one could hear only the frozen trees
whining outside the windows. Trying to make no sound, he took out of
his safe the key of the door which had not been opened for fifteen
years, put on his overcoat, and went out of the house. The garden was
dark and cold. It was raining. A damp, penetrating wind howled in the
garden and gave the trees no rest. Though he strained his eyes, the
banker could see neither the ground, nor the white statues, nor the
garden wing, nor the trees. Approaching the garden wing, he called the
watchman twice. There was no answer. Evidently the watchman had taken
shelter from the bad weather and was now asleep somewhere in the
kitchen or the greenhouse.
"If I have the courage to fulfil my intention," thought the old man,
"the suspicion will fall on the watchman first of all."
In the darkness he groped for the steps and the door and entered the
hall of the garden-wing, then poked his way into a narrow passage and
struck a match. Not a soul was there. Some one's bed, with no
bedclothes on it, stood there, and an iron stove loomed dark in the
corner. The seals on the door that led into the prisoner's room were
unbroken.
When the match went out, the old man, trembling from agitation, peeped
into the little window.
In the prisoner's room a candle was burning dimly. The prisoner
himself sat by the table. Only his back, the hair on his head and his
hands were visible. Open books were strewn about on the table, the two
chairs, and on the carpet near the table.
Five minutes passed and the prisoner never once stirred. Fifteen
years' confinement had taught him to sit motionless. The banker tapped
on the window with his finger, but the prisoner made no movement in
reply. Then the banker cautiously tore the seals from the door and put
the key into the lock. The rusty lock gave a hoarse groan and the door
creaked. The banker expected instantly to hear a cry of surprise and
the sound of steps. Three minutes passed and it was as quiet inside as
it had been before. He made up his mind to enter.
Before the table sat a man, unlike an ordinary human being. It was a
skeleton, with tight-drawn skin, with long curly hair like a woman's,
and a shaggy beard. The colour of his face was yellow, of an earthy
shade; the cheeks were sunken, the back long and narrow, and the hand
upon which he leaned his hairy head was so lean and skinny that it was
painful to look upon. His hair was already silvering with grey, and no
one who glanced at the senile emaciation of the face would have
believed that he was only forty years old. On the table, before his
bended head, lay a sheet of paper on which something was written in a
tiny hand.
"Poor devil," thought the banker, "he's asleep and probably seeing
millions in his dreams. I have only to take and throw this half-dead
thing on the bed, smother him a moment with the pillow, and the most
careful examination will find no trace of unnatural death. But, first,
let us read what he has written here."
The banker took the sheet from the table and read:
"To-morrow at twelve o'clock midnight, I shall obtain my freedom and
the right to mix with people. But before I leave this room and see the
sun I think it necessary to say a few words to you. On my own clear
conscience and before God who sees me I declare to you that I despise
freedom, life, health, and all that your books call the blessings of
the world.
"For fifteen years I have diligently studied earthly life. True, I saw
neither the earth nor the people, but in your books I drank fragrant
wine, sang songs, hunted deer and wild boar in the forests, loved
women... And beautiful women, like clouds ethereal, created by the
magic of your poets' genius, visited me by night and whispered to me
wonderful tales, which made my head drunken. In your books I climbed
the summits of Elbruz and Mont Blanc and saw from there how the sun
rose in the morning, and in the evening suffused the sky, the ocean
and the mountain ridges with a purple gold. I saw from there how above
me lightnings glimmered cleaving the clouds; I saw green forests,
fields, rivers, lakes, cities; I heard syrens singing, and the playing
of the pipes of Pan; I touched the wings of beautiful devils who came
flying to me to speak of God... In your books I cast myself into
bottomless abysses, worked miracles, burned cities to the ground,
preached new religions, conquered whole countries...
"Your books gave me wisdom. All that unwearying human thought created
in the centuries is compressed to a little lump in my skull. I know
that I am cleverer than you all.
"And I despise your books, despise all worldly blessings and wisdom.
Everything is void, frail, visionary and delusive as a mirage. Though
you be proud and wise and beautiful, yet will death wipe you from the
face of the earth like the mice underground; and your posterity, your
history, and the immortality of your men of genius will be as frozen
slag, burnt down together with the terrestrial globe.
"You are mad, and gone the wrong way. You take falsehood for truth and
ugliness for beauty. You would marvel if suddenly apple and orange
trees should bear frogs and lizards instead of fruit, and if roses
should begin to breathe the odour of a sweating horse. So do I marvel
at you, who have bartered heaven for earth. I do not want to
understand you.
"That I may show you in deed my contempt for that by which you live, I
waive the two millions of which I once dreamed as of paradise, and
which I now despise. That I may deprive myself of my right to them, I
shall come out from here five minutes before the stipulated term, and
thus shall violate the agreement."
When he had read, the banker put the sheet on the table, kissed the
head of the strange man, and began to weep. He went out of the wing.
Never at any other time, not even after his terrible losses on the
Exchange, had he felt such contempt for himself as now. Coming home,
he lay down on his bed, but agitation and tears kept him a long time
from sleeping...
The next morning the poor watchman came running to him and told him
that they had seen the man who lived in the wing climb through the
window into the garden. He had gone to the gate and disappeared. The
banker instantly went with his servants to the wing and established
the escape of his prisoner. To avoid unnecessary rumours he took the
paper with the renunciation from the table and, on his return, locked
it in his safe.