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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of Conscience, Complete, by Hector Malot
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: Conscience, Complete
+
+Author: Hector Malot
+
+Last Updated: March 4, 2009
+Release Date: October 5, 2006 [EBook #3990]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ASCII
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK CONSCIENCE, COMPLETE ***
+
+
+
+Produced by David Widger
+
+
+
+
+
+CONSCIENCE
+
+By Hector Malot
+
+
+With a Preface by EDOUARD PAILLERON, of the French Academy
+
+
+
+
+HECTOR MALOT
+
+HECTOR-HENRI MALOT, the son of a notary public, was born at La Brouille
+(Seine-Inferieure), March 20, 1830. He studied law, intending to devote
+himself also to the Notariat, but toward 1853 or 1854 commenced writing
+for various small journals. Somewhat later he assisted in compiling the
+'Biographie Generale' of Firmin Didot, and was also a contributor to
+some reviews. Under the generic title of 'Les Victimes d'Amour,' he made
+his debut with the following three family-romances: 'Les Amants (1859),
+Les Epoux (1865), and Les Enfants (1866).' About the same period he
+published a book, 'La Vie Moderne en Angleterre.' Malot has written
+quite a number of novels, of which the greatest is 'Conscience,' crowned
+by the French Academy in 1878.
+
+His works have met with great success in all countries. They possess
+that lasting interest which attends all work based on keen observation
+and masterly analysis of the secret motives of human actions.
+
+The titles of his writings run as follows: 'Les Amours de Jacques
+(1868); Un Beau Frere (1869); Romain Kalbris (1864), being a romance
+for children; Une Bonne Afaire, and Madame Obernin (1870); Un Cure de
+Province (1872); Un Mariage sons le Second Empire (1873); Une Belle
+Mere (1874); L'Auberge du Monde (1875-1876, 4 vols.); Les Batailles
+du Mariage (1877, 3 vols.); Cara (1877); Le Docteur Claude (1879); Le
+Boheme Tapageuse (1880, 3 vols.); Pompon, and Une Femme d'Argent (1881);
+La Petite Soeur, and Les Millions Honteux (1882); Les Besogneux, and
+Paulette (1883); Marichette, and Micheline (1884.); Le Lieutenant
+Bonnet, and Sang Bleu (1885); Baccara, and Zyte (1886); Viceo Francis,
+Seduction, and Ghislaine (1887); Mondaine (1888); Mariage Riche, and
+Justice (1889); Mere (1890), Anie (1891); Complices (1892); Conscience
+(1893); and Amours de Jeunes et Amours de Vieux (1894).'
+
+About this time Hector Malot resolved not to write fiction any more.
+He announced this determination in a card published in the journal, 'Le
+Temps,' May 25, 1895--It was then maliciously stated that "M. Malot his
+retired from business after having accumulated a fortune." However, he
+took up his pen again and published a history of his literary life:
+Le Roman de mes Romans (1896); besides two volumes of fiction, L'Amour
+dominateur (1896), and Pages choisies (1898), works which showed that,
+in the language of Holy Writ, "his eye was not dimmed nor his natural
+force abated," and afforded him a triumph over his slanderers.
+
+                  EDOUARD PAILLERON
+               de l'Academie Francaise.
+
+
+
+
+CONSCIENCE
+
+
+
+
+BOOK 1.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I. THE REUNION
+
+When Crozat, the Bohemian, escaped from poverty, by a good marriage that
+made him a citizen of the Rue de Vaugirard, he did not break with his
+old comrades; instead of shunning them, or keeping them at a distance,
+he took pleasure in gathering them about him, glad to open his house to
+them, the comforts of which were very different from the attic of the
+Rue Ganneron, that he had occupied for so long a time.
+
+Every Wednesday, from four to seven o'clock, he had a reunion at his
+house, the Hotel des Medicis, and it was a holiday for which his friends
+prepared themselves. When a new idea occurred to one of the habitues it
+was caressed, matured, studied in solitude, in order to be presented in
+full bloom at the assembly.
+
+Crozat's reception of his friends was pleasing, simple, like the man,
+cordial on the part of the husband, as well as on the part of the wife,
+who, having been an actress, held to the religion of comradeship: On a
+table were small pitchers of beer and glasses; within reach was an old
+stone jar from Beauvais, full of tobacco. The beer was good, the tobacco
+dry, and the glasses were never empty.
+
+And it was not silly subjects that were discussed here, worldly
+babblings, or gossiping about absent friends, but the great questions
+that ruled humanity: philosophy, politics, society, and religion.
+
+Formed at first of friends, or, at least, of comrades who had worked and
+suffered together, these reunions had enlarged gradually, until one day
+the rooms at the Hotel des Medicis became a 'parlotte' where preachers
+of ideas and of new religions, thinkers, reformers, apostles,
+politicians, aesthetes, and even babblers in search of ears more or less
+complaisant that would listen to them, met together. Any one might come
+who wished, and if one did not enter there exactly as one would enter an
+ordinary hotel, it was sufficient to be brought by an habitue in order
+to have the right to a pipe, some beer, and to speak.
+
+One of the habitues, Brigard, was a species of apostle, who had acquired
+celebrity by practising in his daily life the ideas that he professed
+and preached. Comte de Brigard by birth, he began by renouncing his
+title, which made him a vassal of the respect of men and of social
+conventions; an instructor of law, he could easily have made a thousand
+or twelve hundred francs a month, but he arranged the number and the
+price of his lessons so that each day brought him only ten francs in
+order that he might not be a slave to money; living with a woman whom he
+loved, he had always insisted, although he had two daughters, on
+living with her 'en union libre', and in not acknowledging his children
+legally, because the law debased the ties which attached him to them and
+lessened his duties; it was conscience that sanctioned these duties; and
+nature, like conscience, made him the most faithful of lovers, the best,
+the most affectionate, the most tender of fathers. Tall, proud, carrying
+in his person and manners the native elegance of his race, he dressed
+like the porter at the corner, only replacing the blue velvet by
+chestnut velvet, a less frivolous color. Living in Clamart for twenty
+years, he always came to Paris on foot, and the only concessions that he
+made to conventionality or to his comfort were to wear sabots in winter,
+and to carry his vest on his arm in summer.
+
+Thus organized, he must have disciples, and he sought them
+everywhere--in the streets, where he buttonholed those he was able to
+snatch under the trees of the Luxembourg Gardens, and on Wednesday
+at the house of his old comrade Crozat. How many he had had! But,
+unfortunately, the greater number turned out badly. Several became
+ministers; others accepted high government positions for life; some
+handled millions of francs; two were at Noumea; one preached in the
+pulpit of Notre Dame.
+
+One afternoon in October the little parlor was full; the end of the
+summer vacation had brought back the habitues, and for the first time
+the number was nearly large enough to open a profitable discussion.
+Crozat, near the door, smiled at the arrivals on shaking hands, and
+Brigard, his soft felt hat on his head, presided, assisted by his two
+favorite disciples of the moment, the advocate Nougarede and the poet
+Glady, neither of whom would turn out badly, he was certain.
+
+To tell the truth, for those who knew how to look and to see, the pale
+face of Nougarede, his thin lips, restless eyes, and an austerity of
+dress and manners which clashed with his twenty-six years, gave him more
+the appearance of a man of ambition than of an apostle. And when one
+knew that Glady was the owner of a beautiful house in Paris, and of real
+estate in the country that brought him a hundred thousand francs a year,
+it was difficult to imagine that he would long follow Father Brigard.
+
+But to see was not the dominant faculty of Brigard; it was to reason,
+and reason told him that ambition would soon make Nougarede a deputy,
+as fortune would one day make Glady an academician; and in that case,
+although he detested assemblies as much as academies, they would then
+have two tribunes whence the good word would fall on the multitude with
+more weight. They might be counted on. When Nougarede began to come
+to the Wednesday reunions he was as empty as a drum, and if he spoke
+brilliantly on no matter what subject with an imperturbable eloquence,
+it was to say nothing. In Glady's first volume were words learnedly
+arranged to please the ears and the eyes. Now, ideas sustained the
+discourse of the advocate, as the verses of the poet said something--and
+these ideas were Brigard's; this something was the perfume of his
+teaching.
+
+For half an hour the pipes burned fiercely, the smoke slowly rose to
+the ceiling, and as in a cloud Brigard might be seen like a bearded god,
+proclaiming his law, his hat on his head; for, if he had made a rule
+never to take it off, he manipulated it continually while he spoke,
+frequently pushing it forward, sometimes to the back of his head, to
+the right, to the left, raising it, and flattening it, according to the
+needs of his argument.
+
+"It is incontestable," he said, "that we scatter our great force when we
+ought to concentrate it."
+
+He pressed down his hat.
+
+"In effect," he raised it, "the hour has arrived for us to assert
+ourselves as a group, and it is a duty for us, since it is a need of
+humanity--"
+
+At this moment a new arrival glided into the room quietly, with the
+manifest intention of disturbing no one; but Crozat, who was seated near
+the door, stopped him and shook hands.
+
+"'Tiens', Saniel! Good-day, doctor."
+
+"Good-evening, my dear sir."
+
+"Come to the table; the beer is good to-day."
+
+"Thank you; I am very well here."
+
+Without taking the chair that Crozat designated, he leaned against the
+wall. He was a tall, solid man about thirty, with tawny hair falling
+on the collar of his coat, a long, curled beard, a face energetic, but
+troubled and wan, to which the pale blue eyes gave an expression of
+hardness that was accentuated by a prominent jaw and a decided air. A
+Gaul, a true Gaul of ancient times, strong, bold, and resolute.
+
+Brigard continued:
+
+"It is incontestable"--this was his formula, because everything he
+said was incontestable to him, simply because he said it--"it is
+incontestable that in the struggle for existence the dogma of conscience
+must be established, its only sanction being the performance of duty and
+inward satisfaction--"
+
+"Duty accomplished toward whom?" interrupted Saniel.
+
+"Toward one's self."
+
+"Then begin by stating what are our duties, and codify what is good and
+what is bad."
+
+"That is easy," some one replied.
+
+"Easy if you admit a certain innate regard for human life, for property,
+and for the family. But you must acknowledge that not all men have this
+regard. How many believe that it is not a fault to run away with the
+wife of a friend, not a crime to appropriate something that they want,
+or to kill an enemy! Where are the duties of those who reason and feel
+in this way? What is their inward satisfaction worth? This is why I will
+not admit that conscience is the proper guide of our actions."
+
+There were several exclamations at this, which Brigard checked.
+
+"What guide, then, shall men obey?" he demanded.
+
+"Force, which is the last word of the philosophy of life!"
+
+"That which leads to a wise and progressive extermination. Is this what
+you desire?"
+
+"Why not? I do not shrink from an extermination that relieves humanity
+of idlers that it drags about without power to advance or to free
+itself, finally sinking under the load. Is it not better for the world
+to be rid of such people, who obstruct the advancement of others?"
+
+"At least the idea is bizarre coming from a doctor," interrupted Crozat,
+"since it would put an end to hospitals."
+
+"Not at all; I would preserve them for the study of monsters."
+
+"In placing society on this antagonistic footing," said Brigard,
+"you destroy society itself, which is founded on reciprocity, on good
+fellowship; and in doing so you can create for the strong a state
+of suspicion that paralyzes them. Carthage and Venice practised the
+selection by force, and destroyed themselves."
+
+"You speak of force, my dear Saniel," interrupted a voice; "where do
+you get that--the force of things, the tatum? There is no beginning, no
+will; events decide for us climate, temperament, environment."
+
+"Then," replied Saniel, "there is no responsibility, and this instrument
+conscience, that should decide everything, is good for nothing. You need
+not consider consequences. Success or defeat may yet be immaterial,
+for the accomplishment of an act that you have believed condemnable
+may serve the race, while another that you have believed beneficent may
+prove injurious; from which it follows that intentions only should be
+judged, and that no one but God can sound human hearts to their depths."
+
+He began to laugh.
+
+"Do you believe that? Is that the conclusion at which you have arrived?"
+
+A waiter entered, carrying pitchers of beer on a tray, and the
+discussion was necessarily interrupted, every one drawing up to the
+table where Crozat filled the glasses, and the conversation took a more
+private turn.
+
+Saniel shook hands with Brigard, who received him somewhat coldly; then
+he approached Glady with the manifest intention of detaining him, but
+Glady had said that he was obliged to leave, so Saniel said that he
+could remain no longer, and had only dropped in on passing.
+
+When they were both gone Brigard turned to Crozat and Nougarede, who
+were near him, and declared that Saniel made him uneasy.
+
+"He believes himself stronger than life," he said, "because he is sound
+and intelligent. He must take care that he does not go too far!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II. THE RICH MAN'S REFUSAL
+
+When Saniel and Glady reached the street, the rain that had fallen since
+morning had ceased, and the asphalt shone clear and glittering like a
+mirror.
+
+"The walking is good," Saniel remarked.
+
+"It will rain again," responded Glady, looking at the sky.
+
+"I think not." It was evident that Glady wished to take a cab, but as
+none passed he was obliged to walk with Saniel.
+
+"Do you know," he said, "that you have wounded Brigard?"
+
+"I regret it sincerely; but the salon of our friend Crozat is not yet a
+church, and I do not suppose that discussion is forbidden there."
+
+"To deny is not to discuss."
+
+"You say that as if you were angry with me."
+
+"Not at all. I am sorry that you have wounded Brigard--nothing more."
+
+"That is too much, because I have a sincere esteem, a real friendship
+for you, if you will permit me to say so."
+
+But Glady, apparently, did not desire the conversation to take this
+turn.
+
+"I think this is an empty cab," he said, as a fiacre approached them.
+
+"No," replied Saniel, "I see the light of a cigar through the
+windowpane."
+
+Glady made a slight gesture of impatience that was not lost upon Saniel,
+who was expecting some such demonstration.
+
+Rich, and frequenting the society of poor men, Glady lived in dread of
+borrowers. It was enough for any man to appear to wish to talk to him
+privately to make him believe that he was going to ask for fifty louis
+or twenty francs; so often was this the case that every friend or
+comrade was an enemy against whom he must defend his purse. And so he
+lay in wait as if expecting some one to spring upon him, his eyes open,
+his ears listening, and his hands in his pockets. This explains his
+attitude toward Saniel, in whom he scented a demand for money, and
+was the reason for his attempt to escape by taking a cab. But luck was
+against him, and he tried to decline the unspoken request in another
+way.
+
+"Do not be surprised," he said, with the volubility with which a man
+speaks when he does not wish to give his companion a chance to say a
+word, "that I was pained to see Brigard take seriously an argument that
+evidently was not directed against him."
+
+"Neither against him nor against his ideas."
+
+"I know that; you do not need to defend yourself. But I have so much
+friendship, so much esteem and respect for Brigard that everything that
+touches him affects me. And how could it be otherwise when one knows his
+value, and what a man he is? This life of mediocrity that he lives, in
+order to be free, is it not admirable? What a beautiful example!"
+
+"Not every one can follow it."
+
+"You think that one cannot be contented with ten francs a day?"
+
+"I mean that not every one has the chance to make ten francs a day."
+
+The vague fears of Glady became definite at these words. They had walked
+down the Rue Ferou and reached the Place St. Sulpice.
+
+"I think that at last I am going to find a cab," he said, precipitately.
+
+But this hope was not realized; there was not a single cab at the
+station, and he was forced to submit to the assault from Saniel.
+
+And Saniel began:
+
+"You are compelled to walk with me, and, frankly, I rejoice, because I
+wish to talk to you of a serious affair--on which depends my future."
+
+"This is a poor place for serious talk."
+
+"I do not find it so."
+
+"We would better appoint some other time."
+
+"Why should we, since chance has thrown us together here?"
+
+Glady resigned himself to the inevitable, and was as polite as he could
+be in the circumstances.
+
+"I await your pleasure," he said in a gracious tone, that was a contrast
+to his former one.
+
+Saniel, who was in such a hurry a few moments before, now silently
+walked by Glady, whose eyes were on the shining asphalt pavement.
+
+At last he spoke.
+
+"I have told you that my future depends on the affair concerning which
+I wish to speak to you. I can tell you all in a few words: If I am
+not able to procure three thousand francs within two days, I shall be
+obliged to leave Paris, to give up my studies and my work here, and go
+and bury myself in my native town and become a plain country doctor."
+
+Glady did not flinch; if he had not foreseen the amount he expected the
+demand, and he continued gazing at his feet.
+
+"You know," continued Saniel, "that I am the son of peasants; my father
+was marshal in a poor village of Auvergne. At school I gave proof of a
+certain aptitude for work above my comrades, and our cure conceived
+an affection for me and taught me all he knew. Then he made me enter
+a small seminary. But I had neither the docile mind nor the submissive
+character that was necessary for this education, and after several years
+of pranks and punishments, although I was not expelled, I was given to
+understand that my departure would be hailed with delight. I then became
+usher in a small school, but without salary, taking board and lodging
+as payment. I passed a good examination and was preparing for my degree,
+when I left the school owing to a quarrel. I had made some money by
+giving private lessons, and I found myself the possessor of nearly
+eighty francs. I started for Paris, where I arrived at five o'clock
+one morning in June, and where I knew, no one. I had a small trunk
+containing a few shirts, which obliged me to take a carriage. I told the
+coachman to take me to a hotel in the Latin Quarter. 'Which hotel?' he
+asked; 'I do not care,' I answered. 'Do you wish to go to the Hotel du
+Senat?' The name pleased me; perhaps it was an omen. He took me to the
+Hotel du Senat, where, with what I had left of my eighty francs, I paid
+a month in advance. I stayed there eight years."
+
+"That is remarkable."
+
+"What else could I do? I knew Latin and Greek as well as any man in
+France, but as far as anything else was concerned I was as ignorant as
+a schoolmaster. The same day I tried to make use of what I knew, and I
+went to a publisher of classic books, of whom I had heard my professor
+of Greek literature speak. After questioning me he gave me a copy of
+Pindar to prepare with Latin notes, and advanced me thirty francs, which
+lasted me a month. I came to Paris with the desire to work, but without
+having made up my mind what to do. I went wherever there were lectures,
+to the Sorbonne, to the College de France, to the Law School, and to the
+School of Medicine; but it was a month before I came to a decision. The
+subtleties of law displeased me, but the study of medicine, depending
+upon the observation of facts, attracted me, and I decided to become a
+doctor."
+
+"A marriage of reason."
+
+"No, a marriage for love. Because, if I had consulted reason, it would
+have told me that to marry medicine when one has nothing--neither family
+to sustain you nor relatives to push you--would be to condemn yourself
+to a life of trials, of battles, and of misery. My student life was
+happy; I worked hard, and by giving lessons in Latin I had enough to
+eat. When I received as house-surgeon six, eight, nine hundred francs,
+I thought it a large fortune, and I would have remained in this position
+for the rest of my life if I had been able to do so, but when I took my
+degree of doctor I was obliged to leave the hospital. The possessor of
+several thousand francs, I should have followed rigorously my dream of
+ambition. While attending the mistress of one of my comrades I made the
+acquaintance of an upholsterer, who suggested that he should furnish
+an apartment for me, and that I might pay him later. I yielded to
+temptation. Remember, I had passed eight years in the Hotel du Senat,
+and I knew nothing of Paris life. A home of my own! My own furniture,
+and a servant in my anteroom! I should be somebody! My upholsterer could
+have installed me in his own quarter of Paris, and perhaps could have
+obtained some patients for me among his customers, who are rich and
+fashionable. But he did not do this, probably concluding that with my
+awkward appearance I would not be a success with such people. When you
+are successful it is original to be a peasant--people find you clever;
+but before success comes to you it is a disgrace. He furnished me an
+apartment in a very respectable house in the Rue Louis-le-Grand. When I
+went into it I had debts to the amount of ten thousand francs behind me,
+the interest on this sum, the rent of two thousand four hundred francs,
+not a sou in my pocket, not a relative--"
+
+"That was courageous."
+
+"I did not know that in Paris everything is accomplished through
+influence, and I imagined that an intelligent man could make his way
+without assistance. I was to learn by experience. When a new doctor
+arrives anywhere his brother doctors do not receive him with much
+sympathy. 'What does this intruder want?' 'Are there not enough of us
+already?' He is watched, and the first patient that he loses is made
+use of as an example of his ignorance or imprudence, and his position
+becomes uncomfortable. The chemists of my quarter whom I called upon
+did not receive me very warmly; they made me feel the distance that
+separates an honorable merchant from a beggar, and I was given to
+understand that they could patronize me only on condition that I ordered
+the specialties that they wished to profit by--iron from this one and
+tar from that. On commencing to practise I had as patients only the
+people of the quarter, whose principle was never to pay a doctor, and
+who wait for the arrival of a new one in order that they may be rid of
+the old one and this sort is numerous everywhere. It happened that my
+concierge was from Auvergne like myself, and he considered it his duty
+to make me give free attendance to all those from our country that
+he could find in the quarter and everywhere else, so that I had the
+patriotic satisfaction of seeing all the charcoal-dealers from Auvergne
+sprawling in my beautiful armchairs. Finally, by remaining religiously
+at home every Sunday in summer, while the other doctors were away, by
+rising quickly at night every time my bell rang, I was able to acquire
+a practice among a class of people who were more reasonable and
+satisfactory. I obtained a prize at the Academy. At the same time I
+delivered, at a moderate price, lectures in anatomy at schools on the
+outskirts of the city; I gave lessons; I undertook all the anonymous
+work of the book trade and of journalism that I could find. I slept five
+hours a day, and in four years I had decreased my debt seven thousand
+francs. If my upholsterer wished to be paid I could have it arranged,
+but that was not his intention. He wishes to take his furniture that is
+not worn out, and to keep the money that he has received. If I do not
+pay these three thousand francs in a few days I shall be turned into
+the street. To tell the truth, I shall soon have a thousand francs, but
+those who owe it to me are not in Paris, or will pay in January. Behold
+my situation! I am desperate because there is no one to whom I can
+apply; those whom I have asked for money have not listened to me; I
+have told you that I have no relatives, and neither have I any
+friends--perhaps because I am not amiable. And then I thought of you.
+You know me. You know that people say I have a future before me. At the
+end of three months I shall be a doctor in the hospitals; my competitors
+admit that I shall not miss admission; I have undertaken some
+experiments that will, perhaps, give me fame. Will you give me your
+hand?"
+
+Glady extended it toward him. "I thank you for having applied to me; it
+is a proof of confidence that touches me." He pressed the hand that he
+had taken with some warmth. "I see that you have divined the sentiments
+of esteem with which you have inspired me."
+
+Saniel drew a long breath.
+
+"Unfortunately," continued Glady, "I cannot do what you desire without
+deviating from my usual line of conduct. When I started out in life I
+lent to all those who appealed to me, and when I did not lose my friends
+I lost my money. I then took an oath to refuse every one. It is an oath
+that I cannot break. What would my old friends say if they learned that
+I did for a young man what I have refused to do for them?"
+
+"Who would know it?"
+
+"My conscience."
+
+They had reached the Quai Voltaire, where fiacres were stationed.
+
+"At last here are some cabs," Glady said. "Pardon me for leaving you,
+but I am in a hurry."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III. A LAST RESORT
+
+Gady entered the cab so quickly that Saniel remained staring at the
+sidewalk, slightly dazed. It was only when the door closed that he
+understood.
+
+"His conscience!" he murmured. "Behold them! Tartufes!"
+
+After a moment of hesitation, he continued his way and reached the
+bridge of Saints-Peres, but he walked with doubtful steps, like a man
+who does not know where he is going. Presently he stopped, and, leaning
+his arms on the parapet, watched the sombre, rapidly flowing Seine, its
+small waves fringed with white foam. The rain had ceased, but the wind
+blew in squalls, roughening the surface of the river and making the
+red and green lights of the omnibus boats sway in the darkness. The
+passers-by came and went, and more than one examined him from the corner
+of the eye, wondering what this tall man was doing there, and if he
+intended to throw himself into the water.
+
+And why not? What better could he do?
+
+And this was what Saniel said to himself while watching the flowing
+water. One plunge, and he would end the fierce battle in which he had so
+madly engaged for four years, and which would in the end drive him mad.
+
+It was not the first time that this idea of ending everything had
+tempted him, and he only warded it off by constantly inventing
+combinations which it seemed to him at the moment might save him. Why
+yield to such a temptation before trying everything? And this was how he
+happened to appeal to Glady. But he knew him, and knew that his avarice,
+about which every one joked, had a certain reason for its existence.
+However, he said to himself that if the landed proprietor obstinately
+refused a friendly loan, which would only pay the debts of youth,
+the poet would willingly fill the role of Providence and save from
+shipwreck, without risking anything, a man with a future, who, later,
+would pay him back. It was with this hope that he risked a refusal.
+The landed proprietor replied; the poet was silent. And now there was
+nothing to expect from any one. Glady was his last resort.
+
+In explaining his situation to Glady he lightened the misery instead of
+exaggerating it. For it was not only his upholsterer that he owed, but
+also his tailor, his bootmaker, his coal-dealer, his concierge, and
+all those with whom he had dealings. In reality, his creditors had not
+harassed him very much until lately, but this state of affairs would
+not last when they saw him prosecuted; they also would sue him, and how
+could he defend himself? How should he live? His only resource would be
+to return to the Hotel du Senat, where even they would not leave him in
+peace, or to his native town and become a country doctor. In either case
+it was renouncing all his ambitions. Would it not be better to die?
+
+What good was life if his dreams were not realized--if he had nothing
+that he wanted?
+
+Like many who frequently come in contact with death, life in itself
+was a small thing to him--his own life as well as that of others; with
+Hamlet he said: "To die, to sleep, no more," but without adding: "To
+die, to sleep, perchance to dream," feeling certain that the dead do not
+dream; and what is better than sleep to those who have had a hard life?
+
+He was absorbed in thought when something came between him and the
+flaring gaslight, and threw a shadow over him that made him straighten
+himself up. What was it? Only a policeman, who came and leaned against
+the parapet near him.
+
+He understood. His attitude was that of a man who contemplates throwing
+himself into the river, and the policeman had placed himself there in
+order to prevent it.
+
+"Thanks!" he said to the astonished man.
+
+He continued his way, walking quickly, but hearing distinctly the steps
+of the policeman following him, who evidently took him for a madman who
+must be watched.
+
+When he left the bridge of Saints-Peres for the Place du Carrousel this
+surveillance ceased, and he could then indulge freely in reflection--at
+least as freely as his trouble and discouragement permitted.
+
+"The weak kill themselves; the strong fight to their last breath."
+
+And, low as he was, he was not yet at his last breath.
+
+When he decided to appeal to Glady he had hesitated between him and a
+usurer named Caffie, whom he did not know personally, but whom he had
+heard spoken of as a rascal who was interested in all sorts of
+affairs, preferring the bad to the good--of successions, marriages,
+interdictions, extortions; and if he had not been to him it was for fear
+of being refused, as much as from the dread of putting himself in such
+hands in case of meeting with compliance. But these scruples and these
+fears were useless now; since Glady failed him, cost what it might and
+happen what would, he must go to this scamp for assistance.
+
+He knew that Caffie lived in the Rue Sainte-Anne, but he did not know
+the number. He had only to go to one of his patients, a wine-merchant
+in the Rue Therese, to find his address in the directory. It was but
+a step, and he decided to run the risk; there was need of haste.
+Discouraged by all the applications that he had made up to this time,
+disheartened by betrayed hopes, irritated by rebuffs, he did not deceive
+himself as to the chances of this last attempt, but at least he would
+try it, slight though the hope of success might be.
+
+It was an old house where Caffie lived, and had been formerly a private
+hotel; it was composed of two wings, one on the street, the other on an
+inside court. A porte cochere gave access to this court, and under its
+roof, near the staircase, was the concierge's lodge. Saniel knocked at
+the door in vain; it was locked and would not open. He waited several
+minutes, and in his nervous impatience walked restlessly up and down the
+court. At last an old woman appeared carrying a small wax taper. She was
+feeble and bent, and began to excuse herself; she was alone and could
+not be everywhere at the same time, in her lodge and lighting the lamps
+on the stairways. Caffie lived on the first floor, in the wing on the
+street.
+
+Saniel mounted the stairs and rang the bell. A long time passed, or
+at least it seemed long to him, before there was an answer. At last he
+heard a slow and heavy step on the tiled floor and the door was opened,
+but held by a hand and a foot.
+
+"What do you wish?"
+
+"Monsieur Caffie."
+
+"I am he. Who are you?"
+
+"Doctor Saniel."
+
+"I have not sent for a doctor."
+
+"It is not as doctor that I am here, but as client."
+
+"This is not the hour when I receive clients."
+
+"But you are at home."
+
+"That is a fact!"
+
+And Caffie, concluding to open the door, asked Saniel to enter, and then
+closed it.
+
+"Come into my office."
+
+They were in a small room filled with papers that had only an old desk
+and three chairs for furniture; it communicated with the office of the
+business man, which was larger, but furnished with the same simplicity
+and strewn with scraps of paper that had a mouldy smell.
+
+"My clerk is ill just now," Caffie said, "and when I am alone I do not
+like to open the door."
+
+After giving this excuse he offered Saniel a chair, and, seating himself
+before his desk, lighted by a lamp from which he had taken the shade, he
+said:
+
+"Doctor, I am ready to listen to you."
+
+He replaced the shade on the lamp.
+
+Saniel made his request concisely, without the details that he
+had entered into with Glady. He owed three thousand francs to the
+upholsterer who had furnished his apartment, and as he could not pay
+immediately he was in danger of being prosecuted.
+
+"Who is the upholsterer?" Caffie asked, while holding his left jaw with
+his right hand.
+
+"Jardine, Boulevard Haussmann."
+
+"I know him. It is his trade to take back his furniture in this way,
+after three quarters of the sum has been paid, and he has become rich at
+it. How much money have you already paid of this ten thousand francs?"
+
+"Including the interest and what I have paid in instalments, nearly
+twelve thousand francs."
+
+"And you still owe three thousand?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"That is nice."
+
+Caffie seemed full of admiration for this manner of proceeding.
+
+"What guarantee have you to offer for this loan of three thousand
+francs?"
+
+"No other than my present position, I confess, and above all, my
+future."
+
+At Caffie's request he explained his plans and prospects for the future,
+while the business man, with his cheek resting on his hand, listened,
+and from time to time breathed a stifled sigh, a sort of groan.
+
+"Hum! hum!" he said when Saniel finished his explanation. "You know, my
+dear friend, you know:
+
+   To fools alone the future's smile unchangeable appears,
+   For Friday's laughter Sunday's sun may change to bitter tears."
+
+"It is Sunday with you, my dear sir."
+
+"But I am not at the end of my life nor at the end of my energy, and I
+assure you that my energy makes me capable of many things."
+
+"I do not doubt it; I know what energy can do. Tell a Greek who is dying
+of hunger to go to heaven and he will go
+
+     Graeculus esuriens in coelum, jusseris, ibit."
+
+"But I do not see that you have started for heaven."
+
+A smile of derision, accompanied by a grimace, crossed Caffies face.
+Before becoming the usurer of the Rue Sainte-Anne, whom every one called
+a rascal, he had been attorney in the country, deputy judge, and if
+unmerited evils had obliged him to resign and to hide the unpleasant
+circumstances in Paris, he never lost an opportunity to prove that by
+education he was far above his present position. Finding this new client
+a man of learning, he was glad to make quotations that he thought would
+make him worthy of consideration.
+
+"It is, perhaps, because I am not Greek," Saniel replied; "but I am an
+Auvergnat, and the men of my country have great physical strength."
+
+Caffie shook his head.
+
+"My dear sir," he said, "I might as well tell you frankly that I do not
+believe the thing can be done. I would do it myself willingly, because
+I read intelligence in your face, and resolution in your whole person,
+which inspire me with confidence in you; but I have no money to put into
+such speculations. I can only be, as usual, a go-between--that is to
+say, I can propose the loan to one of my clients, but I do not know one
+who would be contented with the guarantee of a future that is more
+or less uncertain. There are so many doctors in Paris who are in your
+position."
+
+Saniel rose.
+
+"Are you going?" cried Caffie.
+
+"But--"
+
+"Sit down, my dear sir! It is no use to throw the handle after the axe.
+You make me a proposition, and I show you the difficulties in the way,
+but I do not say there is no way to extricate you from embarrassment. I
+must look around. I have known you only a few minutes; but it does not
+take long to appreciate a man like you, and, frankly, you inspire me
+with great interest."
+
+What did he wish? Saniel was not simple enough to be caught by words,
+nor was he a fop who accepts with gaping mouth all the compliments
+addressed to him. Why did he inspire a sudden interest in this man who
+had the reputation of pushing business matters to extremes? He would
+find out. In the mean time he would be on his guard.
+
+"I thank you for your sympathy," he said.
+
+"I shall prove to you that it is real, and that it may become useful.
+You come to me because you want three thousand francs. I hope I may find
+them for you, and I promise to try, though it will be difficult, very
+difficult. They will make you secure for the present. But will they
+assure your future? that is, will they permit you to continue the
+important works of which you have spoken to me, and on which your future
+depends? No. Your struggles will soon begin again. And you must shake
+yourself clear from such cares in order to secure for yourself the
+liberty that is indispensable if you wish to advance rapidly. And to
+obtain this freedom from cares and this liberty, I see only one way--you
+must marry."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV. 'TWIXT THE DEVIL AND THE DEEP SEA
+
+Saniel, who was on his guard and expected some sort of roguery from this
+man, had not foreseen that these expressions of interest were leading up
+to a proposal of marriage, and an exclamation of surprise escaped
+him. But it was lost in the sound of the door-bell, which rang at that
+moment.
+
+Caffie rose. "How disagreeable it is not to have a clerk!" he said.
+
+He went to open the door with an eagerness that he had not shown to
+Saniel, which proved that he had no fear of admitting people when he was
+not alone.
+
+It was a clerk from the bank.
+
+"You will permit me," Caffie said, on returning to his office. "It will
+take but an instant."
+
+The clerk took a paper from his portfolio and handed it to Caffie.
+
+Caffie drew a key from the pocket of his vest, with which he opened the
+iron safe placed behind his desk, and turning his back to Saniel and the
+clerk counted the bills which they heard rustle in his hands. Presently
+he rose, and closing the door of the safe he placed under the lamp the
+package of bills that he had counted. The clerk then counted them, and
+placing them in his portfolio took his leave.
+
+"Close the door when you go out," Caffie said, who was already seated in
+his arm-chair.
+
+"Do not be afraid."
+
+When the clerk was gone Caffie apologized for the interruption.
+
+"Let us continue our conversation, my dear sir. I told you that there is
+only one way to relieve you permanently from embarrassment, and that
+way you will find is in a good marriage, that will place 'hic et nunc' a
+reasonable sum at your disposal."
+
+"But it would be folly for me to marry now, when I have no position to
+offer a wife."
+
+"And your future, of which you have just spoken with so much assurance,
+have you no faith in that?"
+
+"An absolute faith--as firm to-day as when I first began the battle of
+life, only brighter. However, as others have not the same reasons that
+I have to hope and believe what I hope and believe, it is quite
+natural that they should feel doubts of my future. You felt it yourself
+instantly in not finding it a good guarantee for the small loan of three
+thousand francs."
+
+"A loan and marriage are not the same thing. A loan relieves you
+temporarily, and leaves you in a state to contract several others
+successively, which, you must acknowledge, weakens the guarantee that
+you offer. While a marriage instantly opens to you the road that your
+ambition wishes to travel."
+
+"I have never thought of marriage."
+
+"If you should think of it?"
+
+"There must be a woman first of all."
+
+"If I should propose one, what would you say?"
+
+"But--"
+
+"You are surprised?"
+
+"I confess that I am."
+
+"My dear sir, I am the friend of my clients, and for many of them--I
+dare to say it--a father. And having much affection for a young woman,
+and for the daughter of one of my friends, while listening to you I
+thought that one or the other might be the woman you need. Both have
+fortunes, and both possess physical attractions that a handsome man
+like yourself has a right to demand. And for the rest, I have their
+photographs, and you may see for yourself what they are."
+
+He opened a drawer in his desk, and took from it a package of
+photographs. As he turned them over Saniel saw that they were all
+portraits of women. Presently he selected two and handed them to Saniel.
+
+One represented a woman from thirty-eight to forty years, corpulent,
+robust, covered with horrible cheap jewelry that she had evidently put
+on for the purpose of being photographed. The other was a young girl
+of about twenty years, pretty, simply and elegantly dressed, whose
+distinguished and reserved physiognomy was a strong contrast to the
+first portrait.
+
+While Saniel looked at these pictures Caffie studied him, trying to
+discover the effect they produced.
+
+"Now that you have seen them," he said, "let us talk of them a little.
+If you knew me better, my dear sir, you would know that I am frankness
+itself, and in business my principle is to tell everything, the good and
+the bad, so that my clients are responsible for the decisions they make.
+In reality, there is nothing bad about these two persons, because,
+if there were, I would not propose them to you. But there are certain
+things that my delicacy compels me to point out to you, which I do
+frankly, feeling certain that a man like you is not the slave of narrow
+prejudices."
+
+An expression of pain passed over his face, and he clasped his jaw with
+both hands.
+
+"You suffer?" Saniel asked.
+
+"Yes, from my teeth, cruelly. Pardon me that I show it; I know by
+myself that nothing is more annoying than the sight of the sufferings of
+others."
+
+"At least not to doctors."
+
+"Never mind; we will return to my clients. This one"--and he touched the
+portrait of the bejewelled woman--"is, as you have divined already, a
+widow, a very amiable widow. Perhaps she is a little older than you are,
+but that is nothing. Your experience must have taught you that the man
+who wishes to be loved, tenderly loved, pampered, caressed, spoiled,
+should marry a woman older than himself, who will treat him as a husband
+and as a son. Her first husband was a careful merchant, who, had he
+lived, would have made a large fortune in the butcher business"--he
+mumbled this word instead of pronouncing it clearly--"but although he
+died just at the time when his affairs were beginning to develop, he
+left twenty thousand pounds' income to his wife. As I have told you what
+is good, I must tell you what is to be regretted. Carried away by gay
+companions, this intelligent man became addicted to intemperance, and
+from drinking at saloons she soon took to drinking at home, and his wife
+drank with him. I have every reason to believe that she has reformed;
+but, if it is otherwise, you, a doctor, can easily cure her--"
+
+"You believe it?"
+
+"Without doubt. However, if it is impossible, you need only let her
+alone, and her vice will soon carry her off; and, as the contract will
+be made according to my wishes in view of such an event, you will find
+yourself invested with a fortune and unencumbered with a wife."
+
+"And the other?" Saniel said, who had listened silently to this curious
+explanation of the situation that Caffie made with the most perfect
+good-nature. So grave were the circumstances that he could not help
+being amused at this diplomacy.
+
+"I expected your demand," replied the agent with a shrewd smile. "And if
+I spoke of this amiable widow it was rather to acquit my conscience than
+with any hope of succeeding. However free from prejudices one may be,
+one always retains a few. I understand yours, and more than that, I
+share them. Happily, what I am now about to tell you is something quite
+different. Take her photograph, my dear sir, and look at it while I
+talk. A charming face, is it not? She has been finely educated at a
+fashionable convent. In a word, a pearl, that you shall wear. And now I
+must tell you the flaw, for there is one. Who is blameless? The daughter
+of one of our leading actresses, after leaving the convent she returned
+to live with her mother. It was there, in this environment-ahem!
+ahem!--that an accident happened to her. To be brief, she has a sweet
+little child that the father would have recognized assuredly, had he not
+been already married. But at least he has provided for its future by
+an endowment of two hundred thousand francs, in such a way that whoever
+marries the mother and legitimizes the child will enjoy the interest of
+this sum until the child's majority. If that ever arrives--these little
+creatures are so fragile! You being a physician, you know more about
+that than any one. In case of an accident the father will inherit half
+the money from his son; and if it seems cruel for an own father to
+inherit from his own son, it is quite a different thing when it is a
+stranger who receives the fortune. This is all, my dear sir, plainly and
+frankly, and I will not do you the injury to suppose that you do not see
+the advantages of what I have said to you without need of my insisting
+further. If I have not explained clearly--"
+
+"But nothing is more clear."
+
+"--it is the fault of this pain that paralyzes me."
+
+And he groaned while holding his jaw.
+
+"You have a troublesome tooth?" Saniel said, with the tone of a
+physician who questions a patient.
+
+"All my teeth trouble me. To tell the truth, they are all going to
+pieces."
+
+"Have you consulted a doctor?"
+
+"Neither a doctor nor a dentist. I have faith in medicine, of course;
+but when I consult doctors, which seldom happens, I notice that they
+think much more of their own affairs than of what I am saying, and that
+keeps me away from them. But, my dear sir, when a client consults me, I
+put myself in his place."
+
+While he spoke, Saniel examined him, which he had not done until this
+moment, and he saw the characteristic signs of rapid consumption. His
+clothes hung on him as if made for a man twice his size, and his face
+was red and shining, as if he were covered with a coating of cherry
+jelly.
+
+"Will you show me your teeth?" he asked. "It may be possible to relieve
+your sufferings."
+
+"Do you think so?"
+
+The examination did not last long.
+
+"Your mouth is often dry, is it not?" he asked.
+
+"Yes."
+
+"You are often thirsty?"
+
+"Always."
+
+"Do you sleep well?"
+
+"No."
+
+"Your sight troubles you?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Have you a good appetite?"
+
+"Yes, I eat heartily; and the more I eat the thinner I become. I am
+turning into a skeleton."
+
+"I see that you have scars from boils on the back of your neck."
+
+"They made me suffer enough, the rascals; but they are gone as they
+came. Hang it, one is no longer young at seventy-two years; one has
+small vexations. They are small vexations, are they not?"
+
+"Certainly. With some precautions and a diet that I shall prescribe, if
+you wish, you will soon be better. I will give you a prescription that
+will relieve your toothache."
+
+"We will talk of this again, because we shall have occasion to meet if,
+as I presume, you appreciate the advantages of the proposition that I
+have made you."
+
+"I must have time to reflect."
+
+"Nothing is more reasonable. There is no hurry."
+
+"But I am in a hurry because, if I do not pay Jardine, I shall find
+myself in the street, which would not be a position to offer to a wife."
+
+"In the street? Oh, things will not come to such a pass as that! What
+are the prosecutions?"
+
+"They will soon begin; Jardine has already threatened me."
+
+"They are going to begin? Then they have not begun. If he does, as we
+presume he will, proceed by a replevin, we shall have sufficient time
+before the judgment. Do you owe anything to your landlord?"
+
+"The lease expired on the fifteenth."
+
+"Do not pay it."
+
+"That is easy; it is the only thing that is easy for me to do."
+
+"It is an obstacle in the way of your Jardine, and may stop him a
+moment. We can manage this way more easily. The important thing is to
+warn me as soon as the fire begins. 'Au revoir', my dear Sir."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V. A CHARMING VISITOR
+
+Although Saniel had had no experience in business, he was not simple
+enough not to know that in refusing him this loan Caffie meant to make
+use of him.
+
+"It is very simple," he said to himself, as he went downstairs. "He
+undertakes to manage my affairs, and in such a way that some day I shall
+have to save myself by marrying that charming girl. What a scoundrel!"
+
+However, the situation was such that he was glad to avail himself of the
+assistance of this scoundrel. At least, some time was gained, and when
+Jardine found that he was not disposed to let himself be slaughtered, he
+might accept a reasonable arrangement. But he must manage so that Caffie
+would not prevent this arrangement.
+
+Unfortunately, he felt himself hardly capable of such manoeuvring,
+having been always straightforward, his eyes fixed on the end he wished
+to attain, and thinking only of the work through which he would attain
+it. And now he must act the part of a diplomat, submitting to craftiness
+and rogueries that were not at all in accord with his open nature.
+He had begun by not telling Caffie, instantly, what he thought of his
+propositions; but it is more difficult to act than to control one's
+self, to speak than to be silent.
+
+What would he say, what would he do, when the time for action came?
+
+He reached his house without having decided anything, and as he passed
+before the concierge's lodge absorbed in thought, he heard some one call
+him.
+
+"Doctor, come in a moment, I beg of you."
+
+He thought some one wished to consult him, some countryman who had
+waited for his return; and, although he did not feel like listening
+patiently to idle complainings, he turned back and entered the lodge.
+
+"Some one brought this," the concierge said, handing him a paper that
+was stamped and covered with a running handwriting. "This" was the
+beginning of the fire of which Caffie had spoken. Without reading it,
+Saniel put it in his pocket and turned to go; but the concierge detained
+him.
+
+"I would like to say two words to 'monchieur le docteur' about this
+paper."
+
+"Have you read it?"
+
+"No, but I talked with the officer who gave it to me, and he told me
+what it meant. It is unfortunate, doctor."
+
+To be pitied by his concierge! This was too much.
+
+"It is not as he told you," he replied, haughtily.
+
+"So much the better. I am glad for you and for me. You can pay my little
+bill."
+
+"Give it to me."
+
+"I have given it to you twice already, but I have a copy. Here it is."
+
+To be sued by a creditor paralyzed Saniel; he was stunned, crushed,
+humiliated, and could only answer stupidly. Taking the bill that the
+concierge handed him, he put it in his pocket and stammered a few words.
+
+"You see, doctor, I must say what has been in my heart a long time. You
+are my countryman, and I esteem you too much not to speak. In taking
+your apartment and engaging your upholsterer, you did too much. You ruin
+yourself. Give up your apartment, and take the one opposite that costs
+less than half, and you will get on. You will not be obliged to leave
+this quarter. What will become of our neighbors if you leave us? You are
+a good doctor; everybody knows it and says so. And now, as for my bill,
+it is understood that I shall be paid first, shall I not?"
+
+"As soon as I have the money I will pay you."
+
+"It is a promise?"
+
+"I promise you."
+
+"Thank you very much."
+
+"If it could be to-morrow, it would suit me. I am not rich, you know,
+but I have always paid the gas-bill for your experiments."
+
+With the paper in his pocket, Saniel returned to Caffie, who was just
+going out, and to whom he gave it.
+
+"I will see about it this, evening," said the man of business. "Just
+now I am going to dinner. Do not worry. To-morrow I will do what is
+necessary. Good-evening. I am dying of hunger."
+
+But three days before, Saniel emptied his purse to soothe his
+upholsterer by an instalment as large as he was able to make it, keeping
+only five francs for himself, and with the few sous left he could not
+go to a restaurant, not even the lowest and cheapest. He could only
+buy some bread for his supper, and eat it while working, as he had often
+done before.
+
+But when he returned to his rooms he was not in a state of mind to write
+an article that must be delivered that evening. Among other things that
+he had undertaken was one, and not the least fastidious, which consisted
+in giving, by correspondence, advice to the subscribers of a fashion
+magazine, or, more exactly speaking, to recommend, in the form of
+medical advice, all the cosmetics, depilatories, elixirs, dyes,
+essences, oils, creams, soaps, pomades, toothpowders, rouges, and also
+all the chemists' specialties, to which their inventors wished to give
+an authority that the public, which believes itself acute, refused to
+the simple advertisement on the last page. With his ambition and the
+career before him, he would never have consented to carry on this
+correspondence under his own name. He did it for a neighboring doctor,
+a simple man, who was not so cautious, and who signed his name to these
+letters, glad to get clients from any quarter. For his trouble, Saniel
+took this doctor's place during Sunday in summer, and from time to time
+received a box of perfumery or quack medicines, which he sold at a low
+price when occasion offered.
+
+Every week he received the list of cosmetics and specialties that he
+must make use of in his correspondence, no matter how he recommended
+them, whether in answer to letters that were really addressed to him, or
+by inventing questions that gave him the opportunity to introduce them.
+
+He began to consult this list and the pile of letters from subscribers
+that the magazine had sent him, when the doorbell rang. Perhaps it was
+a patient, the good patient whom he had expected for four years. He left
+his desk to open the door.
+
+It was his coal man, who came with his bill.
+
+"I will stop some day when I am near you," Saniel said. "I am in a hurry
+this evening."
+
+"And I am in a hurry, too; I must pay a large bill tomorrow, and I count
+upon having some money from you."
+
+"I have no money here."
+
+After a long talk he got rid of the man and returned to his desk. He had
+answered but a few of the many letters when his bell rang again. This
+time he would not open the door; it was a creditor, without doubt. And
+he continued his correspondence.
+
+But for four years he had waited for chance to draw him a good ticket
+in the lottery of life--a rich patient afflicted with a cyst or a tumor
+that he would take to a fashionable surgeon, who would divide with
+him the ten or fifteen thousand francs that he would receive for the
+operation. In that case he would be saved.
+
+He ran to the door. The patient with the cyst presented himself in the
+form of a small bearded man with a red face, wearing over his vest the
+wine-merchant's apron of coarse black cloth. In fact, it was the wine
+merchant from the corner, who, having heard of the officer's visit, came
+to ask for the payment of his bill for furnishing wine for three months.
+
+A scene similar to that which he had had with the coal merchant, but
+more violent, took place, and it was only by threatening to put him out
+of the door that Saniel got rid of the man, who went away declaring that
+he would come the next morning with an officer.
+
+Saniel returned to his work.
+
+His pen flew over the paper, when a noise made him raise his head.
+Either he had not closed the door tightly, or his servant was entering
+with his key. What did he want? He did not employ him all day, but only
+during his office hours, to put his rooms in order and to open the door
+for his clients.
+
+As Saniel rose to go and see who it was, there was a knock at the door.
+It was his servant, with a blank and embarrassed air.
+
+"What is the matter, Joseph?"
+
+"I thought I should find you, sir, so I came."
+
+"Why?"
+
+Joseph hesitated; then, taking courage, he said volubly, while lowering
+his eyes:
+
+"I came to ask, sir, if you will pay me my month, which expired on the
+fifteenth, because there is need of money at my house; if there was not
+need of money I would not have come. If you wish, sir, I will release
+you--"
+
+"How?"
+
+"I will take the coat that you made me order a month ago; I am quite
+sure it is not worth what is due me, but it is always so."
+
+"Take the coat."
+
+Joseph took the coat from the wardrobe in the hall, and rolled it in a
+newspaper.
+
+"Of course you will not expect me in the morning," he said, as he put
+his key on the table. "I must look out for another place."
+
+"Very well, I shall not expect you."
+
+"Good-evening, sir."
+
+And Joseph hurried away as quickly as possible.
+
+Left alone, Saniel did not return to his work immediately, but throwing
+himself in an armchair he cast a melancholy glance around his office and
+through the open door into the parlor. In the faint light of the candle
+he saw the large armchairs methodically placed each side of the chimney,
+the curtains at the windows lost in shadow, and all the furniture
+which for four years had cost him so many efforts. He had long been the
+prisoner of this Louis XIV camlet, and he was now going to be executed.
+A beautiful affair, truly, brilliant and able! All this had been used
+only by the poor Auvergnats, without Saniel enjoying it at all, for
+he had neither the bourgeois taste for ornaments nor the desire for
+elegance. A movement of anger and revolt against himself made him strike
+his desk with his fist. What a fool he had been!
+
+The bell rang again. This time, not expecting a rich patient, he would
+not open it. After a moment a slight tap was heard on the panel. He rose
+quickly and ran to open the door.
+
+A woman threw herself into his arms.
+
+"O my dearest! I am so glad to find you at home!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI. A SWEET CONSOLER
+
+She passed her arm about him and pressed him to her, and with arms
+entwined they entered the study.
+
+"How glad I am!" she said. "What a good idea I had!"
+
+With a quick movement she took off her long gray cloak that enveloped
+her from head to foot.
+
+"And are you glad?" she asked, as she stood looking at him.
+
+"Can you ask that?"
+
+"Only to hear you say that you are."
+
+"Are you not my only joy, the sweet lamp that gives me light in the
+cavern where I work day and night?"
+
+"Dear Victor!"
+
+She was a tall, slender young woman with chestnut hair, whose thick
+curls clustering about her forehead almost touched her eyebrows. Her
+beautiful eyes were dark, her nose short, while her superb teeth and
+rich, ruby-colored lips gave her the effect of a pretty doll; and she
+had gayety, playful vivacity, gracious effrontery, and a passionate
+caressing glance. Dressed extravagantly, like the Parisian woman who
+has not a sou, but who adorns everything she wears, she had an ease,
+a freedom, a natural elegance that was charming. With this she had the
+voice of a child, a joyous laugh, and an expression of sensibility on
+her fresh face.
+
+"I have come to dine with you," she said, gayly, "and I am so hungry."
+
+He made a gesture that was not lost upon her.
+
+"Do I disturb you?" she asked, uneasily.
+
+"Not at all."
+
+"Must you go out?"
+
+"No."
+
+"Then why did you make a gesture that showed indifference, or, at least,
+embarrassment?"
+
+"You are mistaken, my little Phillis."
+
+"With any one else I might be mistaken, but with you it is impossible.
+You know that between us words are not necessary; that I read in your
+eyes what you would say, in your face what you think and feel. Is it not
+always so when one loves--as I love you?"
+
+He took her in his arms and kissed her long and tenderly. Then going
+to a chair on which he had thrown his coat, he drew from the pocket the
+bread that he had bought.
+
+"This is my dinner," he said, showing the bread.
+
+"Oh! I must scold you. Work is making you lose your head. Can you not
+take time to eat?"
+
+He smiled sadly.
+
+"It is not time that I want."
+
+He fumbled in his pocket and brought out three big sous.
+
+"I cannot dine at a restaurant with six sous."
+
+She threw herself in his arms.
+
+"O dearest, forgive me!" she cried. "Poor, dear martyr! Dear, great man!
+It is I who accuse you, when I ought to embrace your knees. And you do
+not scold me; a sad smile is your only reply. And it is really so bad as
+that! Nothing to eat!"
+
+"Bread is very good eating. If I might be assured that I shall always
+have some!"
+
+"Well, to-day you shall have something more and better. This morning,
+seeing the storm, an idea came to me associated with you. It is quite
+natural, since you are always in my heart and in my thoughts. I told
+mamma that if the storm continued I would dine at the pension. You can
+imagine with what joy I listened to the wind all day, and watched the
+rain and leaves falling, and the dead branches waving in the whirlwind.
+Thank God, the weather was bad enough for mamma to believe me safe at
+the pension; and here I am. But we must not fast. I shall go and buy
+something to eat, and we will play at making dinner by the fire, which
+will be far more amusing than going to a restaurant."
+
+She put on her cloak quickly.
+
+"Set the table while I make my purchases."
+
+"I have my article to finish that will be sent for at eight o'clock.
+Just think, I have three tonics to recommend, four preparations of iron,
+a dye, two capillary lotions, an opiate, and I don't know how many soaps
+and powders. What a business!"
+
+"Very well, then, do not trouble yourself about the table; we will set
+it together when you have finished, and that will be much more amusing."
+
+"You take everything in good part."
+
+"Is it better to look on the dark side? I shall soon return."
+
+She went to the door.
+
+"Do not be extravagant," he said.
+
+"There is no danger," she replied, striking her pocket.
+
+Then, returning to him, she embraced him passionately.
+
+"Work!"
+
+And she ran out.
+
+They had loved each other for two years. At the time they met, Saniel
+was giving a course of lectures on anatomy at a young ladies' school
+just outside of Paris, and every time he went out there he saw a young
+woman whom he could not help noticing. She came and went on the
+same trains that he did, and gave lessons in a rival school. As she
+frequently carried under her arm a large cartoon, and sometimes a
+plaster cast, he concluded that she gave lessons in drawing. At first
+he paid no attention to her. What was she to him? He had more important
+things in his head than women. But little by little, and because she was
+reserved and discreet, he was struck by the vivacity and gayety of her
+expression. He really enjoyed looking at this pretty and pleasing young
+woman. However, his looks said nothing; if their eyes smiled when they
+met, that was all; they did not make each other's acquaintance. When
+they left the train they did not notice each other; if he took the left
+side of the street, she took the other, and vice versa. This state
+of things lasted several months without a word having been exchanged
+between them; in due time they learned each other's names and
+professions. She was a professor of drawing, as he supposed, the
+daughter of an artist who had been dead several years, and was called
+Mademoiselle Phillis Cormier. He was a physician for whom a brilliant
+future was prophesied, a man of power, who would some day be famous;
+and, very naturally, their attitude remained the same. There was no
+particular reason why it should change. But accident made a reason.
+One summer day, at the hour when they ordinarily took the train back
+to Paris, the sky suddenly became overcast, and it was evident that
+a violent storm was approaching. Saniel saw Phillis hurrying to the
+station without an umbrella, and, as some friend had lent him one, he
+decided to speak to her for the first time.
+
+"It seems as if the storm would overtake us before we reach the station.
+As you have no umbrella, will you permit me to walk beside you, and to
+shelter you with mine?"
+
+She replied with a smile, and they walked side by side until the rain
+began to fall, when she drew nearer to him, and they entered the station
+talking gayly.
+
+"Your umbrella is better than Virginia's skirt," she said.
+
+"And what is Virginia's skirt?"
+
+"Have you not read Paul and Virginia?"
+
+"No."
+
+She looked at him with a mocking smile, wondering what superior men
+read.
+
+Not only had he not read Bernardin de Saint-Pierre's romance, nor any
+others, but he had never been in love. He knew nothing of the affairs of
+the heart nor of the imagination. Leisure must be had for light reading,
+and even more for love, for they require a liberty of mind and an
+independence of life that he had not. Where could he find time to read
+novels? When and how could he pay attention to a woman? Those that he
+had known since his arrival in Paris had not had the slightest influence
+over him, and he retained only faint memories of them. On the contrary,
+thinking of this walk in the rain, he remembered this young girl with a
+vividness entirely new to him. She made a strong impression on him, and
+it remained. He saw her again, with her smile that showed her brilliant
+teeth, he heard the music of her voice, and the bare plain that he had
+walked so many times now seemed the most beautiful country in the world
+to him. Evidently there was a change in him; something was awakened in
+his soul; for the first time he discovered that the hollow and muscular
+conoid organ called the heart had a use besides for the circulation of
+blood.
+
+What a surprise and what a disappointment! Was he going to be simpleton
+enough to love this young girl and entangle his life, already so hard
+and heavily weighted, with a woman? A fine thing, truly, and nature had
+built him to play the lover! It is true that only those who wish it fall
+in love, and he knew the power of will by experience.
+
+But he soon lost confidence in himself. Away from Phillis he could do as
+he wished, but with her it was as she wished. With one look she mastered
+him. He met her, furious at the influence she exercised over him, and
+against which he had struggled since their last meeting; he left her,
+ravished at feeling how profoundly he loved her.
+
+To a man whose life had been ruled by reason and logic until this
+moment, these contradictions were exasperating; and he only excused
+himself for submitting to them by saying that they could in no way
+modify the line of conduct that he had traced out for himself, nor make
+him deviate from the road that he followed.
+
+Rich, or even with a small fortune, he might--when he was with her and
+in her power--let himself be carried away; but when he was dying of
+hunger he was not going to commit the folly of taking a wife. What would
+he have to give her? Misery, nothing but misery; and shame, in default
+of any other reason, would forever prevent him from offering himself to
+her.
+
+She was the daughter of an artist who, after years of struggle, died at
+the moment when fortune was beginning to smile upon him. Ten years more
+of work, and he would have left his family, if not rich, at least in
+comfortable circumstances. In reality, he left nothing but ruin.
+The hotel he built was sold, and, after the debts were paid, nothing
+remained but some furniture. His widow, son, and daughter must work. The
+widow, having no trade, took in sewing; the son left college to become
+the clerk of a money-lender named Caffie; the daughter, who, happily
+for her, had learned to draw and paint under her father's direction,
+obtained pupils, and designed menacs for the stationers, and painted
+silk fans and boxes. They lived with great economy, submitting to many
+privations. The brother, weary of his monotonous existence and of the
+exactions of his master, left them to try his fortunes in America.
+
+If Saniel ever married, which he doubted, certainly he would not marry a
+woman situated as Phillis was.
+
+This reflection was reassuring, and he was more devoted to her. Why
+should he not enjoy the delicious pleasure of seeing her and listening
+to her? His life was neither gay nor happy; he felt perfectly sure of
+himself, and, as he knew her now, he was also sure of her--a brave and
+honest girl. Otherwise, how had she divined that he loved her?
+
+They continued to see each other with a pleasure that seemed equal on
+both sides, meeting in the station, arranging to take the same trains,
+and talking freely and gayly.
+
+Things went on this way until the approach of vacation, when they
+decided to take a walk after their last lesson, instead of returning
+immediately to Paris.
+
+When the day came the sun was very hot; they had walked some distance,
+when Phillis expressed a wish to rest for a few minutes. They seated
+themselves in a shady copse, and soon found themselves in each other's
+arms.
+
+Since then Saniel had never spoken of marriage, and neither had Phillis.
+
+They loved each other.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII. A LITTLE DINNER FOR TWO
+
+Saniel was still at work when Phillis returned.
+
+"You have not yet finished, dear?"
+
+"Give me time to cure, by correspondence, a malady that has not yielded
+to the care of ten physicians, and I am yours."
+
+In three lines he finished the letter, and left his desk.
+
+"I am ready. What shall I do?"
+
+"Help me to take things out of my pockets."
+
+"Don't press too hard," she said as he took each parcel.
+
+At last the pockets were empty.
+
+"Where shall we dine?" she asked.
+
+"Here, as the dining-room is transformed into a laboratory."
+
+"Then let us begin by making a good fire. I wet my feet coming from the
+station."
+
+"I do not know whether there is any wood."
+
+"Let us see."
+
+She took the candle and they passed into the kitchen, which, like the
+dining-room, was a laboratory, a stable where Saniel kept in cages pigs
+from India and rabbits for his experiments, and where Joseph heaped
+pell-mell the things that were in his way, without paying any attention
+to the stove in which there never had been a fire. But their search was
+vain; there was everything in this kitchen except fire-wood.
+
+"Do you value these boxes?" she asked, caressing a little pig that she
+had taken in her arms.
+
+"Not at all; they enclosed the perfumes and tonics, but they are useless
+now."
+
+They returned to the office, Saniel carrying the boxes.
+
+"We will set the table here," she said, gayly, for Saniel told her
+that the dining-room was uninviting, as it was a small bacteriological
+laboratory.
+
+The table was set by Phillis, who went and came, walking about with a
+gracefulness that Saniel admired.
+
+"You are doing nothing," she said.
+
+"I am watching you and thinking."
+
+"And the result of these thoughts?"
+
+"It is that you have a fund of good-humor and gayety, an exuberance of
+life, that would enliven a man condemned to death."
+
+"And what would have become of us, I should like to know, if I had been
+melancholy and discouraged when we lost my poor papa? He was joy itself,
+singing all day long, laughing and joking. He brought me up, and I am
+like him. Mamma, as you know, is melancholy and nervous, looking on the
+dark side, and Florentin is like her. I obtained a place for Florentin,
+I found work for mamma and for myself. We all took courage, and
+gradually we became calm."
+
+She looked at him with a smile that said:
+
+"Will you let me do for you what I have done for others?"
+
+But she did not speak these words. On the contrary, she immediately
+endeavored to destroy the impression which she believed her words had
+made upon him.
+
+"Go and bring some water," she said, "and I will light the fire."
+
+When he returned, carrying a carafe, the fire blazed brightly, lighting
+the whole room. Phillis was seated at the desk, writing.
+
+"What are you doing?" he asked in surprise.
+
+"I am writing our menu, for you know we are not going to sit down at the
+table like the bourgeois. How do you like it?"
+
+She read it to him.
+
+"Sardines de Nantes."
+
+"Cuisse de dinde rotie."
+
+"Terrine de pate de foie gras aux truffes du Perigord."
+
+"But this is a feast."
+
+"Did you think that I would offer you a fricandeau au jus?"
+
+She continued:
+
+"Fromage de Brie."
+
+"Choux a la creme vanillge."
+
+"Pomme de Normandie."
+
+"Wine."
+
+"Ah! Voila! What wine? I do not wish to deceive you. Let us put, 'Wine
+from the wine-seller at the corner.' And now we will sit down."
+
+As he was about to seat himself, she said:
+
+"You do not give me your arm to conduct me to the table. If we do not
+do things seriously and methodically we shall not believe in them, and
+perhaps the Perigord truffles will change into little black pieces of
+anything else."
+
+When they were seated opposite to each other, she continued, jesting:
+
+"My dear doctor, did you go to the representation of Don Juan, on
+Monday?"
+
+And Saniel, who, in spite of all, had kept a sober face, now laughed
+loudly.
+
+"Charming!" she cried, clapping her hands. "No more preoccupation;
+no more cares. Look into my eyes, dear Victor, and think only of the
+present hour, of the joy of being together, of our love."
+
+She reached her hand over the table, and he pressed it in his.
+
+"Very well." The dinner continued gayly, Saniel replying to Phillis's
+smiles, who would not permit the conversation to languish. She helped
+him to each dish, poured out his wine, leaving her chair occasionally
+to put a piece of wood on the fire, and such shoutings and laughter had
+never been heard before in that office.
+
+However, she noticed that, little by little, Saniel's face, that relaxed
+one moment, was the next clouded by the preoccupation and bitterness
+that she had tried hard to chase away. She would make a new effort.
+
+"Does not this charming little dinner give you the wish to repeat it?"
+
+"How? Where?"
+
+"As I am able to come this evening without making mamma uneasy, I shall
+find some excuse to come again next week."
+
+He shook his head.
+
+"Have you engagements for the whole of next week?" she asked with
+uneasiness.
+
+"Where shall I be next week, to-morrow, in a few days?"
+
+"You alarm me. Explain, I beg of you. O Victor, have pity! Do not leave
+me in suspense."
+
+"You are right; I ought to tell you everything, and not let your tender
+heart torment itself, trying to explain my preoccupation."
+
+"If you have cares, do you not esteem me enough to let me share them
+with you? You know that I love you; you only, to-day, to-morrow,
+forever!"
+
+Saniel had not left her ignorant of the difficulties of his position,
+but he had not entered into details, preferring to speak of his hopes
+rather than of his present misery.
+
+The story that he had already told to Glady and Caffie he now told to
+Phillis, adding what had passed with the concierge, the wine-seller, the
+coal man, and Joseph.
+
+She listened, stupefied.
+
+"He took your coat?" she murmured.
+
+"That was what he came for."
+
+"And to-morrow?"
+
+"Ah! to-morrow--to-morrow!"
+
+"Working so hard as you have, how did you come to such a pass?"
+
+"Like you, I believed in the virtue of work, and look at me! Because I
+felt within me a will that nothing could weaken, a strength that nothing
+could fatigue, a courage that nothing could, dishearten, I imagined that
+I was armed for battle in such a way that I should never be conquered,
+and I am conquered, as much by the fault of circumstances as by my
+own--"
+
+"And in what are you to blame, poor dear?"
+
+"For my ignorance of life, stupidity, presumption, and blindness. If
+I had been less simple, should I have been taken in by Jardine's
+propositions? Should I have accepted this furniture, this apartment? He
+told me that the papers he made me sign were mere formalities, that in
+reality I might pay when I could, and that he would be content with a
+fair interest. That seemed reasonable, and, without inquiring further,
+I accepted, happy and delighted to have a home, feeling sure of having
+strength to bear this burden. To have confidence in one's self is
+strength, but it is also weakness. Because you love me you do not know
+me; you do not see me as I am. In reality, I am not sociable, and
+I lack, absolutely, suppleness, delicacy, politeness, as much in my
+character as in my manners. Being so, how can I obtain a large practice,
+or succeed, unless it is by some stroke of luck? I have counted on the
+luck, but its hour has not yet sounded. Because I lack suppleness I have
+not been able to win the sympathy or interest of my masters. They see
+only my reserve; and because I stay away from them, as much through
+timidity as pride, they do not come to me--which is quite natural,
+I admit. And because I have not yielded my ideas to the authority of
+others, they have taken a dislike to me, which is still more natural.
+Because I lack politeness, and am still an Auvergnat, heavy and awkward
+as nature made me, men of the world disdain me, judging me by my
+exterior, which they see and dislike. More wary, more sly, more
+experienced, I should be, at least, sustained by friendship, but I have
+given no thought to it. What good is it? I had no need of it, my force
+was sufficient. I find it more easy to make myself feared than loved.
+Thus formed, there are only two things for me to do: remain in my poor
+room in the Hotel du Senat, living by giving lessons and by work from
+the booksellers, until the examination and admission to the central
+bureau; or to establish myself in an out-of-the-way quarter at
+Belleville, Montrouge, or elsewhere, and there practise among people who
+will demand neither politeness nor fine manners. As these two ways are
+reasonable, I have made up my mind to neither. Belleville, because I
+should work only with my legs, like one of my comrades whom I saw
+work at Villette: 'Your tongue, good. Your arm, good.' And while he is
+supposed to be feeling the pulse of the patient with one hand, with the
+other he is writing his prescription: 'Vomitive, purgative, forty sous;'
+and he hurries away, his diagnosis having taken less than five minutes;
+he had no time to waste. I object to the Hotel du Senat because I have
+had enough of it, and it was there that Jardine tempted me with his
+proposals. See what he has brought me to!"
+
+"And now?"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII. EXPLANATIONS
+
+At this moment, without warning, the candle on the table went out.
+
+Phillis rose. "Where are the candles?" she asked.
+
+"There are no more; this was the last."
+
+"Then we must brighten up the fire."
+
+She threw a small log on the hearth, and then, instead of resuming
+her seat, she took a cushion from the sofa, and placing it before the
+chimney, threw herself upon it, and leaned her elbow on Saniel's knee.
+
+"And now?" she repeated, her eyes raised to his.
+
+"Now I suppose the only thing for me to do is to return to Auvergne and
+become a country doctor."
+
+"My God! is it possible?" she murmured in a tone that surprised Saniel.
+If there was sadness in this cry, there was also a sentiment that he did
+not understand.
+
+"On leaving the school I could continue to live at the Hotel du Senat,
+and, while giving lessons, prepare my 'concours'; now, after having
+reached a certain position, can I return to this life of poverty and
+study? My creditors, who have fallen on me here, will harass me, and my
+competitors will mock my misery--which is caused by my vices. They will
+think that I dishonor the Faculty, and I shall be rebuffed. Neither
+doctor of the hospitals nor fellow, I shall be reduced to nothing but a
+doctor of the quarter. Of what use is it? The effort has been made here;
+you see how it has succeeded."
+
+"Then you mean to go?"
+
+"Not without sorrow and despair, since it will be our separation, the
+renouncement of all the hopes on which I have lived for ten years, the
+abandonment of my work, death itself. You see now why, in spite of your
+gayety, I have not been able to hide my preoccupation from you. The more
+charming you were, the more I felt how dear you are, and the greater my
+despair at the thought of separation."
+
+"Why should we separate?"
+
+"What do you mean?"
+
+She turned toward him.
+
+"To go with you. You must acknowledge that until this moment I have
+never spoken to you of marriage, and never have I let the thought appear
+that you might one day make me your wife. In your position, in the
+struggle you have been through, a wife would have been a burden that
+would have paralyzed you; above all, such a poor, miserable creature
+as myself, with no dot but her misery and that of her family. But the
+conditions are no longer the same. You are as miserable as I am,
+and more desperate. In your own country, where you have only distant
+relatives who are nothing to you, as they have not your education or
+ideas, desires or habits, what will become of you all alone with your
+158 disappointment and regrets? If you accept me, I will go with you;
+together, and loving each other, we cannot be unhappy anywhere. When you
+come home fatigued you will find me with a smile; when you stay at home
+you will tell me your thoughts, and explain your work, and I will try to
+understand. I have no fear of poverty, you know, and neither do I fear
+solitude. Wherever we are together I shall be happy. All that I ask of
+you is to take my mother with us, because you know I cannot leave her
+alone. In attending her, you have learned to know her well enough
+to know that she is not disagreeable or difficult to please. As for
+Florentin, he will remain in Paris and work. His trip to America has
+made him wise, and his ambition will now be easily satisfied; to earn
+a small salary is all that he asks. Without doubt we shall be a burden,
+but not so heavy as one might think at first. A woman, when she chooses,
+brings order and economy into a house, and I promise you that I will be
+that woman. And then I will work. I am sure my stationer will give me
+as many menus when I am in Auvergne as he does now that I am in Paris.
+I could, also, without doubt, procure other work. It would be a hundred
+francs a month, perhaps a hundred and fifty, perhaps even two hundred.
+While waiting for your patients to come, we could live on this money. In
+Auvergne living must be cheap."
+
+She had taken his hands in hers, and she watched anxiously his face as
+the firelight shone on it, to see the effect of her words. It was the
+life of both of them that was to be decided, and the fulness of her
+heart made her voice tremble. What would he reply? She saw that his face
+was agitated, without being able to read more.
+
+As she remained silent, he took her head in his hands, and looked in her
+face for several moments.
+
+"How you love me!" he said.
+
+"Let me prove it in some way besides in words."
+
+"It would be cowardly to let you share my misery."
+
+"It would be loving me enough to feel sure that I would be happy."
+
+"And I?"
+
+"Is not the love in your heart greater than pride? Do you not feel that
+since I have loved you my love has filled all my life, and that there is
+nothing in the world, in the present or in the future, but it and you?
+Because I see you for several hours from time to time in Paris, I am
+happy; whatever difficulties await us, I should be much happier in
+Auvergne, because we should be together always."
+
+He remained silent for some time.
+
+"Could you love me there?" he murmured.
+
+Evidently it was more to himself than to her that he addressed this
+question, which was the sum of his reflections.
+
+"O dear Victor!" she cried. "Why do you doubt me? Have I deserved it?
+The past, the present, do they not assure the future?"
+
+He shook his head.
+
+"The man you have loved, whom you love, has never shown himself to you
+as he really is. In spite of the trials and sorrows of his life he has
+been able to answer your smile with a smile, because, cruel as his life
+was, he was sustained by hope and confidence; in Auvergne there will be
+no more hope or confidence, but the madness of a broken life, and the
+dejection of impotence. What sort of man should I be? Could you love
+such a man?"
+
+"A thousand times more, for he would be unhappy, and I should have to
+comfort him."
+
+"Would you have the strength to do it? After a time you would become
+weary, for the burden would be too heavy, however great your devotion
+or profound your tenderness, to see my real position and my hopes, and,
+descending into the future, to see my ruin. You know I am ambitious
+without having ever compassed the scope of this ambition, and of the
+hopes, dreams if you like, on which it rests. Understand that these
+dreams are on the eve of being realized; two months more, and in
+December or January I pass the 'concours' for the central bureau, which
+will make me a physician of the hospitals, and at the same time the one
+for the admission, which opens the Faculty of Medicine to me. Without
+pride, I believe myself in a position to succeed--what sportsmen call
+'in condition.' And just when I have only a few days to wait, behold me
+ruined forever."
+
+"Why forever?"
+
+"A man leaves his village for Paris to make a name for himself, and he
+returns only when bad luck or inability sends him back. And then it is
+only every four years that there is a 'concours' for admission. In four
+years what will be my moral and intellectual condition? How should I
+support this exile of four years? Imagine the effect that four years of
+isolation in the mountains will produce. But this is not all. Besides
+this ostensible end that I have pursued since I left my village, I
+have my special work that I can carry out only in Paris. Without having
+overwhelmed you with the details of medicine, you know that it is about
+to undergo a revolution that will transform it. Until now it has been
+taught officially, in pathology, that the human organism carries within
+itself the germ of a great many infectious diseases which develop
+spontaneously in certain conditions; for instance, that tuberculosis
+is the result of fatigue, privations, and physiological miseries. Well,
+recently it has been admitted, that is to say, the revolutionists admit,
+a parasitical origin for these diseases, and in France and Germany there
+is an army looking for these parasites. I am a soldier in this army,
+and to help me in these researches I established a laboratory in the
+dining-room. It is to the parasites of tuberculosis and cancers that I
+devote myself, and for seven years, that is, since I was house-surgeon,
+my comrades have called me the cancer topic. I have discovered the
+parasite of the tuberculosis, but I have not yet been able to free it
+from all its impurities by the process of culture. I am still at it.
+That is to say, I am very near it, and to-morrow, perhaps, or in a few
+days, I may make a discovery that will be a revolution, and cover
+its discoverer with glory. The same with the cancer. I have found its
+microbe. But all is not done. See what I must give up in leaving Paris."
+
+"Why give all this up? Could you not continue your researches in
+Auvergne?"
+
+"It is impossible, for many reasons that are too long to explain, but
+one will suffice. The culture of these parasites can be done only in
+certain temperatures rigorously maintained at the necessary degree, and
+these temperatures can be obtained only by stoves, like the one in my
+laboratory, fed by gas, the entrance of which is automatically regulated
+by the temperature of the water. How could I use this stove in a country
+where there is no gas? No, no! If I leave Paris, everything is at an end
+my position, as well as my work. I shall become a country doctor, and
+nothing but a country doctor. Let the sheriff turn me out to-morrow,
+and all the four years' accumulations in my laboratory, all my works en
+train that demand only a few days or hours to complete, may go to the
+second-hand dealer, or be thrown into the street. Of all my
+efforts, weary nights, privations, and hopes, there remains only one
+souvenir--for me. And yet, if it did not remain, perhaps I should be
+less exasperated, and should accept with a heart less sore the life to
+which I shall never resign myself. You know very well that I am a rebel,
+and do not submit tamely."
+
+She rose, and taking his hand, pressed it closely in her own.
+
+"You must stay in Paris," she said. "Pardon me for having insisted that
+you could live in the country. I thought more of myself than of you, of
+our love and our marriage. It was an egotistic thought, a bad thought.
+A way must be found, no matter what it costs, to enable you to continue
+your work."
+
+"But how to find it? Do you think I have not tried everything?"
+
+He related his visits to Jardine, his solicitations, prayers, and also
+his request of a loan from Glady, and his visit to Caffie.
+
+"Caffie!" she cried. "What made you think of going to Caffie?"
+
+"I went partly because you had often spoken of him."
+
+"But I spoke of him to you as the most wicked of men, capable of
+anything and everything that is bad."
+
+"And partly, also, because I knew from one of my patients that he lends
+to those of whom he can make use."
+
+"What did he say to you?"
+
+"That it was probable he would not be able to find any one who would
+lend what I wished, but he would try to find some one, and would give
+me an answer tomorrow evening. He also promised to protect me from
+Jardine."
+
+"You have put yourself in his hands?"
+
+"Well, what do you expect? In my position, I am not at liberty to go to
+whom I wish and to those who inspire me with confidence in their honor.
+If I should go to a notary or a banker they would not listen to me,
+for I should be obliged to tell them, the first thing, that I have no
+security to offer. That is how the unfortunate fall into the hands of
+rascals; at least, these listen to them, and lend them something, small
+though it may be."
+
+"What did he give you?"
+
+"Advice."
+
+"And you took it?"
+
+"There is time gained. To-morrow, perhaps, I shall be turned into the
+street. Caffie will obtain a respite."
+
+"And what price will he ask for this service?"
+
+"It is only those who own something who worry about the price."
+
+"You have your name, dignity, and honor, and once you are in Caffies
+hands, who knows what he may exact from you, what he may make you do,
+without your being able to resist him?"
+
+"Then you wish me to leave Paris?"
+
+"Certainly not; but I wish you to be on your guard against Caffie, whom
+you do not know, but I do, through what Florentin told us when he was
+with him. However secret a man may be, he cannot hide himself from his
+clerk. He is not only guilty of rascalities, but also of real crimes. I
+assure you that he deserves ten deaths. To gain a hundred francs he will
+do anything; he makes money only for the pleasure of making it, for he
+has neither child nor relative."
+
+"Well, I promise to be on my guard as you advise. But, wicked as Caffie
+may be, I believe that I shall accept the concours that he offered
+me. Who knows what may happen in the short time that he gains for me?
+Because I need not tell you that I know beforehand what his reply will
+be to my request for a loan--he could find no one."
+
+"I shall come, all the same, to-morrow evening to learn his answer."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX. CAFFIE'S ANSWER
+
+Although Saniel did not build any false hopes on Caffie's reply, he went
+to see him the next afternoon at the same hour.
+
+As before, he waited some time after ringing the bell. At last he heard
+a slow step within.
+
+"Who is there?" Caffie asked.
+
+As soon as Saniel answered, the door was opened.
+
+"As I do not like to be disturbed in the evening by troublesome people,
+I do not always open the door," Caffie said. "But I have a signal for my
+clients so that I may know them. After ringing, knock three times on the
+door."
+
+During this explanation they entered Caffie's office.
+
+"Have you done anything about my affair?" Saniel asked, after a moment,
+as Caffie seemed disinclined to open the conversation.
+
+"Yes, my dear sir. I have been running about all the morning for you. I
+never neglect my clients; their affairs are mine."
+
+He paused.
+
+"Well?" Saniel said.
+
+Caffie put on an expression of despair.
+
+"What did I tell you, my dear sir? Do you remember? Do me the honor
+to believe that a man of my experience does not speak lightly. What I
+foresaw has come to pass. Everywhere I received the same reply. The risk
+is too great; no one would take it."
+
+"Not even for a large interest?"
+
+"Not even for a large interest; there is so much competition in your
+profession. As for me, I believe in your future, and I have proved it by
+my proposition; but, unfortunately, I am only an intermediary, and not
+the lender of money."
+
+Caffie emphasized the words, "my proposition," and underlined them with
+a glance; but Saniel did not appear to understand.
+
+"And the upholsterer's summons?" he asked.
+
+"You may be easy on that point. I have attended to it. Your landlord, to
+whom he owes rent, will interfere, and your creditor must indemnify him
+before going farther. Will he submit? We shall see. If he does, we shall
+defend ourselves on some other ground. I do not say victoriously, but in
+a way to gain time."
+
+"How much time?"
+
+"That, my dear sir, I do not know; the whole thing depends upon our
+adversary. But what do you mean by 'how much time?'--eternity?"
+
+"I mean until April."
+
+"That is eternity. Do you believe that you will be able to free yourself
+in April? If you have expectations founded on something substantial, you
+should tell me what they are, my dear sir."
+
+This question was put with such an air of benevolence, that Saniel was
+taken in by it.
+
+"I have no guarantee," he said. "But, on the other hand, it is of the
+utmost importance to me that I should have this length of time. As I
+have explained to you, I am about to pass two examinations; they will
+last three months, and in March, or, at the latest, in April, I shall be
+a physician of the hospitals, and fellow of the Faculty. In that case
+I should then offer a surface to the lenders, that would permit you,
+without doubt, to find the sum necessary to pay Jardine, whatever
+expenses there may be, and your fee."
+
+As he spoke, Saniel saw that he was wrong in thus committing himself,
+but he continued to the end.
+
+"I should be unworthy of your confidence, my dear sir," Caffie replied,
+"if I encouraged you with the idea that we could gain so much time.
+Whatever it costs me--and it costs me much, I assure you--I must tell
+you that it is impossible, radically impossible; a few days, yes, or a
+few weeks, but that is all."
+
+"Well, obtain a few weeks," Saniel said, rising, "that will be
+something."
+
+"And afterward?"
+
+"We shall see."
+
+"My dear sir, do not go. You would not believe how much I am touched by
+your position; I think only of you. When I learned that I could not find
+the sum you desire, I paid a friendly visit to my young client of whom I
+spoke to you--"
+
+"The one who received a superior education in a fashionable convent?"
+
+"Exactly; and I asked her what she would think of a young doctor, full
+of talent, future professor of the Faculty, actually considered already
+a savant of the first order, handsome--because you are handsome, my dear
+sir, and it is no flattery to say this--in good health, a peasant by
+birth, who presented himself as a husband. She appeared flattered, I
+tell you frankly. But immediately afterward she said, 'And the child?'
+To which I replied that you were too good, too noble, too generous, not
+to have the indulgence of superior men, who accept an involuntary fault
+with serenity. Did I go too far?"
+
+He did not wait for an answer.
+
+"No?" he went on. "Exactly. The child was present, for the mother
+watches over it with a solicitude that promises much for the future, and
+I examined it leisurely. It is very delicate, my dear sir, and like its
+father. The poor baby! I doubt if you, with all your skill, can make
+it live. If it should die, as it is to be feared it will, it would not
+injure your reputation. You can give it care, but not life."
+
+"Speaking of health," interrupted Saniel, who did not wish to reply,
+"did you do what I advised about yourself?"
+
+"Not yet. The chemists of this quarter are only licensed cutthroats; but
+I am going this evening to see one of my clients who is a chemist, and
+he will deal honestly with me."
+
+"I will see you again, then."
+
+"When you wish, my dear sir; when you have reflected. You have the
+password."
+
+Before leaving home Saniel gave his key to the concierge, so that on
+her arrival Phillis might go immediately to his rooms. On his return
+the concierge told him that "madame" was up-stairs, and when he rang the
+bell, Phillis opened the door.
+
+"Well?" she asked in a trembling voice, before he had time to enter.
+
+"It is as I told you yesterday; he has found no one."
+
+She clasped him in a long, passionate embrace.
+
+"And the upholsterer?"
+
+"Caffie has promised to gain some time for me."
+
+While speaking, they entered the office. A fire burned on the hearth,
+and an inviting dinner was on the table. Saniel looked at it in
+surprise.
+
+"I have set the table, you see; I am going to dine with you."
+
+And throwing herself in his arms:
+
+"Knowing Caffie better than you do, I knew what his answer would be, and
+I did not wish you to be alone on your return. I made an excuse for not
+dining with mamma."
+
+"But this chicken?"
+
+"We must have a piece de resistance."
+
+"This fire, and these candles?"
+
+"There, that is the end of my economies. I should have been so happy if
+they had been less miserable and more useful."
+
+As on the previous evening, they sat before the fire, and she began to
+talk of various things in order to distract him. But what their lips
+did not say, their eyes, on meeting, expressed with more intensity than
+words could do.
+
+It was Saniel who suddenly betrayed his preoccupation.
+
+"Your brother studied Caffie well," he said, as if speaking to himself.
+
+"He did, indeed!"
+
+"He is certainly the most thorough rascal that I have ever met."
+
+"He proposed something infamous, I am sure."
+
+"He proposed that I should marry."
+
+"I suspected that."
+
+"This is the reason why he refuses to lend me the money. I was foolish
+enough to tell him frankly just how I am situated, and how important
+it is for me to be free until April. He hopes that I shall be so pushed
+that I will accept one of the women whom he has proposed to me. With the
+knife at my throat, I should have to yield."
+
+"And these women?" she asked, not daring to look at him.
+
+"Do not be alarmed, you have nothing to fear. One is the drunken widow
+of a butcher, and the other is a young girl who has a baby."
+
+"He dares to propose such women to a man like you!"
+
+And Saniel repeated all that Caffie had said to him about these two
+women.
+
+"What a monster he is!" Phillis said.
+
+"While he was telling me these things I thought of what you said--that
+if some one killed him, it would be no more than he deserved."
+
+"That is perfectly true."
+
+"Nothing would have been easier than for me to have made away with him.
+He had the toothache, and when he showed me his teeth I could easily
+have strangled him. We were alone, and a miserable diabetic, such as he
+is, who has not more than six months to live, I am sure, could not have
+resisted a grasp like this. I could take his keys from his pocket, open
+his safe, and take the thirty, forty, sixty thousand francs that I saw
+heaped up there. The devil take me if it were ever discovered. A
+doctor does not strangle his patients, he poisons them. He kills them
+scientifically, not brutally."
+
+"People who have no conscience can do such things; but for us they are
+impossible."
+
+"I assure you it is not conscience that would have restrained me."
+
+"The fear of remorse, if I may use an ugly word."
+
+"But intelligent persons have no remorse, my dear child, because they
+reason before the deed, and not after. Before acting they weigh the pros
+and cons, and know what the consequences of their actions will be to
+others as well as to themselves. If this previous examination proves
+to them that for some reason or other they may act, they will always be
+calm, assured that they will feel no remorse, which is only the reproach
+of conscience."
+
+"Without doubt what you say is to the point, but it is impossible for
+me to accept it. If I have never committed crimes, I have often been
+foolish and have committed faults, many of them deliberately, after the
+examination of which you speak. I should have been, according to you,
+perfectly placid and free from the reproach of conscience; however, the
+next morning I woke unhappy, tormented, often overwhelmed, and unable to
+stifle the mysterious voice that accused me."
+
+"And in whose name did it speak, this voice, more vague than
+mysterious?"
+
+"In the name of my conscience, evidently."
+
+"'Evidently' is too much, and you would be puzzled if called upon
+to demonstrate this evidence; whereas, nothing is more uncertain and
+elusive than the thing that is called conscience, which is in reality
+only an affair of environment and of education."
+
+"I do not understand."
+
+"Does your conscience tell you it is a crime to love me?"
+
+"No, decidedly."
+
+"You see, then, that you have a personal way of understanding what is
+good and bad, which is not that of our country, where it is admitted,
+from the religious and from the social point of view, that a young
+girl is guilty when she has a lover. Of course, you see, also, that
+conscience is a bad weighing-machine, since each one, in order to make
+it work, uses a weight that he has himself manufactured."
+
+"However it is, you did right not to strangle Cafflie."
+
+"Whom you, yourself, have condemned to death."
+
+"By the hand of justice, whether human or divine; but not by yours, any
+more than by Florentin's or mine, although we know better than any one
+that he does not deserve any mercy."
+
+"And you see I foresaw your objections, as I did not tighten his
+cravat."
+
+"Happily."
+
+"Is it necessary to say 'happily'?"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X. SANIEL MAKES A RESOLUTION
+
+This evening Phillis was obliged to be at home early, but she cleared
+off the table, and put everything in order before leaving.
+
+"You can breakfast on the remains of the chicken," she said, as she put
+it in the pantry.
+
+And as Saniel accompanied her with a candle in his hand, he saw that
+she had thought not only of his breakfast for the following day, but for
+many days, besides carrots for the rabbits.
+
+"What a good heart you have!" he said.
+
+"Because I think of the rabbits?"
+
+"Because of your tenderness and thoughtfulness."
+
+"I wish I could do something for you!"
+
+As soon as she was gone he seated himself at his desk and began to work,
+anxious to make up for the time that he had given to sentiment. The fact
+that his work might not be of use to him, and that his experiments
+might be rudely interrupted the next morning or in a few days, was not a
+sufficient reason for being idle. He had work to do, and he worked as
+if with the certitude that he would pass his examinations, and that
+his experiments of four years past would have a good ending, without
+interference from any one.
+
+This was his strong point, this power to work, that was never disturbed
+or weakened by anything; not by pleasure or pain, by preoccupation or by
+misery. In the street he could think of Phillis, be he hungry or sleepy;
+at his desk he had no thought of Phillis, neither of hunger nor of
+sleep, no cares, no memories; his work occupied him entirely.
+
+It was his strength, and also his pride, the only superiority of which
+he boasted; for although he knew that he had others, he never spoke of
+them, while he often said to his comrades:
+
+"I work when I will and as much as I wish. My will never weakens when I
+am at work."
+
+This evening he worked for about an hour, in his usual condition of
+mind; neither sheriffs, nor Jardine, nor Caffie troubled him. But having
+to draw upon his memory for certain facts, he found that it did not
+obey him as usual; there were a hesitation, a fogginess, above all,
+extraordinary wanderings. He wrestled with it and it obeyed, but only
+for a short time, and soon again it betrayed him a second time, then a
+third and fourth time.
+
+Decidedly he was not in a normal state, and his will obeyed in place of
+commanding.
+
+There were a name and a phrase that recurred to him mechanically from
+time to time. The name was Caffie, and the phrase was, "Nothing easier."
+
+Why should this hypothesis to strangle Caffie, of which he had lightly
+spoken, and to which he had attached no importance at the moment when he
+uttered it, return to him in this way as a sort of obsession?
+
+Was it not strange?
+
+Never, until this day, had he had an idea that he could strangle a man,
+even as wicked as this one, and yet, in talking of it, he found very
+natural and legitimate reasons for the murder of this scamp.
+
+Had not Phillis herself condemned him?
+
+To tell the truth, she had added that Providence or justice should be
+his executor, but this was the scruple of a simple conscience, formed in
+a narrow environment, to which influence he would not submit.
+
+Had he these scruples, this old man who coldly, and merely for the
+interest of so much a hundred on a dot, advised him to hasten the death
+of a woman by drunkenness, and that of an infant in any way he pleased?
+
+When he reached this conclusion he stopped, and asked himself whether he
+were mad to pursue this idea; then immediately, to get rid of it, he set
+to work, which absorbed him for a certain time, but not so long a time
+as at first.
+
+Then, finding that he could not control his will, he turned his thoughts
+to Caffie.
+
+It was only too evident that if he had carried out the idea of
+strangling Caffie, all the difficulties against which he had struggled,
+and which would overwhelm him, if not the following day, at least in a
+few days, would have disappeared immediately.
+
+No more sheriffs, no more creditors. What a deliverance!
+
+Repose, the possibility of passing examinations with a calm spirit that
+the fever of material troubles would not disturb--in this condition he
+felt his success was assured.
+
+And his experiments! He would run no danger of seeing them rudely
+interrupted. His preparations were not cast out-of-doors; his precious
+culture-tubes were not broken; his vases, his balloons, were not at the
+second-hand dealer's. He continued this train of thought to the results
+that he desired for him, glory; for humanity, the cure of one, and
+perhaps two, of the most terrible maladies with which it was afflicted.
+
+The question was simple:
+
+On one side, Caffie;
+
+On the other side, humanity and science;
+
+An old rascal who deserved twenty deaths, and who would, anyhow, die
+naturally in a short time;
+
+And humanity, science, which would profit by a discovery of which he
+would be the author.
+
+He saw that the perspiration stood out on his hands, and he felt it run
+down his neck.
+
+Why this weakness? From horror of the crime, the possibility of which he
+admitted? Or from fear of seeing his experiments destroyed?
+
+He would reflect, think about it, be upon his guard.
+
+He had told Phillis that intelligent men, before engaging in an action,
+weigh the pro and con.
+
+Against Caffie's death he saw nothing.
+
+For, on the contrary, everything combined.
+
+If he had had Phillis's scruples, or Brigard's beliefs, he would have
+stopped.
+
+But, not having them, would he not be silly to draw back?
+
+Before what should he shrink? Why should he stop?
+
+Remorse? But he was convinced that intelligent men had no remorse when
+they came to a decision on good grounds. It was before that they felt
+remorse, not after; and he was exactly in this period of before.
+
+Fear of being arrested? But intelligent men do not let themselves be
+arrested. Those who are lost are brutes who go straight ahead, or
+the half-intelligent, who use their skill and cunning to combine a
+complicated or romantic act, in which their hand is plainly seen. As for
+him, he was a man of science and precision, and he would not compromise
+himself by act or sentiment; there would be nothing to fear during the
+action, and nothing afterward. Caffie strangled, suspicion would not
+fall upon a doctor, but on a brute. When doctors wish to kill any one,
+they do it learnedly, by poison or by some scientific method. Brutal men
+kill brutally; murder, called the assassin's profession.
+
+A few minutes before, he was inundated by perspiration; this word froze
+him.
+
+He rose nervously, and walked up and down the room with long, unsteady
+steps. The fire had long since gone out; out-of-doors the street noises
+had ceased, and in his brain resounded the one word that he pronounced
+in a low tone, "Assassin!"
+
+Was he the man to be influenced and stopped by a word? Where are the
+rich, the self-made men, the successful men, who have not left some
+corpses on the road behind them? Success carries them safely, and they
+achieved success only because they had force.
+
+Certainly, violence was not recreation, and it would be more agreeable
+to go in his way peacefully, by the power of intelligence and work, than
+to make a way by blows; but he had not chosen this road, he was thrown
+into it by circumstances, by fate, and whoever wishes to reach the end
+cannot choose the means. If one must walk in the mud, what matters it,
+when one knows that one will not get muddy?
+
+If Caffie had had heirs, poor people who expected to be saved from
+misery by inheriting his fortune, he would have been touched by this
+consideration, undoubtedly. Robber! The word was yet more vile than that
+of assassin. But who would miss the few banknotes that he would take
+from the safe? To steal is to injure some one. Whom would he injure?
+He could see no one. But he saw distinctly an army of afflicted persons
+whom he would benefit.
+
+A timid ring of the bell made him start violently, and he was angry with
+himself for being so nervous, he who was always master of his mind as of
+his body.
+
+He opened the door, and a man dressed like a laborer bowed humbly.
+
+"I beg your pardon for disturbing you, sir."
+
+"What do you want?"
+
+"I called on account of my wife, if you will be so good as to come to
+see her."
+
+"What is the matter with her?"
+
+"She is about to be confined. The nurse does not know what to do, and
+sent me for a doctor."
+
+"Did the nurse tell you to come for me?"
+
+"No, sir; she sent me to Doctor Legrand."
+
+"Well?"
+
+"His wife told me he could not get up on account of his bronchitis. And
+the chemist gave me your address."
+
+"That is right."
+
+"I must tell you, sir, I am an honest man, but we are not rich; we could
+not pay you--immediately."
+
+"I understand. Wait a few minutes."
+
+Saniel took his instruments and followed the laborer, who, on the way,
+explained his wife's condition.
+
+"Where are we going?" Saniel asked, interrupting these explanations.
+
+"Rue de la Corderie."
+
+It was behind the Saint Honore' market, on the sixth floor, under the
+roof, in a room that was perfectly clean, in spite of its poverty. As
+soon as Saniel entered the nurse came forward, and in a few words told
+him the woman's trouble.
+
+"Is the child living?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"That is well; let us see."
+
+He approached the bed and made a careful examination of the patient, who
+kept repeating:
+
+"I am going to die. Save me, doctor!"
+
+"Certainly, we shall save you," he said, very softly. "I promise you."
+
+He turned away from the bed and said to the nurse:
+
+"The only way to save the mother is to kill the child."
+
+The operation was long, difficult, and painful, and after it was over
+Saniel remained a long time with the patient. When he reached the street
+a neighboring clock struck five, and the market-place had already begun
+to show signs of life.
+
+But in the streets was still the silence and solitude of night, and
+Saniel began to reflect on what had occurred during the last few hours.
+Thus, he had not hesitated to kill this child, who had, perhaps, sixty
+or seventy years of happy life before it, and he hesitated at the death
+of Caffie, to whom remained only a miserable existence of a few weeks.
+The interests of a poor, weak, stunted woman had decided him; his, those
+of humanity, left him perplexed, irresolute, weak, and cowardly. What a
+contradiction!
+
+He walked with his eyes lowered, and at this moment, before him on the
+pavement, he saw an object that glittered in the glare of the gas. He
+approached it, and found that it was a butcher's knife, that must have
+been lost, either on going to the market or the slaughterhouse.
+
+He hesitated a moment whether he should pick it up or leave it there;
+then looking all about him, and seeing no one in the deserted street,
+and hearing no sound of footsteps in the silence, he bent quickly and
+took it.
+
+Caffie's fate was decided.
+
+
+
+
+BOOK 2.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI. THE INSTRUMENT OF DEATH
+
+When, after two hours' sleep, Saniel woke, he did not at first think of
+this knife; he was tired and dull. Mechanically he walked about his room
+without paying attention to what he was doing, as if he were in a state
+of somnambulism, and it astonished him, because he never felt weariness
+of mind any more than of body, no matter how little he had slept, nor
+how hard he had worked.
+
+But suddenly, catching a glimpse of the knife that he had placed on the
+mantel, he received a shock that annihilated his torpor and his fatigue.
+It dazzled him like a flash of lightning.
+
+He took it, and, going to the window, he examined it by the pale light
+of early morning. It was a strong instrument that, in a firm hand, would
+be a terrible arm; newly sharpened, it had the edge of a razor.
+
+Then the idea, the vision that had come to him two hours before, came
+back to him, clear and complete at nightfall, that is, at the moment
+when the concierge was in the second wing of the building, he mounted
+to Caffie's apartment without being seen, and with this knife he cut his
+throat. It was as simple as it was easy, and this knife left beside the
+corpse, and the nature of the wound, would lead the police to look for a
+butcher, or at least a man who was in the habit of using a knife of this
+kind.
+
+The evening before, when he had discussed Caffie's death, the how and
+the when still remained vague and uncertain. But now the day and the
+means were definitely settled: it should be with this knife, and this
+evening.
+
+This shook him out of his torpor and made him shudder.
+
+He was angry with himself for this weakness. Did he know or did he not
+know what he wished? Was he irresolute or cowardly?
+
+Then, going from one idea to another, he thought of an observation that
+he had made, which appeared to prove that with many subjects there is
+less firmness in the morning than in the evening. Was this the result
+of dualism of the nervous centres, and was the human personality double
+like the brain? Were there hours when the right hemisphere is master of
+our will, and were there other hours when the left is master? Did one of
+these hemispheres possess what the other lacked, and is it according to
+the activity of this or that one, that one has such a character or such
+a temperament? This would be curious, and would amount to saying that, a
+lamb in the morning, one might be a tiger at evening. With him it was a
+lamb that woke in the morning to be devoured by a tiger during the
+day. To which hemisphere belonged the one and the other of these
+personalities?
+
+He was angry with himself for yielding to these reflections; it was a
+time, truly, to study this psychological question! It was of Caffie that
+he should think, and of the plan which in an instant flashed through his
+mind in the street, before he decided to pick up this knife.
+
+Evidently things were neither so simple nor so easy as they at first
+appeared, and to insure the success of his plan a combination of
+circumstances was necessary, which might be difficult to bring about.
+
+Would not the concierge see him pass? Would no one go up or down the
+stairs? Would Caffie be alone? Would he open the door? Might not some
+one ring after he had entered?
+
+Here was a series of questions that he had not thought of before, but
+which now presented itself.
+
+He must examine them, weigh them, and not throw himself giddily into an
+adventure that presented such risks.
+
+He was alone all day, fortunately, and, as in the state of agitation in
+which he found himself he could not think of work, he gave himself up to
+this examination. The stakes were worth the trouble--his honor and his
+life.
+
+As soon as he was dressed he went out, and walked straight before him
+through the streets that were already filled with people.
+
+It was only when he had left the heart of Paris that he could reflect
+as he wished, without being disturbed each instant by people in a hurry,
+for whom he must make way, or by others who, reading the newspapers, did
+not look before them, and so jostled against him.
+
+Evidently the risks were more serious than he had imagined; and, as
+they loomed up before him, he asked himself whether he should go on. To
+suppress Caffie, yes; to give himself up, no.
+
+"If it is impossible--"
+
+He was not the man to set himself wildly against the impossible: he
+should have had a dream, a bad dream, and that would be all.
+
+He stopped, and, after a moment of hesitation, turning on his heel, he
+retraced his steps. Of what use was it to go farther? He had no need
+to reflect nor to weigh the pro and con; he must give up this plan;
+decidedly it was too dangerous.
+
+He had gone but a short distance when he asked himself whether these
+dangers were such as he saw them, and whether he were face to face with
+a radically demonstrated impossibility.
+
+Without doubt, the concierge might observe him when he passed her lodge,
+either on going up-stairs or coming down; and, also, she might not
+observe him. This, in reality, depended much upon himself, and on his
+method of proceeding.
+
+Every evening this lame old concierge lighted the gas in the two wings
+of the building, one on the street and one on the court. She began by
+lighting that on the street, and, with the difficulty that she found in
+walking, it should take her some time to climb the five stories and
+to descend. If one watched from the street when, at dusk, she left her
+lodge with a wax taper in her hand, and mounted the stairs behind her,
+at a little distance, in such a way as to be on the landing of the first
+story when she should reach the second, there would be time, the deed
+done, to regain the street before she returned to her lodge, after
+having lighted the gas on the two staircases. It was important to
+proceed methodically, without hurry, but, also, without loitering.
+
+Was this impossible?
+
+Here, exactly, was the delicate point which he must examine with
+composure, without permitting himself to be influenced by any other
+consideration than that which sprang from the deed itself.
+
+He was wrong, then, not to continue his route, and it was better,
+assuredly, to get out of Paris. In the country, in the fields or woods,
+he could find the calm that was indispensable to his over-excited brain,
+in which ideas clashed like the waves of a disturbed sea.
+
+He was at this moment in the middle of the Faubourg Saint Honore; he
+followed a street that would bring him to the Champs Elysees, a desert
+at this early hour.
+
+It took him some time to examine all the hypotheses that might present
+themselves, and he reached the conclusion that what had appeared
+impossible to him was not so. If he preserved his calmness, and did
+not lose perception of the passing time, he could very well escape the
+concierge, which was the main point.
+
+To tell the truth, the danger of the concierge removed, all was not
+easy. There was the possibility of meeting one of the lodgers on the
+stairs; there was a chance of not finding Caffie at home, or, at least,
+not alone; or the bell might ring at the decisive moment. But, as
+everything depended upon chance, these circumstances could not be
+decided beforehand. It was a risk. If one of them happened, he would
+wait until the next day; it would be one more day of agitation to live
+through.
+
+But one question that should be decided in advance, because, surely, it
+presented serious dangers, was how he should justify the coming into his
+hands of a sum of money which, providentially and in the nick of time,
+relieved him from the embarrassments against which he struggled.
+
+He had reached the Bois de Boulogne and still continued his walk. In
+passing a fountain the rippling of the water attracted his attention,
+and he stopped. Although the weather was damp and cold under the
+influence of a strong west wind charged with rain, his tongue was dry;
+he drank two goblets of water, and then pursued his way, indifferent
+where he went.
+
+Then he built up an arrangement which appeared ingenious to him, when it
+occurred to him to remember that he had gone to Caffie to borrow three
+thousand francs. Why would he not lend it to him, if not the first
+day, at least the second? With this loan he paid his debts, if he were
+questioned on this point. To prove this loan he need only to sign a
+receipt which he could place in the safe, and which would be found
+there. Would not the first thought of those who had signed a paper of
+this kind be to take it when an occasion presented itself? As he would
+not seize this occasion to carry off his note, it would be the proof
+that he had not opened the safe.
+
+Among other advantages, this arrangement did away with robbery; it
+was only a loan. Later he would return these three thousand francs to
+Caffies heirs. So much the worse for him if it were a forced loan.
+
+On returning to Paris he would buy a sheet of stamped paper, and as he
+had asked the price the previous evening, he knew that he could afford
+the expense.
+
+When he reached Saint Cloud he entered a tavern and ordered some bread
+and cheese and wine. But if he drank little, he ate less, his parched
+throat refusing to swallow bread.
+
+He took up his march in the clayey streets on the slope of Mont
+Valerian, but he was insensible to the unpleasantness of slipping on the
+soft soil, and walked hither and thither, his only care being not to get
+too far away from the Seine, so that he might enter Paris before night.
+
+He was delighted since he had made up his mind to make out and sign
+a receipt for the money. But on giving it further consideration, he
+perceived that it was not so ingenious as he had at first supposed. Do
+not the dealers of stamped paper often number their paper? With this
+number it would be easy to find the dealer and him who had bought it.
+And then, was it not likely that a scrupulous business man like Caffie
+would keep a record of the loans he made, and would not the absence of
+this one and the note be sufficient to awaken suspicion and to direct it
+to him?
+
+Decidedly, he only escaped one danger to fall into another.
+
+For a moment he was discouraged, but it did not go so far as weakness.
+His error had been in imagining that the execution of the idea that had
+come to him while picking up the knife was as plain as it was easy. But
+complicated and perilous as it was, it was not impossible.
+
+The question which finally stood before him was, to know whether he
+possessed the force needed to cope with these dangers, and on this
+ground hesitation was not possible; to wish to foresee everything was
+folly; that which he would not have expected, would come to pass.
+
+He returned toward Paris, and by the Pont de Suresnes reentered the Bois
+de Boulogne. As it was not yet three o'clock, he had plenty of time to
+reach the Rue Sainte-Anne before night; but, on the way, a heavy shower
+forced him to take shelter, and he watched the falling rain, asking
+himself if this accident, which he had not foreseen, would not upset his
+plan. A man who had received the force of this shower could not appear
+in the street before Caffie's door without attracting the attention of
+the passers-by, and it was important for him that he should not attract
+the attention of any one.
+
+At length the rain ceased, and at twenty minutes of five he reached his
+home. There remained fifteen or twenty minutes of daylight, which was
+more than he needed.
+
+He stuck the point of the knife in a cork, and, after having placed it
+between the folded leaves of a newspaper, in the inside left-hand pocket
+of his overcoat, he went out.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII. THE CRUCIAL MOMENT
+
+When he reached Caffies door the night had scarcely fallen, and the
+streets were not yet lighted.
+
+The better and the surest plan for him had been to wait in the
+'porte-cochere' across the street; from there he could watch the
+'concierge', who would not be able to go out without being seen by him.
+But though the passers were few at this moment, they might have observed
+him. Next to this 'porte-cochere' was a small 'cafe', whose brilliant
+lights would cause him to be seen quite plainly. He, therefore, walked
+on, but soon returned.
+
+All irresolution, all hesitation, had disappeared, and the only point on
+which he still questioned himself bore upon the state in which he found
+himself at this moment. He felt himself firm, and his pulse, he
+was certain, beat regularly. He was as he had imagined he would be;
+experience confirmed his foresight; his hand would tremble no more than
+his will.
+
+As he passed before the house he saw the concierge come slowly out of
+her lodge and close her door carefully, putting the key in her pocket.
+In her left hand she held something white that he could not see
+distinctly in the twilight, but it was probably the wax-taper which,
+doubtless, she had not lighted for fear the wind would blow it out.
+
+This was a favorable circumstance, that gave him one or two minutes more
+than he had counted on, for she would be obliged to strike a match on
+the stairs to light her taper; and, in the execution of his plan, two
+minutes, a single minute even, might be of great importance.
+
+With dragging steps and bent back she disappeared through the vestibule
+of the stairway. Then Saniel continued his walk like an ordinary
+passer-by until she had time to reach the first story; then, turning,
+he returned to the porte-cochere and entered quietly. By the gaslight
+in the vestibule he saw by his watch, which he held in his hand, that
+it was fourteen minutes after five o'clock. Then, if his calculation
+was right, at twenty-four or twenty-five minutes after five he must pass
+before the lodge, which should still be empty at that moment.
+
+On the staircase above him he heard the heavy step of the concierge; she
+had lighted the gas on the first story, and continued on her way slowly.
+With rapid but light steps he mounted behind her, and, on reaching
+Caffie's door, he rang the bell, taking care not to ring too loudly or
+too timidly; then he knocked three times, as Caffie had instructed him.
+
+Was Caffie alone?
+
+Up to this time all had gone as he wished; no one in the vestibule, no
+one on the stairs; fate was in his favor; would it accompany him to the
+end?
+
+While he waited at the door, asking himself this question, an idea
+flashed into his mind. He would make a last attempt. If Caffie consented
+to make the loan he would save himself; if he refused, he condemned
+himself.
+
+After several seconds, that appeared like hours, his listening ears
+perceived a sound which announced that Caffie was at home. A scratching
+of wood on the tiled floor denoted that a chair had been pushed aside;
+heavy, dragging steps approached, then the bolt creaked, and the door
+was opened cautiously.
+
+"Ah! It is you, my dear sir!" Caffie said, in surprise.
+
+Saniel entered briskly and closed the door himself, pressing it firmly.
+
+"Is there anything new?" Caffie asked, as he led the way to his office.
+
+"No," Saniel replied.
+
+"Well, then?" Caffie asked, as he seated himself in an armchair before
+his desk, on which stood a lighted lamp. "I suppose you have come to
+hear more about my young friend. This hurry augurs well."
+
+"No, it is not of the young person that I wish to talk to you."
+
+"I am sorry."
+
+On seating himself opposite to Caffie, Saniel had taken out his watch.
+Two minutes had passed since he left the vestibule; he must hurry. In
+order to keep himself informed of the passing of time, he retained his
+watch in his hand.
+
+"Are you in a hurry?"
+
+"Yes; I will come immediately to business. It concerns myself, my
+position, and I make a last appeal to you. Let us be honest with each
+other. Undoubtedly you think that, pushed by my distress, and seeing
+that I shall be lost forever, I shall decide to accept this marriage to
+save myself."
+
+"Can you suppose such a thing, my dear sir?" Caffie cried.
+
+But Saniel stopped him....
+
+"The calculation is too natural for you not to have made it. Well,
+I must tell you that it is false. Never will I lend myself to such a
+bargain. Renounce your project, and let us discuss my demand. I am in
+absolute want of three thousand francs, and I will pay the interest that
+you fix upon."
+
+"I have not found a money-lender, my dear sir. I have taken a great deal
+of trouble, I assure you, but I did not succeed."
+
+"Make an effort yourself."
+
+"Me? My dear sir!"
+
+"I address myself to you."
+
+"But I have no ready money."
+
+"It is a desperate appeal that I make. I understand that your long
+experience in business makes you insensible to the misery that you see
+every day--"
+
+"Insensible! Say that it breaks my heart, my dear sir."
+
+"But will you not permit yourself to be touched by the misery of a man
+who is young, intelligent, courageous, who will drown if a hand is not
+held out to help him? For you, the assistance that I ask so earnestly is
+nothing--"
+
+"Three thousand francs! Nothing! Bless me! How you talk!"
+
+"For me, if you refuse me, it is death."
+
+Saniel began to speak with his eyes fixed on the hands of his watch, but
+presently, carried away by the fever of the situation, he raised them to
+look at Caffie, and to see the effect that he produced on him. In this
+movement he made a discovery that destroyed all his calculations.
+
+Caffie's office was a small room with a high window looking into the
+court; never having been in this office except in the evening, he had
+not observed that this window had neither shutters nor curtains of
+muslin or of heavier stuff; there was nothing but the glass. To tell the
+truth, two heavy curtains of woollen damask hung on either side of
+the window, but they were not drawn. Talking to Caffie, who was placed
+between him and this window, Saniel suddenly perceived that on the other
+side of the court, in the second wing of the building, on the second
+story, were two lighted windows directly opposite to the office, and
+that from there any one could see everything that occurred in the
+office.
+
+How should he execute his plan under the eyes of these people whom he
+saw coming and going in this room? He would be lost. In any case, it was
+risking an adventure so hazardous that he would be a fool to attempt it,
+and he was not that; never had he felt himself so much the master of his
+mind and nerves.
+
+Also, it was not only to save Caffie's life that he argued, it was to
+save himself in grasping this loan.
+
+"I can only, to my great regret, repeat to you what I have already said,
+my dear sir. I have no ready money."
+
+And he held his jaw, groaning, as if this refusal aroused his toothache.
+
+Saniel rose; evidently there was nothing for him to do but to go. It was
+finished, and instead of being in despair he felt it as a relief.
+
+But, as he was about to leave the room, an idea flashed through his
+mind.
+
+He looked at his watch, which he had not consulted for some time; it was
+twenty minutes after five; there yet remained four minutes, five at the
+most.
+
+"Why do you not draw these curtains?" he said. "I am sure your
+sufferings are partly caused by the wind that comes in this window."
+
+"Do you think so?"
+
+"I am sure of it; you should be warm about the head, and avoid currents
+of air."
+
+Passing behind Caffie, he went to the window to draw the curtains, but
+the cords would not move.
+
+"It is years since they were drawn," Caffie said. "Doubtless the cords
+are entangled. I will bring the light."
+
+And, taking the lamp, he went to the window, holding it high in order to
+throw light on the cords.
+
+With a turn of the hand Saniel disentangled the cords, and the curtains
+slid on the rods, almost covering the window.
+
+"It is true a good deal of air did come in the window," Caffie said. "I
+thank you, my dear doctor."
+
+All this was done with a feverish rapidity that astonished Caffie.
+
+"Decidedly, you are in a hurry," he said.
+
+"Yes, in a great hurry."
+
+He looked at his watch.
+
+"However, I have still time to give you a consultation if you desire
+it."
+
+"I would not trouble you--"
+
+"You do not trouble me."
+
+"But--"
+
+"Sit down in your armchair, and show me your mouth."
+
+While Caffie seated himself, Saniel continued in a vibrating voice:
+
+"You see I give good for evil."
+
+"How is that, my dear sir?"
+
+"You refuse me a service that would save me, and I give you a
+consultation. It is true, it is the last."
+
+"And why the last, my dear sir?"
+
+"Because death is between us."
+
+"Death!"
+
+"Do you not see it?"
+
+"No."
+
+"I see it."
+
+"You must not think of such a thing, my dear sir. One does not die
+because one cannot pay three thousand francs."
+
+The chair in which Caffie seated himself was an old Voltaire, with an
+inclined back, and he half reclined in it. As his shirtcollar was
+too large for him since he had become thin, and his narrow cravat was
+scarcely tied, he displayed as much throat as jaw.
+
+Saniel, behind the chair, had taken the knife in his right hand, while
+he pressed the left heavily on Caffies forehead, and with a powerful
+stroke, as quick as lightning, he cut the larynx under the glottis,
+as well as the two carotid arteries, with the jugular veins. From this
+terrible wound sprang a large jet of blood, which, crossing the room,
+struck against the door. Cut clean, not a cry could be formed in the
+windpipe, and in his armchair Caffie shook with convulsions from head to
+foot.
+
+Leaving his position behind the chair, Saniel, who had thrown the
+knife on the floor, looked at his watch and counted the ticking of the
+second-hand in a low voice.
+
+"One, two, three-"
+
+At the end of ninety seconds the convulsions ceased.
+
+It was twenty-three minutes after five. Now it was important that he
+should hurry and not lose a second.
+
+The blood, after having gushed out, had run down the body and wet the
+vest pocket in which was the key of the safe. But blood does not produce
+the same effect upon a doctor as upon those who are not accustomed to
+its sight and odor, and to its touch. In spite of the lukewarm sea in
+which it lay, Saniel took the key, and after wiping his hand on one of
+the tails of Caffie's coat, he placed it in the lock.
+
+Would it turn freely, or was it closed with a combination? The question
+was poignant. The key turned and the door opened. On a shelf and in a
+wooden bowl were packages of bank-notes and rolls of gold that he had
+seen the evening when the bank-clerk came. Roughly, without counting; he
+thrust them into his pocket, and without closing the safe, he ran to the
+front door, taking care not to step in the streams of blood, which, on
+the sloping tiled floor, ran toward this door. The time was short.
+
+And now was the greatest danger, that of meeting some one behind this
+door, or on the stairs. He listened, and heard no noise. He went out,
+and no one was to be seen. Without running, but hastily, he descended
+the stairs. Should he look in the lodge, or should he turn his head
+away? He looked, but the concierge was not there.
+
+A second later he was in the street mingling with the passersby, and he
+drew a long breath.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII. DISTRACTION
+
+There was no longer any need to be cautious, to listen, to stretch his
+nerves, to restrain his heart; he could walk freely and reflect.
+
+His first thought was to endeavor to explain to himself how he felt, and
+he found that it was an immense relief; something, doubtless, analogous
+to the returning to life after being in a state of asphyxiation.
+Physically, he was calm; morally, he felt no remorse. He was right,
+therefore, in his theory when he told Phillis that in the intelligent
+man remorse precedes the action, instead of following it.
+
+But where he was mistaken was in imagining that during the act he should
+maintain his coolness and force, which, in reality, had failed him
+completely.
+
+Going from one idea to another, tossed by irresolution, he was by no
+means the strong man that he had believed himself: one to go to the
+end unmoved, ready to face every attack; master of his nerves as of his
+will, in full possession of all his powers. On the contrary, he had been
+the plaything of agitation and weakness. If a serious danger had risen.
+before him, he would not have known on which side to attack it; fear
+would have paralyzed him, and he would have been lost.
+
+To tell the truth, his hand had been firm, but his head had been
+bewildered.
+
+There was something humiliating in this, he was obliged to acknowledge;
+and, what was more serious, it was alarming. Because, although
+everything had gone as he wished, up to the present time, all was not
+finished, nor even begun.
+
+If the investigations of the law should reach him, how should he defend
+himself?
+
+He felt sure that he had not been seen in Caffies house at the moment
+when the crime was committed; but does one ever know whether one has
+been seen or not?
+
+And there was the production of money that he should use to pay his
+debts, which might become an accusation against which it would be
+difficult to defend himself. In any case, he must be ready to explain
+his position. And what might complicate the matter was, that Caffie,
+a careful man, had probably taken care to write the numbers of his
+bank-notes in a book, which would be found.
+
+On leaving the Rue Sainte-Anne he took the Rue Neuve-des-Petits-Champs
+to his home, to leave the bank-notes and to wash off the stains of blood
+that might have splashed on him and his hands, particularly the right
+one, which was still red. But suddenly it occurred to him that he might
+be followed, and it would be folly to show where he lived. He hastened
+his steps, in order to make any one who might be following him run,
+and took the streets that were not well lighted, those where there was
+little chance of any one seeing the stains, if they were visible, on
+his clothing or boots. He walked in this way for nearly half an hour,
+turning and returning on his track, and after having crossed the Place
+Vendome twice, where he was able to look behind him, he decided to go
+home, not knowing whether he should be satisfied to have bewildered all
+quest, or whether he should not be furious to have yielded to a sort of
+panic.
+
+As he passed by the lodge without stopping, his concierge called him,
+and, running out, gave him a letter with unusual eagerness. Saniel, who
+wished to escape observation, took it hastily, and stuffed it into his
+pocket.
+
+"It is an important letter," the concierge said. "The servant who
+brought it told me that it contained money."
+
+It needed this recommendation at such a moment, or Saniel would not have
+opened it, which he did as soon as he entered his rooms.
+
+   "I do not wish, my dear Doctor, to leave Paris for Monaco, where I
+   go to pass two or three months, without sending you our thanks.
+
+               "Yours very gratefully,
+
+                    "C. DUPHOT."
+
+These thanks were represented by two bills of one hundred francs, a
+payment more than sufficient for the care that Saniel had given some
+months before to the mistress of this old comrade. Of what use now were
+these two hundred francs, which a few days sooner would have been so
+much to him? He threw them on his desk; and then, after having lighted
+two candles, he inspected his clothing.
+
+The precaution that he had taken to place himself behind the chair was
+wise. The blood, in squirting in front and on each side, had not
+reached him; only the hand that held the knife and the shirt-sleeve were
+splashed, but this was of no consequence. A doctor has the right to have
+some blood on his sleeves, and this shirt went to join the one he had
+worn the previous night when attending the sick woman.
+
+Free from this care, he still had the money in his pockets. He emptied
+them on his desk and counted all: five rouleaux of gold, of a thousand
+francs, and three packages of ten thousand francs each, of bank-notes.
+
+How should he get rid of this sum all at once, and, later, how should he
+justify its production when the moment came, if it came?
+
+The question was complex, and, unfortunately for him, he was hardly in a
+state to consider it calmly.
+
+For the gold, he had only to burn the papers in which it was rolled.
+Louis have neither numbers nor particular marks, but bills have. Where
+should he conceal them while waiting to learn through the newspapers if
+Caffie had or had not made a note of these numbers?
+
+While burning these papers on which Caffie had written "2,000 francs,"
+he tried to think of a place of concealment.
+
+As he threw a glance around him, asking from things the inspiration that
+his brain did not furnish, he caught sight of the letter he had just
+received, and it suggested an idea. Duphot was at Monaco to play. Why
+should he not go also, and play?
+
+Having neither relatives nor friends from whom he could procure a
+certain sum, his only resource was to make it at play; and in his
+desperate position, known to every one, nothing was more natural than
+this experiment. He had received two hundred francs, which would not
+save him from his creditors. He would risk them at roulette at Monaco.
+Whether he lost or won was of little consequence. He would have played
+that would be sufficient. He would be seen playing. Who would know
+whether he lost or won? From Monaco he would pay Jardine by telegraph,
+out of the five thousand Louis, which would be more than sufficient for
+that; and, when he returned to Paris, he would free himself from his
+other creditors with what remained.
+
+The money affair decided--and it seemed to him cleverly settled--did
+not include the bank-notes, which, spread out before his eyes, disturbed
+him. What should he do with them? One moment he thought of burning them,
+but reflection held him back. Would it not be folly to destroy this
+fortune? In any case, would it not be the work of a narrow mind, of one
+not fertile in resources?
+
+In trying to think of some safe place to hide the banknotes, one thought
+continually absorbed him: What was happening in the Rue Sainte-Anne? Had
+any one discovered the dead man?
+
+He should be there to observe events, instead of timidly shutting
+himself up in his office.
+
+For several minutes he tried to resist this thought, but it was stronger
+than his will or his reason. So much was he under its power that he
+could do nothing.
+
+Willing or unwilling, foolish or not, he must go to the Rue Sainte-Anne.
+
+He washed his hands, changed his shirt, and throwing the notes and gold
+into a drawer, he went out.
+
+He knew very well that there was a certain danger in leaving these
+proofs of the crime, which, found in an official search, would overwhelm
+him, without his being able to defend himself. But he thought that
+an immediate search was unlikely to occur, and if he could not make a
+probable story, it would be better for him not to reason about it. It
+was a risk that he ran, but how much he had on his side!
+
+He hastened along the Rue Neuve-des-Petits-Champs, but on approaching
+the Rue Sainte-Anne he slackened his steps, looking about him and
+listening. Nothing unusual struck him. Even when he turned into the Rue
+Sainte-Anne he found it bore its ordinary aspect. A few passers-by,
+not curious; no groups on the sidewalk; no shopkeepers at their doors.
+Nothing was different from usual.
+
+Apparently, nothing had yet been discovered. Then he stopped, judging
+it useless to go farther. Already he had passed too much time before
+Caffie's door, and when one was of his build, above the medium height,
+with a physiognomy and appearance unlike others, one should avoid
+attracting attention.
+
+For several minutes he walked up and down slowly, from the Rue
+Neuve-des-Petits-Champs to the Rue du Hasard; from there he could see
+Caffie's house, and yet be so far away that no one would suspect him of
+watching it.
+
+But this promenade, which was quite natural, and which he would have
+continued for an hour in ordinary circumstances, without thinking
+anything about it, soon alarmed him. It seemed as if people looked at
+him, and two persons stopping to talk made him wonder if they spoke of
+him. Why did they not continue their way? Why, from time to time, did
+they turn their heads toward him?
+
+He left the place, and neither wishing nor being able to decide to go
+far away from "the house," he concluded to go to a small cafe which was
+close by.
+
+On entering, he seated himself at a table near the door that appeared
+to be an excellent observatory, from where he could easily survey the
+street. A waiter asked him what he would have, and he ordered coffee.
+
+He gave this order mechanically, without thinking what he was saying,
+and not till afterward did he wonder if it were natural to take coffee
+at this hour. The men seated at the other tables drank appetizers or
+beer. Had he not made a blunder?
+
+But everything seemed a blunder, as everything seemed dangerous. Could
+he not regain his composure and his reason? He drank his coffee slowly;
+then he asked for a newspaper. The street was quiet, and people left the
+cafe one by one.
+
+Behind his newspaper he reflected. It was his feverish curiosity that
+made him admit that Caffie's death would be discovered during the
+evening. In reality, it might easily remain undiscovered until the next
+day.
+
+But he could not stay in the cafe until the next day, nor even until
+midnight. Perhaps he had remained there too long already.
+
+He did not wish to go yet, so he ordered writing materials, and paid the
+waiter, in case he might wish to go hastily--if anything occurred.
+
+What should he write? He wished to test himself, and found that he was
+able to write clearly, and to select the proper words; but when he came
+to read it over, his will failed him.
+
+Time passed. Suddenly there was a movement under the porte-cochere of
+"the house," and a man ran through the street. Two or three persons
+stopped in a group.
+
+Without hurrying too much, Saniel went out, and in a strong voice asked
+what had happened.
+
+"An agent of business has been assassinated in his office. Word has been
+sent to the police bureau in the Rue du Hasard."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIV. THE EXAMINATION
+
+Saniel was there to observe, without having decided what he should do.
+Instantly, with the decision that had "failed him so often during his
+vigil," he resolved to go to Caffie's. Was he not a doctor, and the
+physician of the dead-man? What could be more natural?
+
+"A money-lender!" he exclaimed. "Is it Monsieur Caffie?"
+
+"Exactly."
+
+"But I am his doctor."
+
+"A doctor! Here is a doctor!" cried several voices.
+
+The crowd parted, and Saniel passed under the porte-cochere, where the
+concierge, half fainting, was seated on a chair, surrounded by all the
+maids of the house and several neighbors, to whom she related the news.
+
+By using his elbows he was able to approach her.
+
+"Who has said Monsieur Caffie is dead?" he asked with authority.
+
+"No one has said he is dead; at least, I have not."
+
+"Well, then?"
+
+"There is a stain of blood that has run from his office down to the
+landing; and as he is at home, since the light of his lamp is seen
+in the court, and he never leaves it burning when he goes to dinner,
+something must have happened. And why are his curtains drawn? He always
+leaves them open."
+
+At this moment two policemen appeared, preceded by a locksmith armed
+with a bunch of keys, and a little man with a shrewd, sharp appearance,
+wearing spectacles, and a hat from under which fell blond curls. The
+commissioner of police probably.
+
+"On which story?" he asked the concierge.
+
+"On the first."
+
+"Come with us."
+
+He started to go upstairs, accompanied by the concierge, the locksmith,
+and one of the policemen; Saniel wished to follow them, but the other
+policeman barred the way.
+
+"Pardon, Monsieur Commissioner," Saniel said.
+
+"What do you wish, sir?"
+
+"I am Monsieur Caffie's physician."
+
+"Your name?"
+
+"Doctor Saniel."
+
+"Let the doctor pass," the commissioner said, "but alone. Make every one
+go out, and shut the porte-cochere."
+
+On reaching the landing the commissioner stopped to look at the brown
+stain which, running under the door, spread over the tiling, as Caffie
+never had had a mat.
+
+"It is certainly a stain of blood," Saniel said, who stopped to examine
+it and dipped his finger in it.
+
+"Open the door," the commissioner said to the locksmith.
+
+The latter examined the lock, looked among his keys, selected one, and
+unlocked the door.
+
+"Let no one enter," the commissioner said. "Doctor, have the goodness to
+follow me."
+
+And, going ahead, he entered the first office, that of the clerk,
+followed by Saniel. Two little rills of blood, already thickened,
+starting from Caffie's chair, and running across the tiled floor, which
+sloped a little toward the side of the staircase, joined in the stain
+which caused the discovery of the crime. The commissioner and Saniel
+took care not to step in it.
+
+"The unfortunate man has had his throat cut," Saniel said. "Death must
+have occurred two or three hours ago. There is nothing to do."
+
+"Speak for yourself, doctor."
+
+And, stooping, he picked up the knife.
+
+"Is it not a butcher's knife?" asked Saniel, who could only use this
+word.
+
+"It looks like it."
+
+He had raised Caffie's head and examined the wound.
+
+"You see," he said, "that the victim has been butchered. The stroke was
+from left to right, by a firm hand which must be accustomed to handle
+this knife. But it is not only a strong and practised hand that has done
+this deed; it was guided by an intelligence that knew how to proceed
+to insure a quick, almost instantaneous death, and at the same time a
+silent one."
+
+"You think it was done by a butcher?"
+
+"By a professional killer; the larynx has been cut above the glottis,
+and with the same stroke the two carotid arteries, with the jugular
+veins. As the assassin had to raise the head, the victim was not able
+to cry out; considerable blood has flowed, and death must have ensued in
+one or two minutes."
+
+"The scene appears to me very well reconstructed."
+
+"The blood should have burst out in this direction," Saniel continued,
+pointing to the door. "But as this door was open, nothing is to be
+seen."
+
+While Saniel spoke, the commissioner threw a glance about the room--the
+glance of the police, which takes in everything.
+
+"The safe is open," he said. "The affair becomes clear; the
+assassination was followed by theft."
+
+There was a door opposite to the entrance, which the commissioner
+opened; it was that of Caffie's bedroom.
+
+"I will give you a man to help you carry the body into this room, where
+you can continue your examination more easily, while I will continue my
+investigations in this office."
+
+Saniel would have liked to remain in the office to assist at these
+investigations, but it was impossible to raise an objection. The chair
+was rolled into the bedroom, where two candles had been lighted on the
+mantel, and when the body was laid on the bed, the commissioner returned
+to the office.
+
+Saniel made his examination last as long a time as possible, to the end
+that he need not leave the house; but he could not prolong it beyond
+certain limits. When they were reached, he returned to the clerk's
+office, where the commissioner had installed himself, and was hearing
+the concierge's deposition.
+
+"And so," he said, "from five to seven o'clock no one asked for M.
+Caffie?"
+
+"No one. But I left my lodge at a quarter past five to light the gas
+on the stairs; that took me twenty minutes, because I am stiff in my
+joints, and during this time some one might have gone up and down the
+stairs without my seeing them."
+
+"Well," the commissioner said, turning to Saniel, "have you found any
+distinguishing feature?"
+
+"No; there is only the wound on the neck."
+
+"Will you draw up your medico-legal report while I continue my inquest?"
+
+"Willingly."
+
+And, without waiting, he seated himself at the clerk's desk, facing the
+commissioner's secretary, who had arrived a few minutes previous.
+
+"I am going to make you take the oath," the commissioner said.
+
+After this formality Saniel began his report:
+
+"We, the undersigned, Victor Saniel, doctor of medicine of the Paris
+Faculty, residing in Paris in the Rue Louis-le-Grand, after having taken
+an oath to fulfil in all honor and conscience the mission confided to
+us--"
+
+All the time that he was writing he paid attention to everything that
+was said, and did not lose one word of the concierge's deposition.
+
+"I am certain," she said, "that from half-past five until now no one has
+gone up or down the stairs but the people who live in the house."
+
+"But before half-past five?"
+
+"I have told you that from a quarter past five until half-past I was not
+in my lodge."
+
+"And before a quarter past five o'clock?"
+
+"Several persons passed whom I did not know."
+
+"Did any one among them ask you for Monsieur Caffie?"
+
+"No; that is to say, yes. There was one who asked me if Monsieur Caffie
+was at home; but I know him well; that is why I answered No."
+
+"And who is he?"
+
+"One of Monsieur Caffies old clerks."
+
+"His name?"
+
+"Monsieur Florentin--Monsieur Florentin Cormier."
+
+Saniel's hand was arrested at this name, but he did not raise his head.
+
+"At what hour did he come?" asked the commissioner.
+
+"Near three o'clock, before rather than after."
+
+"Did you see him go away?"
+
+"Certainly, he spoke to me."
+
+"What time was it?"
+
+"Half-past three."
+
+"Do you think that death could have occurred at this moment?" the
+commissioner asked, turning to Saniel.
+
+"No; I think it must have been between five and six o'clock."
+
+"It is wrong for the commissioner to suspect Monsieur Florentin," cried
+the concierge. "He is a good young man, incapable of harming a fly.
+And then, there is a good reason why death could not have taken place
+between three o'clock and half-past; it is that Monsieur Caffie's lamp
+was lighted, and you know the poor gentleman was not a man to light his
+lamp in broad daylight, looking as he was--"
+
+She stopped abruptly, striking her forehead with her hand.
+
+"That is what I remember, and you will see that Monsieur Florentin has
+nothing to do with this affair. As I went upstairs at a quarter past
+five to light my gas, some one came behind me and rang Monsieur Caffie's
+bell, and rapped three or four times at equal distances, which is the
+signal to open the door."
+
+Again Saniel's pen stopped, and he was obliged to lean his hand on the
+table to prevent its trembling.
+
+"Who was it?"
+
+"Ah! That I do not know," she answered. "I did not see him, but I heard
+him, the step of a man. It was this rascal who killed him, you may be
+sure."
+
+This seemed likely.
+
+"He went out while I was on the stairs; he knew the customs of the
+house."
+
+Saniel continued his report.
+
+After having questioned and cross-questioned the concierge without being
+able to make her say more, the commissioner dismissed her, and leaving
+Saniel at his work, he passed into Caffie's office, where he remained a
+long time.
+
+When he returned he brought a small note-book that he consulted. Without
+doubt it was the book of Caffie's safe, simple and primitive, like
+everything relating to the old man's habits, governed by the narrowest
+economy in his expenses, as well as in his work.
+
+"According to this note-book," the commissioner said to his secretary,
+"thirty-five or thirty-six thousand francs must have been taken from the
+safe; but there are left deeds and papers for a large sum."
+
+Saniel, who had finished his report, did not take his eyes from the
+note-book, and what he could see reassured him. Evidently these accounts
+were reduced to a minimum: a date, a name, a sum, and after this name
+a capital P, which, without doubt, meant "paid." It was hardly possible
+that with such a system Caffie had ever taken the trouble to enter the
+number of the bills that had passed through his hands; in any case, if
+he did, it was not in this note-book. Would another one be found?
+
+"My report is finished," he said. "Here it is."
+
+"Since you are here, perhaps you can give me some information concerning
+the habits of the victim and the persons he received."
+
+"Not at all. I have known him but a short time, and he was my patient,
+as I was his client, by accident. He undertook an affair for me, and
+I gave him advice; he was in the last stage of diabetes. The assassin
+hastened his death only a short time-a few days."
+
+"That is nothing; he hastened it."
+
+"Oh, certainly! Otherwise, if he is skilful in cutting throats, perhaps
+he is less so in making a diagnosis of their maladies."
+
+"That is probable," responded the commissioner, smiling. "You think it
+was a butcher?"
+
+"It seems probable."
+
+"The knife?"
+
+"He might have stolen it or found it."
+
+"But the mode of operating?"
+
+"That, it seems to me, is the point from where we should start."
+
+Saniel could remain no longer, and he rose to leave.
+
+"You have my address," he said; "but I must tell you, if you want me, I
+leave to-morrow for Nice. But I shall be absent only just long enough to
+go and return."
+
+"If we want you, it will not be for several days. We shall not get on
+very rapidly, we have so little to guide us."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XV. A NEW PLAN
+
+Saniel walked home briskly. If, more than once during this interview,
+his emotion was poignant, he could not but be satisfied with the result.
+The concierge had not seen him, that was henceforth unquestionable; the
+hypothesis of the butcher's knife was put in a way to make his fortune;
+and it seemed probable that Caffie had not kept the numbers of the
+bank-notes.
+
+But if they had been noted, and should the notebook containing them be
+discovered later, the danger was not immediate. While writing his report
+and listening to the concierge's deposition, by a sort of inspiration he
+thought of a way of disposing of them. He would divide them into small
+packages, place them in envelopes, and address them with different
+initials to the poste restante, where they would remain until he could
+call for them without compromising himself.
+
+In the deposition of the concierge, in the track indicated by the knife,
+in the poste restante, he had just motives for satisfaction, that made
+him breathe freely. Decidedly, fate seemed to be with him, and he should
+have been able to say that everything was going well, if he had not
+committed the imprudence of entering the cafe. Why had he gone there
+and remained long enough to attract attention? What might not be the
+consequences of this stupidity?
+
+As soon as he reached home and his door was closed, he carried out his
+intentions regarding the bank-notes, dividing them into ten packages.
+His first thought was to place them in the nearest letterbox, but
+reflection showed him that this would be unwise, and he decided to mail
+each one in a different quarter of the city.
+
+After his long walk of the morning, and the emotions of the evening, he
+felt a fatigue that he had never known before, but he comprehended that
+he was not at liberty to yield to this weariness. A new situation was
+made for him, and henceforth he no longer belonged to himself. For the
+rest of his life he would be the prisoner of his crime. And it was this
+crime which, from this evening, would command, and he must obey.
+
+Why had he not foreseen this situation when, weighing the pro and con
+like an intelligent man who can scrutinize the future under all its
+phases, he had examined what must happen? But surprising as it was, the
+discovery was no less certain, and the sad and troublesome proof
+was that, however intelligent one may be, one can always learn by
+experience.
+
+What was there yet to learn? He confessed that he found himself face to
+face with the unknown, and all that he wished was, that this lesson he
+had learned from experience might be the hardest. It would be folly to
+imagine that it was the last. Time would show.
+
+When he returned home, after posting his letters, it was long past one
+o'clock. He went to bed immediately, and slept heavily, without waking
+or dreaming.
+
+It was broad daylight when he opened his eyes the next morning.
+Surprised at having slept so late, he jumped up and looked at his watch,
+which said eight o'clock. But as he should not leave until a quarter
+past eleven, he had plenty of time.
+
+How should he employ it?
+
+It was the first time in years that he had asked himself such a
+question; he, who each day always found that he needed three or four
+hours more to carry out his programme.
+
+He dressed slowly, and then thought of writing to Phillis to tell her of
+his trip to Nice. But suddenly he changed his mind, and decided to go to
+see her.
+
+The preceding year he attended Madame Cormier, who had been stricken
+with paralysis, and he could occasionally present himself at her house
+without appearing to call upon Phillis. It was easy to say that he was
+passing by, and wished to learn news of the patient whom he had cured.
+
+At nine o'clock he knocked at her door.
+
+"Enter," a man's voice said.
+
+He was surprised, for in his visits to Madame Cormier he had never seen
+a man there. He crossed the hall and knocked at the dining-room door.
+This time it was Phillis who bid him come in.
+
+He opened the door and saw Phillis, in a gray blouse, seated before a
+large table placed by the window. She was painting some cards.
+
+Hearing steps, she turned her head and instantly rose, but she
+restrained the cry-the name that was on her lips.
+
+"Mamma," she said, "here is Doctor Saniel."
+
+Madame Cormier entered, walking with difficulty; for, if Saniel had put
+her on her feet, he had not given her the suppleness or the grace of
+youth.
+
+After a few words, Saniel explained that, having to pay a visit to
+the Batignolles, he would not come so near his former patient without
+calling to see her.
+
+While Madame Cormier told at great length how she felt, and also how
+she did not feel, Phillis looked at Saniel, uneasy to see his face so
+convulsed. Surely, something very serious had happened; his visit
+said this. But what? Her anguish was so much the greater, because he
+certainly avoided looking at her. Why? She had done nothing, and could
+find nothing with which to reproach herself.
+
+At this moment the door opened, and a man still young, tall, with a
+curled beard, entered the room.
+
+"My son," Madame Cormier said.
+
+"My brother Florentin, of whom we have spoken so often," Phillis said.
+
+Florentin! Was he then becoming imbecile, that he had not thought the
+voice of the man who bid him enter was that of Phillis's brother? Was he
+so profoundly overwhelmed that such a simple reasoning was impossible
+to him? Decidedly, it was important for him to go away as quickly as
+possible; the journey would calm his nerves.
+
+"They wrote to me," Florentin said, "and since my return they have told
+me how good you were to my mother. Permit me to thank you from a touched
+and grateful heart. I hope that before long this gratitude will be
+something more than a vain word."
+
+"Do not let us speak of that," Saniel said, looking at Phillis with a
+frankness and an open countenance that reassured heron a certain
+point. "It is I who am obliged to Madame Cormier. If the word were not
+barbarous, I should say that her illness has been a good thing for me."
+
+To turn the conversation, and because he wished to speak to Phillis
+alone, he approached her table and talked with her about her work.
+
+Saniel then gave Madame Cormier some advice, and rose to go.
+
+Phillis followed him, and Florentin was about to accompany them, but
+Phillis stopped him.
+
+"I wish to ask Doctor Saniel a question," she said.
+
+When they were on the landing she closed the door.
+
+"What is the matter?" she asked in a hurried and trembling voice.
+
+"I wished to tell you that I start for Monaco at eleven o'clock."
+
+"You are going away?"
+
+"I have received two hundred francs from a patient, and I am going
+to risk them at play. Two hundred francs will not pay Jardine or the
+others, but with them I may win several thousands of francs."
+
+"Oh! Poor dear! How desperate you must be--you, such as you are, to have
+such an idea!"
+
+"Am I wrong?"
+
+"Never wrong to my eyes, to my heart, to my love. O my beloved, may
+fortune be with you!"
+
+"Give me your hand."
+
+She looked around, listening. There was no one, no noise.
+
+Then, drawing him toward her, she put her lips on his:
+
+"All yours, yours!"
+
+"I will return Tuesday."
+
+"Tuesday, at five o'clock, I shall be there."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVI. THE SMILES OF FORTUNE
+
+No one knew so little about play as Saniel. He knew that people played
+at Monaco, and that was all. He bought his ticket for Monaco, and left
+the train at that place.
+
+On leaving the station he looked all about him, to see what kind of a
+place it was. Seeing nothing that looked like a gambling-house as he
+understood it, that is, like the Casino de Royal, the only establishment
+of the kind that he had ever seen, he asked a passer-by:
+
+"Where is the gambling-house?"
+
+"There is none at Monaco."
+
+"I thought there was."
+
+"There is one at Monte Carlo."
+
+"Is it far?"
+
+"Over yonder."
+
+With his hand the man indicated, on the slope of the mountain, a green
+spot where, in the midst of the foliage, were seen roofs and facades of
+imposing buildings.
+
+Saniel thanked him and followed his directions, while the man, calling
+another, related the question that had been addressed to him, and both
+laughed, shrugging their shoulders. Could any one be so stupid as these
+Parisians! Another one who was going to be plucked, and who came from
+Paris expressly for that! Was he not funny, with his big legs and arms?
+
+Without troubling himself about the laughter that he heard behind him,
+Saniel continued his way. In spite of his night on the train, he felt no
+fatigue; on the contrary, his mind and body were active. The journey had
+calmed the agitation of his nerves, and it was with perfect tranquillity
+he looked back upon all that had passed before his departure. In the
+state of satisfaction that was his now, he had nothing more to fear from
+stupidity or acts of folly; and, since he had recovered his will, all
+would go well. No more backward glances, and fewer still before. The
+present only should absorb him.
+
+The present, at this moment, was play. What did they play? He knew
+roulette, but he knew not if the game was roulette. He would do as
+others did. If he were ridiculed, it was of little importance; and in
+reality he should desire to be ridiculed. People remember with pleasure
+those at whom they have laughed, and he had come here to find some one
+who would remember him.
+
+When he entered the salon where the playing was going on, he observed
+that a religious silence reigned there. Round a large table covered with
+a carpet of green cloth, which was divided by lines and figures, some
+men were seated on high chairs, making them appear like officers;
+others, on lower chairs, or simply standing about the table, pushed
+or picked up the louis and bank bills on the green cloth, and a strong
+voice repeated, in a monotonous tone:
+
+"Messieurs, faites votre jeu! Le jeu est fait! Rien ne va plus!"
+
+Then a little ivory ball was thrown into a cylinder, where it rolled
+with a metallic noise. Although he had never seen roulette, it required
+no effort to divine that this was the game.
+
+And, before putting several louis on the table, he looked about him to
+see how it was played. But after the tenth time he understood as little
+as at first. With the rakes the croupiers collected the stakes of
+certain players; with these same rakes they doubled, separated, or even
+paid, in proportions of which he took no account, certain others, and
+that was all.
+
+But it mattered little. Having seen how the money was placed on the
+table, that was sufficient.
+
+He had five louis in his hand when the croupier said:
+
+"Messieurs, faites votre jeu."
+
+He placed them on the number thirty-two, or, at least, he believed that
+he placed them on this number.
+
+"Rien ne va plus!" The ball rolled in the cylinder.
+
+"Thirty-one!" cried the croupier, adding some other words that Saniel
+did not understand. So little did he understand roulette that he thought
+he had lost. He had placed his stake on the thirty-two, and it was the
+thirty-one that had appeared; the bank had won. He was surprised to see
+the croupier push a heap of gold toward him, which amounted to nearly a
+hundred louis, and accompany this movement with a glance which, without
+any doubt, meant to say:
+
+"For you, sir."
+
+What should he do? Since he had lost, he could not take this, money that
+was given to him by mistake.
+
+In placing his stake on the table, he had leaned over the shoulder of a
+gentleman whose hair and beard were of a most extraordinary black, who,
+without playing, pricked a card with a pin. This gentleman turned toward
+him, and with an amiable smile, and in a most gracious tone said:
+
+"It is yours, sir."
+
+Decidedly, he was mistaken in thinking he had lost; and he must take
+this heap of louis, which he did, but neglecting to take, also, his
+first stake.
+
+The game continued.
+
+"Thirty-two," called the croupier.
+
+Saniel perceived that his five louis had remained on the thirty-two;
+he believed that he had won, since this number was called, and his
+ignorance was such that he did not know that in roulette a number is
+paid thirty-six times the stake: the croupier would, therefore, push
+toward him one hundred and eighty Louis.
+
+But, to his great surprise, he pushed him no more money than at first.
+This was incomprehensible. When he lost, money was paid to him, and when
+he won, he was paid only half his due.
+
+His face betrayed his astonishment so plainly that he saw a mocking
+smile in the eyes of the black-haired man, who had again turned toward
+him.
+
+As he played merely for the sake of playing, and not to win or lose, he
+pocketed all that was pushed toward him and his stake.
+
+"Since you are not going to play any more," said the amiable gentleman,
+leaving his chair, "will you permit me to say a word to you?"
+
+Saniel bowed, and together they left the table. When they were far
+enough away to converse without disturbing the players, the gentleman
+bowed ceremoniously:
+
+"Permit me to present myself-Prince Mazzazoli."
+
+Saniel replied by giving his name and position.
+
+"Well, doctor," the prince said with a strong Italian accent, "you
+will pardon me, I hope, for making the simple observation that my age
+authorizes: you play like a child."
+
+"Like an ignoramus," Saniel replied, without being angry. For, however
+unusual this observation might be, he had already decided that it might
+be a good thing in the future to call upon the testimony of a prince.
+
+"I am sure you are still asking yourself why you received eighteen times
+the sum of your stake at the first play, and why you did not receive
+thirty-six times the sum at the second."
+
+"That is true."
+
+"Well, I will tell you." And he proceeded to explain.
+
+Saniel did not wait for the conclusion to learn the fact that this
+very-much-dyed Italian prince was a liar.
+
+"I do not intend to play again," he said.
+
+"With your luck that would be more than a fault."
+
+"I wanted a certain sum; I have won it, and that satisfies me."
+
+"You will not be so foolish as to refuse the hand that Fortune holds
+out?"
+
+"Are you sure she holds it out to me?" Saniel asked, finding that it was
+the prince.
+
+"Do not doubt it. I will show you--"
+
+"Thank you; but I never break a resolution."
+
+In another moment Saniel would have turned his back on the man, but he
+was a witness whom it would be well to treat with caution.
+
+"I have nothing more to do here," he said, politely. "Permit me to
+retire, after having thanked you for your offer, whose kindness I
+appreciate."
+
+"Well," cried the prince, "since you will not risk your fate, let me do
+it for you. This money may be a fetich. Take off five louis, only
+five louis, and confide them to me. I will play them according to my
+combinations, which are certain, and this evening I will give you your
+part of the proceeds. Where are you staying? I live at the Villa des
+Palmes."
+
+"Nowhere; I have just arrived."
+
+"Then let us meet here this evening at ten o'clock, in this room, and we
+will liquidate our association."
+
+His first impulse was to refuse. Of what use to give alms to this old
+monkey? But, after all, it did not cost much to pay his witness five
+louis, and he gave them to him.
+
+"A thousand thanks! This evening, at ten o'clock."
+
+As Saniel left the room he found himself face to face with his old
+comrade Duphot, who was accompanied by a woman, the same whom he had
+cured.
+
+"What! you here?" both the lover and his mistress exclaimed.
+
+Saniel related why he was at Monaco, and what he had done since his
+arrival.
+
+"With my money! Ah! She is very well," Duphot cried.
+
+"And you will play no more?" the woman asked.
+
+"I have all I want."
+
+"Then you will play for me."
+
+He wished to decline, but they drew him to the roulette table, and each
+put a louis in his hand.
+
+"Play."
+
+"How?"
+
+"As inspiration counsels you. You have the luck."
+
+But his luck had died. The two louis were lost.
+
+They gave him two others, which won eight.
+
+"You see, dear friend."
+
+He went on, with varying luck, winning and losing.
+
+At the end of a quarter of an hour they permitted him to go.
+
+"And what are you going to do now?" Duphot asked.
+
+"To send what I owe to my creditors by telegraph."
+
+"Do you know where the telegraph is?"
+
+"No."
+
+"I will go with you."
+
+This was a second witness that Saniel was too wise to shake off.
+
+When he had sent his telegram to Jardine, he had nothing more to do
+at Monte Carlo, and as he could not leave before eleven o'clock in the
+evening, he was idle, not knowing how to employ his time. So he bought
+a Nice newspaper and seated himself in the garden, under a gaslight,
+facing the dark and tranquil sea. Perhaps he could find in it some
+telegraph despatch which would tell him what had occurred in the Rue
+Sainte-Anne since his departure.
+
+At the end of the paper, under "Latest News," he read:
+
+"The crime of the Rue Sainte-Anne seems to take a new turn; the
+investigations made with more care have led to the discovery of a
+trousers' button, to which is attached a piece of cloth. It shows,
+therefore, that before the crime there was a struggle between the victim
+and the assassin. As this button has certain letters and marks, it is a
+valuable clew for the police."
+
+This proof of a struggle between the victim and the assassin made Saniel
+smile. Who could tell how long this button had been there?
+
+Suddenly he left his seat, and entering a copse he examined his
+clothing. Was it he who had lost it?
+
+But soon he was ashamed of this unconscious movement. The button which
+the police were so proud to discover, did not belong to him. This new
+track on which they were about to enter did not lead to him.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVII. PHILLIS'S FEARS
+
+On Tuesday, a little before five o'clock, as she had promised, Phillis
+rang at Saniel's door, and he left his laboratory where he was at work,
+to let her in.
+
+She threw herself on his neck.
+
+"Well?" she asked, in a trembling voice.
+
+He told her how he had played and won, without stating the exact sum;
+also the propositions of the Prince Mazzazoli, the meeting with Duphot,
+and the telegram to Jardine.
+
+"Oh! What happiness!" she said, pressing him in her arms. "You are
+free!"
+
+"No more creditors! I am my own master. You see it was a good
+inspiration. Justice willed it."
+
+Then interrupting him:
+
+"Apropos of justice, you did not speak of Caffie the morning of your
+departure."
+
+"I was so preoccupied I had no time to think of Caffie."
+
+"Is it not curious, the coincidence of his death with the condemnation
+that we pronounced against him? Does it not prove exactly the justice of
+things?"
+
+"If you choose."
+
+"As the money you won at Monaco proves to you that what is just will
+happen. Caffie is punished for all his rascalities and crimes, and you
+are rewarded for your sufferings."
+
+"Would it not have been just if Caffie had been punished sooner, and if
+I had suffered less?"
+
+She remained silent.
+
+"You see," he said smiling, "that your philosophy is weak."
+
+"It is not of my philosophy that I am thinking, but of Caffie and
+ourselves."
+
+"And how can Caffie be associated with you or yours?"
+
+"He is, or rather he may be, if this justice in which I believe in spite
+of your joking permits him to be."
+
+"You are talking in enigmas."
+
+"What have you heard about Caffie since you went away?"
+
+"Nothing, or almost nothing."
+
+"You know it is thought that the crime was committed by a butcher."
+
+"The commissioner picked up the knife before me, and it is certainly a
+butcher's knife. And more than that, the stroke that cut Caffie's throat
+was given by a hand accustomed to butchery. I have indicated this in my
+report."
+
+"Since then, more careful investigations have discovered a trousers'
+button--"
+
+"Which might have been torn off in a struggle between Caffie and his
+assassin, I read in a newspaper. But as for me, I do not believe in this
+struggle. Caffie's position in his chair, where he was assaulted and
+where he died, indicates that the old scamp was surprised. Otherwise,
+if he had not been, if he had struggled, he could have cried out, and,
+without doubt, he would have been heard."
+
+"If you knew how happy I am to hear you say that!" she cried.
+
+"Happy! What difference can it make to you?" and he looked at her in
+surprise. "Of what importance is it to you whether Caffie was killed
+with or without a struggle? You condemned him; he is dead. That should
+satisfy you."
+
+"I was very wrong to pronounce this condemnation, which I did without
+attaching any importance to it."
+
+"Do you think that hastened its execution?"
+
+"I am not so foolish as that, but I should be better pleased if I had
+not condemned him."
+
+"Do you regret it?"
+
+"I regret that he is dead."
+
+"Decidedly, the enigma continues; but you know I do not understand it,
+and, if you wish, we will stop there. We have something better to do
+than to talk of Caffie."
+
+"On the contrary, let me talk to you of him, because we want your
+advice."
+
+Again he looked at her, trying to read her face and to divine why she
+insisted on speaking of Caffie, when he had just expressed a wish not to
+speak of him. What was there beneath this insistence?
+
+"I will listen," he said; "and, since you wish to ask my advice on the
+subject, you must tell me immediately what you mean."
+
+"You are right; and I should have told you before, but embarrassment and
+shame restrained me. And I reproach myself, for with you I should feel
+neither embarrassment nor reproach."
+
+"Assuredly."
+
+"But before everything else, I must tell you--you must know--that my
+brother Florentin is a good and honest boy; you must believe it, you
+must be convinced of it."
+
+"I am, since you tell me so. Besides, he produced the best impression on
+me during the short time I saw him the other day at your house."
+
+"Would not one see immediately that he has a good nature?"
+
+"Certainly."
+
+"Frank and upright; weak, it is true, and a little effeminate also,
+that is, lacking energy, letting himself be carried away by goodness and
+tenderness. This weakness made him commit a fault before his departure
+for America. I have kept it from you until this moment, but you must
+know it now. Loving a woman who controlled him and made him do what she
+wished, he let himself be persuaded to-take a sum of forty-five francs
+that she demanded, that she insisted on having that evening, hoping to
+be able to replace it three days later, without his employer discovering
+it."
+
+"His employer was Caffie?"
+
+"No; it was three months after he left Caffie, and he was with another
+man of business of whom I have never spoken to you, and now you
+understand why. The money he expected failed him; his fault was
+discovered, and his employer lodged a complaint against him."
+
+"We made him withdraw his complaint, never mind how, and Florentin went
+to America to seek his fortune. And since you have seen him, you admit
+that he might be capable of the fault that he committed, without being
+capable-of becoming an assassin."
+
+He was about to reply, but she closed his lips with a quick gesture.
+
+"You will see why I speak of this, and you will understand why I do
+not drop the subject of Caffie, and of this button, on which the police
+count to find the criminal. This button belonged to Florentin."
+
+"To your brother?"
+
+"Yes, to Florentin, who, the day of the crime, had been to see Caffie."
+
+"That is true; the concierge told the commissioner of police that he
+called about three o'clock."
+
+Phillis gave a cry of despair.
+
+"They know he was there? Then it is more serious than we imagined or
+believed."
+
+"In answering a question as to whom Caffie had received that day, the
+concierge named your brother. But as this visit took place between three
+and half-past, and the crime was certainly committed between five and
+half-past, no one can accuse your brother of being the assassin, since
+he left before Caffie lighted his lamp. As this lamp could not light
+itself, it proves that he could not have butchered a man who was living
+an hour after the concierge saw your brother and talked with him."
+
+"What you say is a great relief; if you could know how alarmed we have
+been!"
+
+"You were too hasty to alarm yourself."
+
+"Too hasty? But when Florentin read the account to us and came to the
+button, he exclaimed, 'This button is mine!' and we experienced a
+shock that made us lose our heads. We saw the police falling on us,
+questioning Florentin, reproaching him with the past, which would be
+retailed in all the newspapers, and you must understand how we felt."
+
+"But cannot your brother explain how he lost this button at Caffie's?"
+
+"Certainly, and in the most natural way. He went to see Caffie, to ask
+him for a letter of recommendation, saying that he had been his clerk
+for several years. Caffie gave it to him, and then, in the course of
+conversation, Caffie spoke of a bundle of papers that he could not find.
+Florentin had had charge of these papers, and had placed them on a high
+shelf in the closet. As Caffie could not find them, and wanted them,
+Florentin brought a small ladder, and, mounting it, found them. He was
+about to descend the ladder, when he made a misstep, and in trying to
+save himself, one of the buttons of his trousers was pulled off."
+
+"And he did not pick it up?"
+
+"He did not even notice it at first. But later, in the street, seeing
+one leg of his trousers longer than the other, he thought of the ladder,
+and found that he had lost a button. He would not return to Caffie's to
+look for it, of course."
+
+"Of course."
+
+"How could he foresee that Caffie would be assassinated? That the crime
+would be so skilfully planned and executed that the criminal would
+escape? That two days later the police would find a button on which they
+would build a story that would make him the criminal? Florentin had not
+thought of all that."
+
+"That is understood."
+
+"The same evening he replaced the button by another, and it was only on
+reading the newspaper that he felt there might be something serious in
+this apparently insignificant fact. And we shared his alarm."
+
+"Have you spoken to any one of this button?"
+
+"Certainly not; we know too much. I tell you of it because I tell you
+everything; and if we are menaced, we have no help to expect, except
+from you. Florentin is a good boy, but he is weak and foolish. Mamma
+is like him in more than one respect, and as for me, although I am more
+resistant, I confess that, in the face of the law and the police, I
+should easily lose my head, like children who begin to scream when they
+are left in the dark. Is not the law, when you know nothing of it, a
+night of trouble, full of horrors, and peopled with phantoms?"
+
+"I do not believe there is the danger that you imagined in the first
+moment of alarm."
+
+"It was natural."
+
+"Very natural, I admit, but reflection must show how little foundation
+there is for it. The button has not the name of the tailor who furnished
+it?"
+
+"No, but it has the initials and the mark of the manufacturer; an A and
+a P, with a crown and a cock."
+
+"Well! Among two or three thousand tailors in Paris, how is it possible
+for the police to find those who use these buttons? And when the tailors
+are found, how could they designate the owner of this button, this one
+exactly, and not another? It is looking for a needle in a bundle of hay.
+Where did your brother have these trousers made? Did he bring them from
+America?"
+
+"The poor boy brought nothing from America but wretchedly shabby
+clothes, and we had to clothe him from head to foot. We were obliged to
+economize, and a little tailor in the Avenue de Clichy, called Valerius,
+made this suit."
+
+"It seems to me scarcely probable that the police will find this little
+tailor. But if they do, would he recognize the button as coming from
+his stock? And, if they get as far as your brother, they must prove that
+there was a struggle; that the button was torn off in this struggle;
+that your brother was in the Rue Sainte-Anne between five and six
+o'clock; in which case, without doubt, he will find it easy to prove
+where he was at that moment."
+
+"He was with us--with mamma."
+
+"You see, then, you need not feel alarmed."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVIII. A GRAVE DISCUSSION
+
+Phillis hurried to return to the Rue des Moines, to share with her
+mother and brother the confidence that Saniel caused her to feel.
+
+She pulled the bell with a trembling hand, for the time was past when
+in this quiet house, where all the lodgers knew each other, the key was
+left in the door, and one had only to knock before entering. Since the
+newspapers had spoken of the button, all was changed; the feeling of
+liberty and security had disappeared; the door was always closed, and
+when the bell rang they looked at each other in fear and with trembling.
+
+When Florentin opened the door, the table was set for dinner.
+
+"I was afraid something had happened to you," Madame Cormier said.
+
+"I was detained."
+
+She took off her hat and cloak hastily.
+
+"You have learned nothing?" the mother asked, bringing in the soup.
+
+"No."
+
+"They spoke to you of nothing?" Florentin continued in a low voice.
+
+"They spoke to me of nothing else; or I heard only that when I was not
+addressed directly."
+
+"What was said?"
+
+"No one believes that the investigations of the police bear on the
+button."
+
+"You see, Florentin," Madame Cormier interrupted, smiling at her son.
+
+But he shook his head.
+
+"However, the opinion of all has a value," Phillis cried.
+
+"Speak lower," Florentin said.
+
+"It is thought that it is impossible for the police to find, among the
+two or three thousand tailors in Paris, all those who use the buttons
+marked A. P. And if they did find them, they could not designate all
+their customers to whom they have furnished these buttons. It is really
+looking for a needle in a bundle of hay."
+
+"When one takes plenty of time, one finds a needle in a bundle of hay,"
+Florentin said.
+
+"You ask me what I heard, and I tell you. But I do not depend entirely
+on that. As I passed near the Rue Louis-le-Grand, I went to Doctor
+Saniel's; it being his office hour I hoped to find him."
+
+"You told him the situation?" Florentin exclaimed.
+
+In any other circumstances she would have replied frankly, explaining
+that she had perfect confidence in Saniel; but when she saw her
+brother's agitation, she could not exasperate him by this avowal, above
+all, because she could not at the same time give her reasons for her
+faith in him. She must reassure him before everything.
+
+"No," she said, "but I spoke of Caffie to Doctor Saniel without his
+being surprised. As he made the first deposition, was it not natural
+that my curiosity should wish to learn a little more than the newspapers
+tell?"
+
+"Never mind, the act must appear strange."
+
+"I think not. But, anyhow, the interest that we have to learn all
+made me overlook this; and I think, when I have told you the doctor's
+opinion, you will not regret my visit."
+
+"And this opinion?" Madame Cormier asked.
+
+"His opinion is, that there was no struggle between Caffie and the
+assassin, whereas the position of Caffie in the chair where he was
+attacked proves that he was surprised. Therefore, if there was no
+struggle, there was no button torn off, and all the scaffolding of the
+police falls to the ground."
+
+Madame Cormier breathed a profound sigh of deliverance.
+
+"You see," she said to her son.
+
+"And the doctor's opinion is not the opinion of the first-comer, it is
+not even that of an ordinary physician. It is that of the physician who
+has certified to the death, and who, more than any one, has power,
+has authority, to say how it was given--by surprise, without struggle,
+without a button being pulled off."
+
+"It is not Doctor Saniel who directs the search of the police, or
+who inspires it," replied Florentin. "His opinion does not produce a
+criminal, while the button can--at least for those who believe in the
+struggle; and between the two the police will not hesitate.
+
+"Already the newspapers laugh at them for not having discovered the
+assassin, who has rejoined all the others they have let escape. They
+must follow the track they have started on, and this track--"
+
+He lowered his voice:
+
+"It will lead them here."
+
+"To do that they must pass by the Avenue de Clichy, and that seems
+unlikely."
+
+"It is the possible that torments me, and not the unlikely, and you
+cannot but recognize that what I fear is possible. I was at Caffies
+the day of the crime. I lost there a button torn off by violence.
+This button picked up by the police proves, according to them, the
+criminality of the one who lost it. They will find that I am the one--"
+
+"They will not find you."
+
+"Let us admit that they do find me. How should I defend myself?"
+
+"By proving that you were not in the Rue Sainte-Anne between five and
+six o'clock, since you were here."
+
+"And what witnesses will prove this alibi? I have only one--mamma.
+What is the testimony of a mother worth in favor of her son in such
+circumstances?"
+
+"You will have that of the doctor, affirming that there was no struggle,
+and consequently no button torn off."
+
+"Affirming, but carrying no proof to support his theory; the opinion of
+one doctor, which the opinion of another doctor may refute and destroy.
+And then, to prove that there was no struggle; Doctor Saniel will say
+that Caffie was surprised. Who could surprise Caffie? To open Caffies
+door when the clerk was away, it was necessary to ring first, and then
+to knock three times in a peculiar way. No stranger could know that, and
+who could know it better than I?"
+
+Step by step Phillis defended the ground against her brother; but little
+by little the confidence which at first sustained her weakened. With
+Saniel she was brave. Between her brother and mother, in this room that
+had witnessed their fears, not daring to speak loud, she was downcast,
+and let herself be overcome by their anxieties.
+
+"Truly," she said, "it seems as if we were guilty and not innocent."
+
+"And while we are tormenting ourselves, the criminal, probably, in
+perfect safety laughs at the police investigations; he had not thought
+of this button; chance throws it in his way. Luck is for him, and
+against us--once more."
+
+This was the plaint that was often on Florentin's lips. Although he had
+never been a gambler--and for sufficient reason--in his eyes everything
+was decided by luck. There are those who are born under a lucky star,
+others under an unlucky one. There are those who, in the battle of life,
+receive knocks without being discouraged, because they expect something
+the next day, as there are those who become discouraged because they
+expect nothing, and know by experience that tomorrow will be for them
+what today is, what yesterday was. And Florentin was one of these.
+
+"Why did I not stay in America?" he said.
+
+"Because you were too unhappy, my poor boy!" Madame Cormier said, whose
+maternal heart was moved by this cry.
+
+"Am I happier here, or shall I be to-morrow? What does this to-morrow,
+full of uncertainty and dangers, hold for us?"
+
+"Why do you insist that it has only dangers?" Phillis asked, in a
+conciliating and caressing tone.
+
+"You always expect the good."
+
+"At least I hope for it, and do not admit deliberately that it is
+impossible. I do not say that life is always rose-colored, but neither
+is it always black. I believe it is like the seasons. After winter,
+which is vile, I confess, come the spring, summer, and autumn."
+
+"Well, if I had the money necessary for the voyage, I would go and pass
+the end of the winter in a country where it would be less disagreeable
+than here, and, above all, less dangerous for my constitution."
+
+"You do not say that seriously, I hope?" cried Madame Cormier.
+
+"On the contrary, very seriously."
+
+"We are hardly reunited, and you think of a separation," she said,
+sadly.
+
+"It is not of a separation that Florentin thinks," cried Phillis, "but
+of a flight."
+
+"And why not?"
+
+"Because only the guilty fly."
+
+"It is exactly the contrary. The intelligent criminals stay, and, as
+generally they are resolute men, they know beforehand that they are
+able to face the danger; while the innocent, timid like myself, or the
+unlucky, lose their heads and fly, because they know beforehand, also,
+that if a danger threatens them, it will crush them. That is why I would
+return to America if I could pay my passage; at least I should feel easy
+there."
+
+There was a moment of silence, during which each one seemed to have no
+thought but to finish dinner.
+
+"Granting that this project is not likely," Florentin said, "I have
+another idea."
+
+"Why do you have ideas?" Phillis asked.
+
+"I wish you were in my place; we should see if you would not have them."
+
+"I assure you that I am in your place, and that your trouble is mine,
+only it does not betray itself in the same manner. But what is your
+idea?"
+
+"It is to find Valerius and tell him all."
+
+"And who will answer to us for Valerius's discretion?" asked Madame
+Cormier. "Would it not be the greatest imprudence that you could commit?
+One cannot play with a secret of this importance."
+
+"Valerius is an honest man."
+
+"It is because he cannot work when political, or rather patriotic,
+affairs go wrong, that you say this."
+
+"And why not? With a poor man who lives in a small way by his work, are
+not this care and pride in his country marks of an honorable heart?"
+
+"I grant the honorable heart, but it is another reason for being prudent
+with him," Phillis said. "Precisely because he may be what you think,
+reserve is necessary. You tell him what is passed. If he accepts it and
+your innocence, it is well; he will not betray your secret voluntarily
+nor by stupidity. But he will not accept it; he will look beyond. He
+will suppose that you wish to deceive him, and he will suspect you. In
+that case, would he not go and tell all to the police commissioner of
+our quarter? As for me, I think it is a danger that it would be foolish
+to risk."
+
+"And, according to you, what is to be done?"
+
+"Nothing; that is, wait, since there are a thousand chances against one
+for our uneasiness, and we exaggerate those that may never be realized."
+
+"Well, let us wait," he said. "Moreover, I like that; at the least, I
+have no responsibilities. What can happen will happen."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIX. THE KNOCK AT THE DOOR
+
+In order to put the button found at Caffies on the track of the
+assassin, it required that it should have come from a Parisian tailor,
+or, at least, a French one, and that the trousers had not been sold by a
+ready-made clothing-house, where the names of customers are not kept.
+
+The task of the police was therefore difficult, as weak, also, were the
+chances of success. As Saniel had said, it was like looking for a needle
+in a bundle of hay, to go to each tailor in Paris.
+
+But this was not their way of proceeding. In place of trying to find
+those who used these buttons, they looked for those who made them or
+sold them, and suddenly, without going farther than the directory, they
+found this manufacturer: "A. Pelinotte, manufacturer of metal buttons
+for trousers; trademark, A.P., crown and cock; Faubourg du Temple."
+
+At first this manufacturer was not disposed to answer questions of the
+agent who went to see him; but when he began to understand that he might
+reap some advantage from the affair, like the good merchant that he was,
+young and active, he put his books and clerks at his disposition. His
+boast was, in effect, that his buttons, thanks to a brass bonnet around
+which the thread was rolled instead of passing through the holes, never
+cut the thread and could not be broken. When they came off it was with
+a piece of the cloth. What better justification of his pretensions,
+what better advertisement than his button torn off with a piece of the
+trousers of the assassin? The affair would go before the assizes, and in
+all the newspapers there would be mention of the "A. P. buttons."
+
+He was asked for his customers' names, and after a few days the search
+began, guided by a list so exact that useless steps were spared.
+
+One morning a detective reached the Avenue de Clichy, and found the
+tailor Valerius in his shop, reading a newspaper. For it was not only
+when the country was in danger that Valerius had a passion for reading
+papers, but every morning and evening.
+
+Nothing that was published in the papers escaped him, and at the first
+words of the agent he understood immediately about what he was to be
+questioned.
+
+"It is concerning the affair in the Rue Sainte-Anne that you wish this
+information?" he said.
+
+"Frankly, yes."
+
+"Well, frankly also, I do not know if the secrets of the profession
+permit me to answer you."
+
+The agent, who was by no means stupid, immediately understood the man's
+character, and instead of yielding to the desire to laugh, caused by
+this reply honestly made by this good-natured man, whose long, black,
+bushy beard and bald head accentuated his gravity, he yielded to the
+necessity of the occasion.
+
+"That is a question to discuss."
+
+"Then let us discuss it. A customer, confiding in my honesty and
+discretion, gives me an order to make a pair of trousers; he pays me as
+he agreed, without beating me down, and on the day he promised. We are
+loyal to each other. I give him a pair of good trousers, honestly made,
+and he pays me with good money. We are even. Have I the right afterward,
+by imprudent words, or otherwise, to furnish clews against him? The case
+is a delicate one."
+
+"Do you place the interest of the individual above that of society?"
+
+"When it is a question of a professional secret, yes. Where should we be
+if the lawyer, the notary, the doctor, the confessor, the tailor, could
+accept compromises on this point of doctrine? It would be anarchy,
+simply, and in the end it would be the interest of society that would
+suffer."
+
+The agent, who had no time to lose, began to be impatient.
+
+"I will tell you," he said, "that the tailor, however important his
+profession may be, is not placed exactly as the doctor or confessor.
+Have you not a book in which you write your customers' orders?"
+
+"Certainly."
+
+"So that if you persevere in a theory, pushing it to an extreme, I need
+only to go to the commissioner of your quarter, who, in virtue of the
+power of the law conferred upon him, will seize your books."
+
+"That would be by violence, and my responsibility would be at an end."
+
+"And in these books the judge would see to whom you have furnished
+trousers of this stuff. It would only remain then to discover in whose
+interest you have wished to escape the investigations of the law."
+
+Saying this, he took from his pocket a small box, and taking out a piece
+of paper, he took from it a button to which adhered a piece of navy blue
+stuff.
+
+Valerius, who was not in the least moved by the threat of the
+commissioner, for he was a man to brave martyrdom, looked at the box
+curiously. When the agent displayed the button, a movement of great
+surprise escaped him.
+
+"You see," the agent exclaimed, "that you know this cloth!"
+
+"Will you permit me to look at it?" Valerius asked.
+
+"Willingly, but on condition that you do not touch it; it is precious."
+
+Valerius took the box, and approaching the front of the shop, looked at
+the button and the piece of cloth.
+
+"It is a button marked 'A.P.,' as you see, and we know that you use
+these buttons."
+
+"I do not deny it; they are good buttons, and I give only good things to
+my customers."
+
+Returning the box to the agent, he took a large book and began to turn
+over the leaves; pieces of cloth were pasted on the pages, and at the
+side were several lines of large handwriting. Arriving at a page where
+was a piece of blue cloth, he took the box and compared this piece with
+that of the button, examining it by daylight.
+
+"Sir," he said, "I am going to tell you some very serious things."
+
+"I am listening."
+
+"We hold the assassin of the Rue Sainte-Anne, and it is I who will give
+you the means of discovering him."
+
+"You have made trousers of this cloth?"
+
+"I have made three pairs; but there is only one pair that can interest
+you, that of the assassin. I have just told you that the secrets of the
+profession prevented me from replying to your questions, but what I have
+just seen frees my conscience. As I explained to you, when I make a
+pair of good trousers for a customer who pays me in good money, I do not
+think I have the right to reveal the affairs of my client to any one in
+the world, even to the law."
+
+"I understand," interrupted the agent, whose impatience increased.
+
+"But this reserve on my part rests on reciprocity: to a good customer,
+a good tailor. If the customer is not good the reciprocity ceases, or,
+rather, it continues on another footing--that of war; if any one
+treats me badly, I return the same. The trousers to which this stuff
+belongs"--he showed the button--"I made for an individual whom I do not
+know, and who presented himself to me as an Alsacian, which I believed
+so much more easily, because he spoke with a strong foreign accent.
+These trousers--I need not tell you how careful I was with them. I am
+a patriot, sir. He agreed to pay for them on delivery. When they were
+delivered, the young apprentice who took them had the weakness to not
+insist upon the money. I went to him, but could obtain nothing; he
+would pay me the next day, and so on. Finally he disappeared, leaving no
+address."
+
+"And this customer?"
+
+"I will give you his name without the slightest hesitation. Fritzner,
+not an Alsacian as I believed, but a Prussian to a certainty, who surely
+struck the blow; his disappearance the day after the crime is the proof
+of it."
+
+"You say that you were not able to procure his address?"
+
+"But you, who have other means at your disposal, can find him. He is
+twenty-seven or thirty years old, of middle height, blue eyes, a blond
+beard, and a complete blue suit of this cloth."
+
+The agent wrote this description in his note-book as the tailor gave it
+to him.
+
+"If he has not left Paris with these stolen thirty-five thousand francs,
+we shall find him, and the thanks will be yours," he said.
+
+"I am happy to be able to do anything for you."
+
+The agent was going, but he thought better of it.
+
+"You said that you had made three suits of this cloth?"
+
+"Yes, but there is only this Fritzner who counts. The two others are
+honest men, well known in the quarter, and they paid me honestly."
+
+"Since they have no cause for alarm, you need have no scruples in naming
+them. It is not in the name of justice that I ask their names, but for
+myself.--They will look well in my report and will prove that I pushed
+my investigations thoroughly."
+
+"One is a merchant in the Rue Truffant, and is called Monsieur Blanchet;
+the other is a young man just arrived from America, and his name is
+Monsieur Florentin Cormier."
+
+"You say Florentin Cormier?" the agent asked, who remembered this name
+was that of one who had seen Caffie on the day of the crime. "Do you
+know him?"
+
+"Not exactly; it is the first time that I have made clothes for him. But
+I know his mother and sister, who have lived in the Rue des Moines five
+or six years at least; good, honest people, who work hard and have no
+debts."
+
+The next morning about ten o'clock, a short time after Phillis's
+departure, Florentin, who was reading the newspaper in the dining-room,
+while his mother prepared the breakfast, heard stealthy steps that
+stopped on the landing before their door. His ear was too familiar with
+the ordinary sounds in the house to be deceived; there was in these
+steps a hesitation or a precaution which evidently betrayed a stranger,
+and with the few connections they had, a stranger was surely an
+enemy--the one whom he expected.
+
+A ring of the doorbell, given by a firm hand, made him jump from his
+chair. He did not hesitate; slowly, and with an air of indifference, he
+opened the door.
+
+He saw before him a man of about forty years, with a polite and shrewd
+face, dressed in a short coat, and wearing a flat hat.
+
+"Monsieur Florentin Cormier?"
+
+"I am he."
+
+And he asked him to come in.
+
+"The judge desires to see you at his office."
+
+Madame Cormier came from the kitchen in time to hear these few words,
+and if Florentin had not motioned to her to be silent, she would have
+betrayed herself. The words on her lips were:
+
+"You came to arrest my son!" They would have escaped her, but she
+crushed them back.
+
+"And can you tell me for what affair the judge summons me?" Florentin
+asked, steadying his voice.
+
+"For the Caffie affair."
+
+"And at what hour should I present myself before the judge?"
+
+"Immediately."
+
+"But my son has not breakfasted!" Madame Cormier exclaimed. "At least,
+take something before going, my dear child."
+
+"It is not worth while."
+
+He made a sign to her that she should not insist. His throat was too
+tight to swallow a piece of bread, and it was important that he should
+not betray his emotion before this agent.
+
+"I am ready," he said.
+
+Going to his mother he embraced her, but lightly, without effusion, as
+if he were only to be absent a short time.
+
+"By-and-by."
+
+She was distracted; but, understanding that she would compromise her son
+if she yielded to her feelings, she controlled herself.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XX. A TIGHTENING CHAIN
+
+As it was a part that he played, Florentin said to himself that he would
+play it to the best of his ability in entering the skin of the person he
+wished to be, and this part was that of a witness.
+
+He had been Caffie's clerk; the justice would interrogate him about his
+old employer, and nothing would be more natural. It was that only, and
+nothing but that, which he could admit; consequently, he should interest
+himself in the police investigations, and have the curiosity to learn
+how they stood.
+
+"Have you advanced far in the Caffie affair?" he asked the agent as they
+walked along.
+
+"I do not know," the agent answered, who thought it prudent to be
+reserved. "I know nothing more than the newspapers tell."
+
+On leaving his mother's house, Florentin observed on the other side
+of the street a man who appeared to be stationed there; at the end of
+several minutes, on turning a corner, he saw that this man followed them
+at a certain distance. Then it was not a simple appearance before the
+judge, for such precautions are not taken with a witness.
+
+When they reached the Place Clichy, the agent asked him if he would take
+a carriage, but he declined. What good was it? It was a useless expense.
+
+Then he saw the agent raise his hat, as if bowing to some one, but this
+bow was certainly not made to any one; and immediately, the man who had
+followed them approached. The raising of the hat was a signal. As from
+the deserted quarters of the Batignolles they entered the crowd, they
+feared he might try to escape. The character of the arrest became
+accentuated.
+
+After the presentiments and fears that had tormented him during the
+last few days this did not astonish him, but since they took these
+precautions with him, all was not yet decided. He must, then, defend
+himself to the utmost. Distracted before the danger came, he felt less
+weak now that he was in it.
+
+On arriving at the Palais de justice he was introduced immediately
+into the judge's office. But he did not attend to him at once; he was
+questioning a woman, and Florentin examined him by stealth. He saw a man
+of elegant and easy figure, still young, with nothing solemn or imposing
+about him, having more the air of a boulevardier or of a sportsman than
+of a magistrate.
+
+While continuing his questioning, he also examined Florentin, but with
+a rapid glance, without persistence, carelessly, and simply because his
+eyes fell upon him. Before a table a clerk was writing, and near the
+door two policemen waited, with the weary, empty faces of men whose
+minds are elsewhere.
+
+Soon the judge turned his head toward them.
+
+"You may take away the accused."
+
+Then, immediately addressing Florentin, he asked him his name, his
+Christian names, and his residence.
+
+"You have been the clerk of the agent of affairs, Caffie. Why did you
+leave him?"
+
+"Because my work was too heavy."
+
+"You are afraid of work?"
+
+"No, when it is not too hard; it was at his office, and left me no time
+to work for myself. I was obliged to reach his office at eight o'clock
+in the morning, breakfast there, and did not leave until seven to dine
+with my mother at the Batignolles. I had an hour and a half for that;
+at half-past eight I had to return, and stay until ten or half-past. In
+accepting this position I believed that I should be able to finish my
+education, interrupted by the death of my father, and to study law and
+become something better than a miserable clerk of a business man. It was
+impossible with Monsieur Caffie, so I left him, and this was the only
+reason why we separated."
+
+"Where have you been since?"
+
+This was a delicate question, and one that Florentin dreaded, for it
+might raise prejudices that nothing would destroy. However, he must
+reply, for what he would not tell himself others would reveal; an
+investigation on this point was too easy.
+
+"With another business man, Monsieur Savoureux, Rue de la Victoire,
+where I was not obliged to work in the evening. I stayed there about
+three months, and then went to America."
+
+"Why?"
+
+"Because, when I began to study seriously, I found that my studies
+had been neglected too long to make it possible for me to take them
+up again. I had forgotten nearly all I had learned. I should, without
+doubt, fail in my examination, and I should only begin the law too late.
+I left France for America, where I hoped to find a good situation."
+
+"How long since your return?"
+
+"Three weeks."
+
+"And you went to see Caffie?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"What for?"
+
+"To ask him for a recommendation to replace the one he gave me, which I
+had lost."
+
+"It was the day of the crime?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"At what time?"
+
+"I reached his house about a quarter to three, and I left about
+half-past three."
+
+"Did he give you the certificate for which you asked?"
+
+"Yes; here it is."
+
+And, taking it from his pocket, he presented it to the judge. It was
+a paper saying that, during the time that M. Florentin Cormier was his
+clerk, Caffie was entirely satisfied with him; with his work, as with
+his accuracy and probity.
+
+"And you did not return to him during the evening?" the judge asked.
+
+"Why should I return? I had obtained what I desired."
+
+"Well, did you or did you not return?"
+
+"I did not return to him."
+
+"Do you remember what you did on leaving Caffie's house?"
+
+If Florentin had indulged in the smallest illusion about his appearance
+before the judge, the manner of conducting the interview would have
+destroyed it. It was not a witness who was being questioned, it was a
+culprit. He had not to enlighten the justice, he had to defend himself.
+
+"Perfectly," he said. "It is not so long ago. On leaving the Rue
+Sainte-Anne, as I had nothing to do, I went down to the quays, and
+looked at the old books from the Pont Royale to the Institute; but at
+this moment a heavy shower came on, and I returned to the Batignolles,
+where I remained with my mother."
+
+"What time was it when you reached your mother's house?"
+
+"A few minutes after five."
+
+"Can you not say exactly?"
+
+"About a quarter past five, a few minutes more or less."
+
+"And you did not go out again?"
+
+"No."
+
+"Did any one call at your mother's after you arrived there?"
+
+"No one. My sister came in at seven o'clock, as usual, when she returned
+from her lesson."
+
+"Before you went up to your rooms did you speak with any of the other
+lodgers?"
+
+"No."
+
+There was a pause, and Florentin felt the judge's eyes fixed on him with
+an aggravating persistency. It seemed as if this look, which enveloped
+him from head to foot, wished to penetrate his inmost thoughts.
+
+"Another thing," said the judge. "You did not lose a trousers' button
+while you were with Caffie?"
+
+Florentin expected this question, and for some time he had considered
+what answer he should make to it. To deny was impossible. It would be
+easy to convict him of a fib, for the fact of the question being asked
+was sufficient to say there was proof that the button was his. He must,
+then, confess the truth, grave as it might be.
+
+"Yes," he said, "and this is how--"
+
+He related in detail the story of the bundle of papers placed on the
+highest shelf of the cases, his slipping on the ladder, and the loss of
+the button, which he did not discover until he was in the street.
+
+The judge opened a drawer and took from it a small box, from which he
+took a button that he handed to Florentin.
+
+"Is that it?" he asked.
+
+Florentin looked at it.
+
+"It is difficult for me to answer," he said, finally; "one button
+resembles another."
+
+"Not always."
+
+"In that case, it would be necessary for me to have observed the form
+of the one I lost, and I gave no attention to it. It seems to me that no
+one knows exactly how, or of what, the buttons are made that they wear."
+
+The judge examined him anew.
+
+"But are not the trousers that you wear to-day the same from which this
+button was torn?"
+
+"It is the pair I wore the day I called on Monsieur Caffie."
+
+"Then it is quite easy to compare the button that I show you with those
+on your trousers, and your answer becomes easy."
+
+It was impossible to escape this verification.
+
+"Unbutton your vest," said the judge, "and make your comparison with
+care--with all the care that you think wise. The question has some
+importance."
+
+Florentin felt it only too much, the importance of this question, but as
+it was set before him, he could not but answer frankly.
+
+He unbuttoned his waistcoat, and compared the button with his.
+
+"I believe that it is really the button that I lost," he said.
+
+Although he endeavored not to betray his anguish, he felt that his voice
+trembled, and that it had a hoarse sound. Then he wished to explain this
+emotion.
+
+"This is a truly terrible position for me," he said.
+
+The judge did not reply.
+
+"But because I lost a button at Monsieur Caffie's, it does not follow
+that it was torn off in a struggle."
+
+"You have your theory, and you will make the most of it, but this is not
+the place. I have only one more question to ask: By what button have you
+replaced the one you lost?"
+
+"By the first one I came across."
+
+"Who sewed it on?"
+
+"I did."
+
+"Are you in the habit of sewing on your buttons yourself?"
+
+Although the judge did not press this question by his tone, nor by the
+form in which he made it, Florentin saw the strength of the accusation
+that his reply would make against him.
+
+"Sometimes," he said.
+
+"And yet, on returning home, you found your mother, you told me. Was
+there any reason why she could not sew this button on for you?"
+
+"I did not ask her to do it."
+
+"But when she saw you sewing it, did she not take the needle from your
+hands?"
+
+"She did not see me."
+
+"Why?"
+
+"She was occupied preparing our dinner."
+
+"That is sufficient."
+
+"I was in the entry of our apartment, where I have slept since my
+return; my mother was in the kitchen."
+
+"Is there no communication between the kitchen and the entry?"
+
+"The door was closed."
+
+A flood of words rushed to his lips, to protest against the conclusions
+which seemed to follow these answers, but he kept them back. He saw
+himself caught in a net, and all his efforts to free himself only bound
+him more strongly.
+
+As he was asked no more questions it seemed to him best to say nothing,
+and he was silent a long time, of the duration of which he was only
+vaguely conscious.
+
+The judge talked in a low tone, the recorder wrote rapidly, and he heard
+only a monotonous murmur that interrupted the scratching of a pen on the
+paper.
+
+"Your testimony will now be read to you," the judge said.
+
+He wished to give all his attention to this reading, but he soon lost
+the thread of it. The impression it made upon him, however, was that it
+faithfully reproduced all that he had said, and he signed it.
+
+"Now," said the judge, "my duty obliges me, in presence of the charges
+which emanate from your testimony, to deliver against you a 'manda
+depot'."
+
+Florentin received this blow without flinching.
+
+"I know," he said, "that all the protestations I might make would have
+no effect at this moment; I therefore spare you them. But I have a favor
+to ask of you; it is to permit me to write to my mother and sister the
+news of my arrest--they love me tenderly. Oh, you shall read my letter!"
+
+"You may, sir."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXI. "REGARDING THE CAFFIE AFFAIR"
+
+After the departure of her son and the detective, Madame Cormier was
+prostrated. Her son! Her Florentin! The poor child! And she was sunk in
+despair.
+
+Had they not suffered enough? Was this new proof necessary? Why had
+their life been so unmercifully cruel? Why had not Dr. Saniel let
+her die? At least she would not have seen this last catastrophe, this
+disgrace; her son accused of assassination, in prison, at the assizes!
+
+Heretofore when she had yielded to her feelings and bewailed their sad
+lot, Phillis was at hand to cheer and caress her; but now she was alone
+in her deserted apartment, no one to hear her, see her, nor scold. Why
+should she not abandon herself to tears? She wept and trembled, but the
+moment arrived when, after having reached the extreme of despair, which
+showed her her son condemned as an assassin, and executed, she stopped
+and asked herself if she had not gone too far.
+
+He would return; certainly she might expect him. And she waited for him
+without breakfasting; he would not like to sit down to the table all
+alone, the poor child.
+
+Besides, she was too profoundly overcome to eat. She arranged the fire
+with care, so that the haricot of mutton would keep warm, for it was his
+favorite dish.
+
+Minutes and hours passed and he did not return. Her anguish came back;
+a witness would not be retained so long by the judge. Had they arrested
+him? Then what would become of him?
+
+She fell into a state of tears and despair, and longed for Phillis.
+Fortunately she would not be late to-day. Finally a quick, light step
+was heard on the landing, and as soon as she could, Madame Cormier went
+to open the door, and was stunned on seeing the agitated face of her
+daughter. Evidently Phillis was surprised by the sudden opening of the
+door.
+
+"You know all, then?" Madame Cormier cried.
+
+Phillis put her arms about her, and drew her into the dining-room, where
+she made her sit down.
+
+"Becalm," she said. "They will not keep him."
+
+"You know some way?"
+
+"We will find a way. I promise you that they will not keep him."
+
+"You are sure?"
+
+"I promise you."
+
+"You give me life. But how did you know?"
+
+"He wrote to me. The concierge gave me his letter, which had just come."
+
+"What does he say?"
+
+Madame Cormier took the letter that Phillis handed her, but the paper
+shook so violently in her trembling hand that she could not read.
+
+"Read it to me."
+
+Phillis took it and read
+
+   "DEAR LITTLE SISTER: After listening to my story, the judge retains
+   me. Soften for mamma the pain of this blow. Make her understand
+   that they will soon acknowledge the falseness of this accusation;
+   and, on your part, try to make this falseness evident, while on
+   mine, I will work to prove my innocence.
+
+   "Embrace poor mamma for me, and find in your tenderness, strength,
+   and love, some consolation for her; mine will be to think that you
+   are near her, dear little beloved sister.
+
+                         "FLORENTIN."
+
+"And it is this honest boy that they accuse of assassination!" cried
+Madame Cormier, beginning to weep.
+
+It required several minutes for Phillis to quiet her a little.
+
+"We must think of him, mamma; we must not give up."
+
+"You are going to do something, are you not, my little Phillis?"
+
+"I am going to find Doctor Saniel."
+
+"He is a doctor, not a lawyer."
+
+"It is exactly as a doctor that he can save Florentin. He knows that
+Caffie was killed without a struggle between him and the assassin;
+consequently without the wrenching off of a button. He will say it and
+prove it to the judge, and Florentin's innocence is evident. I am going
+to see him."
+
+"I beg of you, do not leave me alone too long."
+
+"I will come back immediately."
+
+Phillis ran from the Batignolles to the Rue Louis-le-Grand. In answer to
+her ring, Joseph, who had returned to his place in the anteroom, opened
+the door, and as Saniel was alone, she went immediately to his office.
+
+"What is the matter?" he asked, on seeing her agitation.
+
+"My brother is arrested."
+
+"Ah! The poor boy!"
+
+What he had said to her on explaining that this arrest could not take
+place was sincere; he believed it, and he more than believed it, he
+wished it. When he decided to kill Caffie he had not thought that the
+law would ever discover a criminal; it would be a crime that would
+remain unpunished, as so many were, and no one would be disturbed. But
+now the law had found and arrested one who was the brother of the woman
+he loved.
+
+"How was he arrested?" he asked, as much for the sake of knowing as to
+recover himself.
+
+She told what she knew, and read Florentin's letter.
+
+"He is a good boy, your brother," he said, as if talking to himself.
+
+"You will save him?"
+
+"How can I?"
+
+This cry escaped him without her understanding its weight; without her
+divining the expression of anxious curiosity in his glance.
+
+"To whom shall I address myself, if not to you? Are you not everything
+to me? My support, my guide, my counsel, my God!"
+
+She explained what she wished him to do. Once more an exclamation
+escaped Saniel.
+
+"You wish me to go to the judge--me?"
+
+"Who, better than you, can explain how things happened?"
+
+Saniel, who had recovered from his first feeling of surprise, did not
+flinch. Evidently she spoke with entire honesty, suspecting nothing, and
+it would be folly to look for more than she said.
+
+"But I cannot present myself before a judge in such away," he said. "It
+is he who sends for those he wants to see."
+
+"Why can you not go to his court, since you know things which will throw
+light upon it?"
+
+"Is it truly easy to go before this court? In going before it, I make
+myself the defender of your brother."
+
+"That is exactly what I ask of you."
+
+"And in presenting myself as his defender, I take away the weight of my
+deposition, which would have more authority if it were that of a simple
+witness."
+
+"But when will you be asked for this deposition? Think of Florentin's
+sufferings during this time, of mamma's, and of mine. He may lose his
+head; he may kill himself. His spirit is not strong, nor is mamma's. How
+will they bear all that the newspapers will publish?"
+
+Saniel hesitated a moment.
+
+"Well, I will go," he said. "Not this evening, it is too late, but
+tomorrow."
+
+"Oh, dear Victor!" she exclaimed, pressing him in her arms, "I knew that
+you would save him. We will owe you his life, as we owe you mamma's, as
+I owe you happiness. Am I not right to say you are my God?"
+
+After she was gone he had a moment of repentance in which he regretted
+this weakness; for it was a weakness, a stupid sentimentalism, unworthy
+of a sensible man, who should not permit himself to be thus touched and
+involved. Why should he go and invite danger when he could be quiet,
+without any one giving him a thought? Was it not folly? The law wanted a
+criminal. Public curiosity demanded one. Why take away the one that
+they had? If he succeeded, would they not look for another? It was
+imprudence, and, to use the true word, madness. Now that he was no
+longer under the influence of Phillis's beautiful, tearful eyes,
+he would not commit this imprudence. All the evening this idea
+strengthened, and when he went to bed his resolution was taken. He would
+not go to the judge.
+
+But on awakening, he was surprised to find that this resolution of the
+evening was not that of the morning, and that this dual personality,
+which had already struck him, asserted itself anew. It was at night that
+he resolved to kill Caffie, and he committed the deed in the evening.
+It was in the morning that he had abandoned the idea, as it was in the
+morning that he revoked the decision made the previous evening not to go
+to the rescue of this poor boy. Of what then, was the will of man made,
+undulating like the sea, and variable as the wind, that he had the folly
+to believe his was firm?
+
+At noon he went to the Palais de justice and sent in his card to the
+judge, on which he wrote these words: "Regarding the Caffie affair."
+
+He was received almost immediately, and briefly explained how, according
+to his opinion, Caffie was killed quickly and suddenly by a firm and
+skilful hand, that of a killer by profession.
+
+"That is the conclusion of your report," the judge said.
+
+"What I could not point out in my report, as I did not know of the
+finding of the button and the opinion it has led to, is that there
+was no struggle between the assassin and the victim, as is generally
+supposed."
+
+And medically he demonstrated how this struggle was impossible.
+
+The judge listened attentively, without a word, without interruption.
+
+"Do you know this young man?" he asked.
+
+"I have seen him only once; but I know his mother, who was my patient,
+and it is at her instigation that I decided to make this explanation to
+you."
+
+"Without doubt, it has its value, but I must tell you that it tends in
+no way to destroy our hypothesis."
+
+"But if it has no foundation?"
+
+"I must tell you that you are negative, doctor, and not suggestive. We
+have a criminal and you have not. Do you see one?"
+
+Saniel thought that the judge looked at him with a disagreeable
+persistency.
+
+"No," he said, sharply.
+
+Then rising, he said, more calmly:
+
+"That is not in my line."
+
+He had nothing to do but to retire, which he did; and on passing through
+the vestibule he said to himself that the magistrate was right. He
+believed that he held a criminal. Why should he let him go?
+
+As for him, he had done what he could.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXII. NOUGAREDE'S BRIDE
+
+Saniel passed the first proofs of his two 'concours' so brilliantly that
+the results of either were not doubtful. In delivering his thesis for
+the 'agregation', he commanded the admiration of his audience; by turns
+aggressive, severe, ironical, eloquent, he reduced his adversary to such
+an extremity that, overwhelmed, he was not able to reply. In his lecture
+at the hospital, his eloquence and his clear demonstration convinced the
+judges who were opposed to him that he was in the right.
+
+What could Caffie's death weigh, placed in the balance with these
+results? So little that it counted for nothing, and would have held
+no place in his thoughts if it had not been mixed in his mind with the
+accusation that would send Florentin to the assizes.
+
+Cleared of this fact, the death of the old man rarely crossed his mind.
+He had other things in his head, truly, than this memory which brought
+neither regret nor remorse; and it was not at this moment, when he
+touched the end at which he aimed, that he would embarrass himself, or
+sadden his triumph, with Caffie.
+
+A little before the expiration of the two months, during which time
+the poste restante retained the letters containing the thirty thousand
+francs, he called for them, and readdressed and mailed them to other
+post-offices.
+
+What did he want of this money, which was, in reality, a nuisance? His
+habits remained the same, except that he no longer struggled with his
+creditors, and paid cash for everything. He had no desire to make any
+change in his former mode of living; his ambition was otherwise and
+higher than in the small satisfactions, very small for him, that money
+gives.
+
+Days passed without a thought of Caffie, except in connection with
+Florentin. But Florentin, and above all, Phillis, reminded him that
+the comfort he enjoyed he owed to Caffie's death, and he was troubled
+accordingly.
+
+He did not believe that the investigations of the law would reach him
+now; everything conspired to confirm him in his scrutiny. That which
+he arranged so laboriously had succeeded according to his wish, and the
+only imprudence that he had committed, in a moment of aberration, seemed
+not to have been observed; no one had noticed his presence in the cafe
+opposite Caffie's house, and no one was astonished at his pertinacity in
+remaining there at an hour so unusual.
+
+But it was not enough that he was safe; he must prevent Florentin from
+being unjustly condemned for a crime of which he was innocent. It was
+a great deal that he should be imprisoned, that his sister should be in
+despair, and his mother ill from chagrin; but if he should be sent to
+the scaffold or to the galleys, it would be too much. In itself the
+death of Caffie was a small thing; it became atrocious if it led to such
+an ending.
+
+He did not wish this to happen, and he would do everything not only to
+prevent the condemnation, but to shorten the imprisonment.
+
+It was this sentiment that he obeyed in going to see the judge; but
+the manner in which he was received, showing him that the law was
+not disposed to let its hypothesis be changed by a simple medical
+demonstration, threw him into a state of uneasiness and perplexity.
+
+Without doubt, any one else in his place would have let things take
+their course, and since the law had a criminal with which it contented
+itself, would have done nothing to release him. While it followed its
+hypothesis to prove the criminality of the one it held, it would not
+look elsewhere; when it had condemned him, all would be finished; the
+Caffie affair would be buried, as Caffie himself was buried; silence and
+oblivion would give him security. The crime punished, the conscience of
+the public satisfied, it would ask for no more, not even to know if the
+debt was paid by the one who really owed it; it was paid, and that was
+sufficient. But he was not "any one else," and if he found the death of
+this old scamp legitimate, it was on the condition that Florentin did
+not pay for it, from whom he had not profited.
+
+Florentin must be released as soon as possible, and it was his duty
+to interest himself in his behalf--his imperative duty not only toward
+Phillis, but toward himself.
+
+He told Phillis that until Florentin came before the jury, he could
+do nothing, or almost nothing. When the time came, he would assert his
+authority, and speaking in the name of science, he would prove to the
+jury that the story of the button was an invention of the police, who
+were pushed to extremes, and would not bear examination; but until then
+the poor boy remained at Mazas, and however assured one might be at this
+moment of an acquittal, an immediate 'ordonnance de non-lieu' was of
+more value, if it could be obtained.
+
+For this the intervention and direction of a doctor were of little use;
+it required that of an advocate.
+
+Whom should he have? Phillis would have liked to apply to the most
+illustrious, to him who, by his talent, authority, and success, would
+win all his cases. But Saniel explained to her that workers of miracles
+were probably as difficult to find at the bar as in the medical
+profession, and that, if they did exist, they would expect a large fee.
+To tell the truth, he would have willingly given the thirty thousand
+francs in the 'poste restante', or a large part of this sum, to give
+Florentin his liberty; but it would be imprudent to take out the bills
+at this moment, and he could not declare that he had thirty thousand
+francs, or even ten thousand. He decided with Phillis to consult
+Brigard.
+
+On a Wednesday he went to the parlor in the Rue Vaugirard, where he
+had not been since his experiment with Glady. As usual, he was received
+affectionately by Crozat, who scolded him for coming so rarely, and as
+usual also, in order not to disturb the discussion that was going on, he
+remained standing near the door.
+
+This evening the theme of the discourse was a phrase of Chateaubriand's:
+"The tiger kills and sleeps; man kills and is sleepless." On listening
+to the discussion, Saniel said to himself that it was truly a pity not
+to be able to reply to all this rhetoric by a simple fact of personal
+experience. He had never slept so well, so tranquilly, as since Caffie's
+death, which relieved him from all the cares that in these last months
+had tormented and broken his sleep so much.
+
+At the end, Brigard concluded the discussion on saying that nothing
+better proved the power of the human conscience than this difference
+between man and beast.
+
+When they had all gone but Brigard, and Saniel was alone with him and
+Crozat, he stated his desire.
+
+"But is it the Caffie affair?"
+
+"Exactly."
+
+And he explained in detail the interest he felt in Florentin, the son of
+one of his patients, and also the situation of this patient.
+
+Brigard strongly recommended Nougarede, and described his recent
+successes before a jury. Crozat concurred with Brigard, and advised
+Saniel to see Nougarede the day after to-morrow.
+
+"In the morning, because after the Palais, Nougarede will be at
+his wedding, which, as you know, prevents him from coming here this
+evening."
+
+"What! Nougarede married?" exclaimed Saniel, surprised that the favorite
+disciple gave this lie to the doctrine and examples of his master.
+
+"My God, yes! We must not be too hard on him.
+
+"He submits to the fate of a special environment. Without our knowledge,
+Nougarede, we may say it now, and ought to say it, was the happy
+lover of a charming young person, the daughter of one of our most
+distinguished actresses, who was brought up in a fashionable convent.
+You see the situation. The result of this liaison was a child, a
+delicious little boy. It seemed quite natural that they should live 'en
+union libre', since they loved each other, and not weaken by legalities
+the strength of those that attached them to this child. But the mother
+is an actress, as I have told you, and wished her daughter to receive
+all the sacraments that the law and the church can confer. She managed
+so well that poor Nougarede yielded. He goes to the mayor, to the
+church; he legitimizes the child, and he even accepts a dot of two
+hundred thousand francs. I pity him, the unfortunate man! But I confess
+that I have the weakness to not condemn him as he would deserve if he
+married in any other way."
+
+Saniel was a little surprised at these points of resemblance with the
+charming young person that Caffie had proposed to him. At the least, it
+was curious; but if it were the same woman, he was not vexed to see that
+Nougarede had been less difficult than himself.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIII. STUNNING NEWS
+
+On going to see Nougarede, Saniel vaguely fancied the lawyer would tell
+him that an acquittal was certain if Florentin passed to the assizes,
+and even that an 'ordonnance de non-lieu' was probable. But his hope was
+not realized.
+
+"The adventure of the button for you or me would not have the same
+gravity as for this boy; we have no antecedents on which presumptions
+might be established, but he has. The forty-five francs which constitute
+an embezzlement for a salaried man will be, certainly, a starting-point
+for the accusation; one commences by a weakness and finishes by a crime.
+Do you not hear the advocate-general? He will begin by presenting the
+portrait of the honest, laborious, exact, scrupulous clerk, content with
+a little, and getting satisfaction from his duties accomplished; then,
+in opposition, he will pass to the clerk of to-day, as irregular in
+his work as in his conduct, full of desires, in a hurry to enjoy,
+discontented with everything and everybody, with others as with himself.
+And he will go on to speak of the embezzlement of the forty-five francs
+as the beginning of the crimes that led to the assassination. You may
+be sure if the affair goes to the assizes that you will hear these words
+and more, and I assure you that it will be difficult for us to destroy
+the impression that he will produce on the jury. But I hope we shall
+succeed."
+
+He had to give up the idea of obtaining the 'ordonnance de non-lieu',
+and to tell himself that the 'affaire' would come before the assizes;
+but it does not follow that one is condemned for what one is accused
+of, and Saniel persisted in believing that Florentin would not be.
+Assuredly, the prison was hard for the poor boy, and the trial before
+the jury, with all the ignominy that necessarily accompanies it, would
+be harder yet. But, after all, it would all disappear in the joy of
+acquittal; when that time came, there would be found, surely, some
+ingenious idea, sympathy, effective support, to pay him for all that he
+would have suffered. Certainly, things would come to pass thus, and the
+acquittal would be carried with a high hand.
+
+He said this to himself again and again, and from the day when he put
+the affair in Nougarede's hands, he often went to see him, to hear him
+repeat it.
+
+"He cannot be condemned; can he?"
+
+"One may always be condemned, even when one is innocent; as one may die
+at any time, you know that, even with excellent health."
+
+In one of these visits he met Madame Nougarede, who had then been
+several days married, and on recognizing in her the young virgin with
+a child, of whom Caffie showed him the portrait, he was strengthened
+in his idea that conscience, such as it was understood, was decidedly a
+strange weighing-machine, which might be made to say whatever one chose.
+Of what good were these hypocrisies, and whom did they deceive?
+
+Although he had told Phillis repeatedly that an acquittal was
+certain, and that he had promised her he would do all he could for
+Florentin--which he really did--she did not give entirely into his
+hands, or into Nougarede's, the task of defending her brother, but
+worked with them in his defence.
+
+Nougarede believed that the delay in bringing the affair before the
+assizes was caused by the attempts to learn if, during his residence in
+America, Florentin had not worked in some large meat-shop or sheepfold,
+where he would have learned to use a butcher knife, which was the chief
+point for the accusation. Phillis wrote to the various towns where
+Florentin had lived, and to tell the truth, he had worked at La Plata
+for six months as accountant in a large sheepfold, but never slaughtered
+the sheep.
+
+When she received a letter, she carried it immediately to Saniel, and
+then to Nougarede; and, at the same time, on all sides, in Paris, among
+those who had held relations with her brother, she sought for testimony
+that should prove to the jury that he could not be the man that his
+accusers believed him. It was thus that, all alone, without other means
+of action than those which she found in her sisterly tenderness and
+bravery, she organized an investigation parallel to that of the law,
+which, on the day of judgment, would carry a certain weight, it seemed,
+with the conviction of the jury, showing them what had been the true
+life of this irregular and debauched man, capable of anything to glut
+his appetite and satisfy his desires.
+
+Each time that she obtained a favorable deposition, she ran to Saniel
+to tell him, and then together they repeated that a conviction was
+impossible.
+
+"You are sure, are you not?"
+
+"Have I not always told you so?"
+
+He had also said that Florentin could not be arrested, basing the
+accusation on the torn button, and he had said that certainly an
+'ordonnance de non-lieu' would be given by the judge; but they wished to
+remember neither the one nor the other.
+
+Things had reached this state, when one Saturday evening Phillis arrived
+at Saniel's, radiant.
+
+As soon as the door opened she exclaimed:
+
+"He is saved!"
+
+"An ordonnance de non-lieu?"
+
+"No; but now it is of little importance. We can go to the assizes."
+
+She breathed a sigh which showed how great were her fears, in spite
+of the confidence she expressed when she repeated that conviction was
+impossible.
+
+He left his desk, and going toward her, took her in his arms, and made
+her sit down beside him on the divan.
+
+"You will see that I do not let myself be carried away by an illusion,
+and that, as I tell you, he is saved, really saved. You know that an
+illustrated paper has published his portrait?"
+
+"I do not read illustrated papers."
+
+"You could have seen them at the kiosks where they are displayed. It
+is there that I saw them yesterday morning when I went out, and I was
+petrified, red with shame, distracted, not knowing where to hide myself.
+'Florentin Cormier, the assassin of the Rue Sainte-Anne.' Is it not
+infamous that an innocent person should be thus dishonored? This was
+what I said to myself. Where did the paper get the photograph? They came
+to ask us for one, but you can imagine how I treated them, not knowing
+how anything good for us would result from such a disgrace."
+
+"And what is the result?"
+
+"The proof that it is not Florentin who was with Caffie at the moment
+when the assassination took place. All day yesterday and all this
+morning I was filled with the feeling of disgrace that followed me, when
+at three o'clock I received this little note from the concierge of the
+Rue Sainte-Anne."
+
+She took from her pocket a piece of paper folded in the form of a
+letter, which she handed to Saniel.
+
+   "MADEMOISELLE: If you will pass through the Rue Sainte-Anne, I have
+   something to tell you that will give you a great deal of pleasure, I
+   believe.
+
+          "I am your servant,
+
+               "WIDOW ANAIS BOUCHU."
+
+"You know the lame old concierge has never been willing to admit that my
+brother could be guilty. Florentin was polite and kind to her during
+his stay with Caffie, and she is grateful. Very often she has said to me
+that she is certain the guilty one would be found, and that when it was
+announced I must tell her. Instead of my telling her the good news, she
+has written to me. You may be sure I hurried to the Rue Sainte-Anne,
+expecting to hear something favorable, but we have a proof. When I
+arrived, the old woman took both of my hands, and told me that she would
+conduct me immediately to a lady who saw Caffie's assassin."
+
+"Saw him!" exclaimed Saniel, struck by a blow that shook him from head
+to foot.
+
+"She saw him perfectly, as I tell you. She added that this lady was the
+proprietor of the house, and that she lived in the second wing of the
+building, on the second story on the court, just opposite to Caffie's
+office. This lady, who is called Madame Dammauville, widow of a lawyer,
+is afflicted with paralysis, and I believe has not left her room for a
+year. The concierge explained this to me while crossing the court and
+mounting the stairs, but would say no more."
+
+If Phillis had been able to observe Saniel, she would have seen him pale
+to such a degree that his lips were as white as his cheeks; but she was
+completely absorbed in what she was saying.
+
+"A servant conducted us to Madame Dammauville, whom I found in a small
+bed near a window, and the concierge told her who I was. She received me
+kindly, and after having made me sit down in front of her, she told
+me that hearing from her concierge that I was exerting myself in my
+brother's behalf, she had something to tell me which would demonstrate
+that Caffie's assassin was not the man whom the law had arrested and
+detained. The evening of the assassination she was in this same room,
+lying on this same bed, before this same window, and after having read
+all day, she reflected and dreamed about her book, while listlessly
+watching the coming of twilight in the court, that already obscured
+everything in its shadow. Mechanically she had fixed her eyes on the
+window of Caffie's office opposite. Suddenly she saw a tall man, whom
+she took for an upholsterer, approach the window, and try to draw the
+curtains. Then Caffie rose, and taking the lamp, he came forward in
+such a way that the light fell full on the face of this upholsterer. You
+understand, do you not?"
+
+"Yes," murmured Saniel.
+
+"She saw him then plainly enough to remember him, and not to confound
+him with another. Tall, with long hair, a curled blond beard, and
+dressed like a gentleman, not like a poor man. The curtains were drawn.
+It was fifteen or twenty minutes after five. And it was at this
+same moment that Caffie was butchered by this false upholsterer, who
+evidently had only drawn the curtains so that he might kill Caffie in
+security, and not imagining that some one should see him doing a deed
+that denounced him as the assassin as surely as if he had been surprised
+with the knife in his hand. On reading the description of Florentin in
+the newspapers when he was arrested, Madame Dammauville believed the
+criminal was found--a tall man, with long hair and curled beard. There
+are some points of resemblance, but in the portrait published in the
+illustrated paper that she received, she did not recognize the man who
+drew the curtains, and she is certain that the judge is deceived. You
+see that Florentin is saved!"
+
+
+
+
+BOOK 3.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIV. HEDGING
+
+As he did not reply to this cry of triumph, she looked at him in
+surprise saw his face, pale, agitated, under the shock evidently of a
+violent emotion that she could not explain to herself.
+
+"What is the matter?" she asked, with uneasiness.
+
+"Nothing," he answered, almost brutally.
+
+"You do not wish to weaken my hope?" she said, not imagining that he
+could not think of this hope and of Florentin. This was a path to lead
+him out of his confusion. In following it he would have time to recover
+himself.
+
+"It is true," he said.
+
+"You do not think that what Madame Dammauville saw proves Florentin's
+innocence?"
+
+"Would what may be a proof for Madame Dammauville, for you, and for me,
+be one in the eyes of the law?"
+
+"However--"
+
+"I saw you so joyful that I did not dare to interrupt you."
+
+"Then you believe that this testimony is without value," she murmured,
+feeling crushed.
+
+"I do not say that. We must reflect, weigh the pro and con, compass the
+situation from divers points of view; that is what I try to do, which is
+the cause of my preoccupation that astonishes you."
+
+"Say that it crushes me; I let myself be carried away."
+
+"You need not be crushed or carried away. Certainly, what this lady told
+you forms a considerable piece of work."
+
+"Does it not?"
+
+"Without any doubt. But in order that the testimony she gives may be of
+great consequence, the witness must be worthy of trust."
+
+"Do you believe this lady could have invented such a story?"
+
+"I do not say that; but before all, it is necessary to know who she is."
+
+"The widow of an attorney."
+
+"The widow of an attorney and landowner. Evidently this constitutes
+a social status that merits consideration from the law; but the moral
+state, what is it? You say that she is paralyzed?"
+
+"She has been so a little more than a year."
+
+"Of what paralysis? That is a vague word for us others. There are
+paralyses that affect the sight; others that affect the mind. Is it one
+of these with which this lady is afflicted, or one of the others, which
+permitted her really to see, the evening of the assassination, that
+which she relates, and which leaves her mental faculties in a sane
+condition? Before everything, it is important to know this."
+
+Phillis was prostrated.
+
+"I had not thought of all that," she murmured.
+
+"It is very natural that you had not; but I am a doctor, and while you
+talked it was the doctor who listened."
+
+"It is true, it is true," she repeated. "I only saw Florentin."
+
+"In your place I should have seen, like you, only my brother, and I
+should have been carried away by hope. But I am not in your place. It
+is by your voice that this woman speaks, whom I do not know, and against
+whom I must be on my guard, for the sole reason that it is a paralytic
+who has told this story."
+
+She could not restrain the tears that came to her eyes, and she let them
+flow silently, finding nothing to reply.
+
+"I am sorry to pain you," he said.
+
+"I saw only Florentin's liberty."
+
+"I do not say this testimony of Madame Dammauville will not influence
+the judge, and, above all, the jury; but I must warn you that you
+will expose yourself to a terrible deception if you believe that her
+testimony alone will give your brother liberty. It is not on a testimony
+of this kind or of this quality that the law decides; better than we,
+it knows to what illusions people can lend themselves when it is the
+question of a crime that absorbs and excites the public curiosity. There
+are some witnesses who, with the best faith in the world, believe they
+have seen the most extraordinary things which only existed in their
+imaginations; and there are people who accuse themselves rather than say
+nothing."
+
+He heaped words on words, as if, in trying to convince Phillis, he might
+hope to convince himself; but when the sound of his words faded, he was
+obliged to declare to himself that, whatever the paralysis of this woman
+might be, it had not, in this instance, produced either defect of sight
+or of mind. She had seen, indeed, the tall man with long hair and curled
+beard, dressed like a gentleman, who was not Florentin. When she related
+the story of the lamp and the curtain cords, she knew what she was
+saying.
+
+In his first alarm he had been very near betraying himself. Without
+doubt he should have told himself that this incident of the curtains
+might prove a trap; but all passed so rapidly that he never imagined
+that, exactly at the moment when Caffie raised the lamp to give him
+light, there was a woman opposite looking at him, and who saw him
+so plainly that she had not forgotten him. He thought to use all
+precautions on his side in drawing the curtains, when, on the contrary,
+he would have done better had he left them undrawn. Without doubt the
+widow of the attorney would have been a witness of a part of the scene,
+but in the shadow she would not have distinguished his features as she
+was able to do when he placed himself before the window under the light.
+But this idea did not enter his mind, and, to save himself from
+an immediate danger, he threw himself into another which, although
+uncertain, was not less grave.
+
+Little by little Phillis recovered herself, and the hope that Madame
+Dammauville put in her heart, momentarily crushed by Saniel's remarks,
+sprang up again.
+
+"Is it not possible Madame Dammauville really saw what she relates?"
+
+"Without any doubt; and there are even probabilities that it is so,
+since the man who drew the curtains was not your brother, as we know.
+Unfortunately, it is not ourselves who must be convinced, since we are
+convinced in advance. It is those who, in advance also, have one whom
+they will not give up unless he is torn from them by force."
+
+"But if Madame Dammauville saw clearly?"
+
+"What must be learned before everything is, if she is in a state to see
+clearly; I have said nothing else."
+
+"A doctor would surely know on examining her?"
+
+"Without doubt."
+
+"If you were this doctor?"
+
+It was a cry rather than an exclamation. She wished that he should
+present himself before this woman; but in that case she would recognize
+him.
+
+Once more, under the pain of betraying his emotion, he must recover from
+this first impulse.
+
+"But how can you wish me to go and examine this woman whom I do not
+know, and who does not know me? You know very well that patients choose
+their doctors, and not doctors their patients."
+
+"If she sent for you?"
+
+"By what right?"
+
+"By what I shall learn on making the concierge talk, could you not
+recognize her kind of paralysis without seeing her?"
+
+"That would be a little vague. However, I will do the best I can. Try
+to learn not only what concerns her illness, but all that relates to
+her--what her position is, who are her relations, which is important
+for a witness who overawes as much by what he is as by what he says.
+You understand that a deposition that destroys the whole plan of the
+prosecution will be severely disputed, and will only be accepted if
+Madame Dammauville has by her character and position a sufficient
+authority to break down all opposition."
+
+"I will also try to learn who is her doctor. You may know him. What he
+would tell you would be worth more than all the details that I could
+bring you."
+
+"We should be immediately decided on the paralysis, and we should see
+what credit we could accord this woman's words."
+
+While listening to Phillis and talking himself, he had time to compass
+the situation that this thunderbolt created for him. Evidently, the
+first thing to do was to prevent a suspicion from arising in Phillis's
+mind, and it was to this that he applied himself on explaining the
+different kinds of paralysis. He knew her well enough to know that he
+had succeeded. But what would she do now? How did she mean to make use
+of Madame Dammauville's declaration? Had she spoken of it to any one
+besides himself? Was it her intention to go to Nougarede and tell
+him what she had learned? All that must be made clear, and as soon as
+possible. She must do nothing without his knowledge and approval. The
+circumstances were critical enough, without his letting accident become
+the master to direct them and conduct them blindly.
+
+"When did you see Madame Dammauville?" he asked.
+
+"Just this minute."
+
+"And now, what do you wish to do?"
+
+"I think that I ought to tell Monsieur Nougarde."
+
+"Evidently, whatever the value of Madame Dammauville's declaration, he
+should know it; he will appraise it. Only, as it is well to explain to
+him what may vitiate this testimony, if you wish, I will go to see him."
+
+"Certainly I wish it, and I thank you."
+
+"In the mean time, return to your mother and tell her what you have
+learned; but, that she may not yield to an exaggerated hope, tell
+her, also, that if there are chances, and great ones, in favor of your
+brother, on the other side there are some that are unfavorable. Tomorrow
+or this evening you will return to the Rue Sainte-Anne and begin
+your inquiries of the concierge. If the old woman tells you nothing
+interesting, you must go to Madame Dammauville, and make some reason
+for seeing her. Make her talk, and you will notice if her ideas are
+consecutive, and examine her face and eyes. Above all, neglect nothing
+that appears to you characteristic. Having taken care of your mother,
+you know almost as well as a doctor the symptoms of myelitis, and you
+could see instantly if Madame Dammauville has them."
+
+"If I dared!" she said timidly, after a short hesitation.
+
+"What?"
+
+"I would ask you to come with me to the concierge immediately."
+
+"You think of such a thing!" he exclaimed.
+
+Since the evening when he had testified to the death of Caffie, he had
+not returned to the Rue Sainte-Anne; and it was not when the description
+given by Madame Dammauville was, doubtless, already spread in the
+quarter, that he was going to commit the imprudence of showing himself.
+But he must explain this exclamation.
+
+"How can you expect a doctor to give himself up to such an
+investigation? On your part it is quite natural; on mine it would be
+unheard of and ridiculous; add that it would be dangerous. You must
+conciliate Madame Dammauville, and this would be truly a stupidity that
+would give her a pretext for thinking that you are trying to find out
+whether she is, or is not, in her right mind."
+
+"That is true," she said. "I had not thought of that. I said to myself
+that, while I could only listen to what the concierge would tell me, you
+would know how to question her in a way that would lead her to say what
+you want to learn."
+
+"I hope that your investigation will tell me. In any case, let us offend
+in nothing. If to-morrow you bring me only insignificant details, we
+will consider what to do. In the mean time, return to the concierge this
+evening and question her. If it is possible, see Madame Dammauville,
+and do not go home until after having obtained some news on this subject
+that is of such importance to us. And I will go to see Nougarde."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXV. DANGEROUS DETAILS
+
+It was not to falsify Phillis's story that Saniel insisted on going
+to see Nougarede. What good would it do? That would be a blunder which
+sooner or later would show itself, and in that case would turn against
+him. He would have liked, with the authority of a physician, to explain
+that this testimony of a paralytic could have no more importance than
+that of a crazy woman.
+
+But at the first words of an explanation Nougarede stopped him.
+
+"What you say is very possible, my dear friend; but I shall make you
+see that it is not for us to raise objections of this kind. Here is a
+testimony that may save our client; let us accept this, such as it may
+be, whence it comes. It is the business of the prosecution to prove that
+our witness could not see what she relates that she saw, or that her
+mental condition does not permit her to know what she saw; and do not
+be afraid, investigation will not be lacking. Do not let us even give a
+hint from our side; that would be stupid."
+
+This, certainly, was not what Saniel wished; only he believed it a duty,
+in his quality of physician, to indicate some rocks against which they
+might strike themselves.
+
+"Our duty," continued the advocate, "is, therefore, to manage in a way
+to escape them; and this is how I understand the role of this really
+providential witness, if it is possible to make her undertake it.
+Since it has occurred to you--you who wish the acquittal of this poor
+boy--that the testimony of Madame Dammauville may be vitiated by the
+simple fact that it comes from a sick woman, it is incontestable, is
+it not, that this same idea will occur to those who wish for his
+conviction? This testimony should be irrefutable; it should be presented
+in such a way that no one could raise anything against it, so that it
+would compel the acquittal in the same moment that it is presented. It
+was between a quarter past and half past five o'clock that Caffie was
+assassinated; at exactly a quarter past five, a woman of respectable
+position, and whose intellectual as well as physical faculties render
+her worthy of being believed, saw in Caffies office a man, with whom
+it is materially impossible to confound Florentin Cormier, draw the
+curtains of the window, and thus prepare for the crime. She would make
+her deposition in these conditions, and in these terms, and the affair
+would be finished. There would not be a judge, after this confrontation,
+who would send Florentin Cormier before the assizes, and, assuredly,
+there would not be two voices in the jury for conviction. But things
+will not happen like this. Without doubt, Madame Dammauville bears a
+name that is worth something; her husband was an estimable attorney, a
+brother of the one who was notary at Paris."
+
+"Have you ever had any business with her?"
+
+"Never. I tell you what is well known to every one, morally she is
+irreproachable. But is she the same physically and mentally? Not at all,
+unfortunately. If a physician can be found who will declare that her
+paralysis does not give her aberrations or hallucinations, another one
+will be found who will contest these opinions, and who will come to
+an opposite conclusion. So much for the witness herself; now for
+the testimony. This testimony does not say that the man who drew the
+curtains at a quarter past five was built in such a way that it is
+materially impossible to confound him with Florentin Cormier, because
+he was small or hunchbacked or bald, or dressed like a workman; while
+Florentin is tall, straight, with long hair and beard, and dressed like
+a gentleman. It says, simply, that the man who drew the curtains
+was tall, with long hair, and curled blond beard, and dressed like a
+gentleman. But this description is exactly Florentin Cormier's, as it is
+yours--"
+
+"Mine!" Saniel exclaimed.
+
+"Yours, as well as that of many others. And it is this, unfortunately
+for us, which destroys the irrefutability that we must have. How is
+it certain that this tall man, with long hair and curled beard, is not
+Florentin Cormier, since these are his chief characteristics? And it was
+at night, at a distance of twelve or fifteen metres, through a window,
+whose panes were obscured by the dust of papers and the mist, that
+this sick woman, whose eyes are affected, whose mind is weakened by
+suffering, was able, in a very short space of time, when she had no
+interest to imprint upon her memory what she saw, to grasp certain
+signs, that she recalled yesterday strongly enough to declare that the
+man who drew the curtains was not Florentin Cormier, against whom so
+many charges have accumulated from various sides, and who has only this
+testimony in his favor--every sensible person could not but find it
+suspicious!"
+
+"But it is true," Saniel said, happy to lend himself to this view of the
+matter, which was his own.
+
+"What makes the truth of a thing, my dear sir, is the way of presenting
+it; let us change this manner and we falsify it. To arrive at the
+conclusion which made you say 'It is true,' I am on the side of the idea
+that to-morrow Madame Dammauville's story should be known to the law,
+that the brave lady should be heard before the prosecution, and that
+time should be allowed to examine this testimony that you suspect. Now
+let us look at it from the opposite point. Madame Dammauville's story is
+not known to the law, or, if something transpires, we will arrange that
+this something is so vague that the prosecution will attach but little
+importance to it. And this is possible if we do not base a new defence
+on this testimony. We arrive at the judgment, and when the prosecution
+has listened to its witnesses which have overwhelmed us--the agent of
+affairs Savoureux, the tailor Valerius,--it is Madame Dammauville's
+turn. She simply relates what she saw, and declares that the man who
+is on the prisoner's bench is not the same who drew the curtains at a
+quarter past five. Do you see the 'coup de theatre'? The prosecution had
+not foreseen it; it had not inquired into the health of the witness; the
+physician would not be there to quote the defects of sight or reason;
+very probably it would not think of the dusty windowpanes, or of the
+distance. And all the opposing arguments that would be properly arranged
+if there were time, would be lacking, and we should carry the acquittal
+with a high hand."
+
+Arranged thus, things were too favorable for Saniel for him not to
+receive, with a sentiment of relief, this combination which brought
+Florentin's acquittal more surely, it seemed to him, than all that
+they had arranged for his defence up to this day. However, an objection
+occurred to him, which he communicated to Nougarede immediately.
+
+"Would one wish to admit that Madame Dammauville had kept silent on so
+grave a matter, and waited for an audience to reveal it?"
+
+"This silence she kept until yesterday; why should she not keep it a few
+days longer? It is evident that if she had not related what she saw, it
+is because she had reasons for being silent. It is probable that, being
+ill, she did not wish to expose herself to the annoyances and fatigue
+of an investigation; and in her eyes her deposition was not of great
+importance. What should she have revealed to the prosecution? That the
+man who committed the crime was tall, with a curled blond beard? This
+man the law held, or it held one the description of whom answered to
+this, which to Madame Dammauville was the same thing. She did not
+need, therefore, to call the police or the judge to tell them these
+insignificant things for her own comfort; and, also, because she
+believed that she had nothing interesting to say, she did not speak. It
+was when accident brought to her notice the portrait of the accused, she
+recognized that the law had not the real criminal, and then she broke
+the silence. The moment when she first saw this portrait is not stated
+precisely; I undertake to arrange that. The difficulty is not there."
+
+"Where do you see it?"
+
+"Here: Madame Dammauville may have already told her story to so many
+persons that it is already public property, where the prosecution has
+picked it up. In that case there will be no 'coup de theatre'. She
+will be questioned, her deposition examined, and we will have only a
+suspected testimony. The first thing to do, then, is to know how far
+this story has spread, and if there is yet time to prevent it from
+spreading farther."
+
+"That is not easy, it seems to me."
+
+"I believe Mademoiselle Phillis can do it. She is a brave woman, whom
+nothing dejects or disconcerts, which is the living proof that we
+are only valued according to the force and versatility of the inner
+consciousness. For the rest, I need not sound her praises, since you
+know her better than I; and what I say has no other object but to
+explain the confidence that I place in her. As I cannot interfere
+myself, I think there is no better person than she to act on Madame
+Dammauville, without disturbing or wounding her, and to bring about
+the result that we desire. I am sure that she has already won Madame
+Dammauville, and that she will be listened to with sympathy."
+
+"Do you wish me to write to her to come to see you tomorrow?"
+
+"No; it would be better for you so see her this evening, if possible."
+
+"I shall go to the Batignolles when I leave you."
+
+"She will enter into her part perfectly, I am certain, and she will
+succeed, I hope."
+
+"It seems to me that your combination rests, above all, on the 'coup de
+theatre' of the non-recognition of Florentin by Madame Dammauville. How
+will you bring this paralytic to court?"
+
+"I depend upon you."
+
+"And how?"
+
+"You will examine her."
+
+"I shall have to go to her house!"
+
+"Why not?"
+
+"Because I am not her doctor."
+
+"You will become so."
+
+"It is impossible."
+
+"I do not find it at all impossible that you should be called in
+consultation. I have not forgotten that your thesis was on the paralyses
+due to the affection of the spinal cord, and it was remarkable enough
+for us to discuss it in our 'parlotte' of the Rue de Vaugirard. You
+have, therefore, authority in the matter."
+
+"It is not on account of having written several works on the
+pathological anatomy of medullary lesions, and especially on the
+alterations of the spinal ganglia, that one acquires authority in a
+question so comprehensive and so delicate."
+
+"Do not be too modest, dear friend. I have had, lately, to consult my
+Dictionary of Medicine, and at each page your work was quoted. And,
+besides, the way in which you passed your examinations made you famous.
+Every one talks of you. So it is not impossible that Mademoiselle
+Phillis, relating that her mother was cured of a similar paralysis, will
+give Madame Dammauville the idea of consulting you, and her physician
+will send for you."
+
+"You will not do that?"
+
+"And why should I not do it?"
+
+They looked at each other a moment in silence, and Saniel turned his
+eyes away.
+
+"I detest nothing so much as to appear to put myself forward."
+
+"In this case it is no matter what you detest or like. The question is
+to save this unfortunate young man whom you know to be innocent; and you
+can do a kind deed and aid us. You examine Madame Dammauville; you see
+with which paralysis she is afflicted, and consequently, what exceptions
+may be taken at her testimony. At the same time, you see if you can cure
+her, or, at least, put her in a state to go to court."
+
+"And if it is proved that she cannot leave her bed?"
+
+"In that case I shall change my order of battle, and that is why it is
+of capital importance--you know that that is the word--that we should be
+warned beforehand."
+
+"You will make the judge receive her deposition?"
+
+"In any case. But I shall make her write a letter that I shall read at
+the desired moment, and I shall call upon her physician to explain that
+he would not permit his patient to come to court. Without doubt, the
+effect would not be what I desire, but, anyhow, we should have one."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVI. A GOOD MEMORY
+
+After Phillis, Nougarde also wished him to see Madame Dammauville; this
+coincidence was not the least danger of the situation that opened before
+him.
+
+If he saw her, the chances were that she would recognize in him the
+man who drew the curtains; for, if he was able to speak to Phillis and
+Nougarede of an affection of the eyes or of the mind, he did not believe
+in these affections, which for him were only makeshifts.
+
+When he reached Madame Cormier's, Phillis had not returned, and he was
+obliged to explain to the uneasy mother why her daughter was late.
+
+It was a delirium of joy, before which he felt embarrassed. How should
+he break the hope of this unhappy mother?
+
+What he had said to Phillis and to Nougarede he repeated to her.
+
+"But it is possible, also, for paralytics to enjoy all their faculties!"
+Madame Cormier said, with a decision that was not in accordance with her
+habit or with her character.
+
+"Assuredly."
+
+"Am I not an example?"
+
+"Without doubt."
+
+"Then Florentin will be saved."
+
+"This is what we hope. I only caution you against an excess of joy by
+an excess of prudence. Nevertheless, it is probable Mademoiselle Phillis
+will settle this for us when she returns."
+
+"Perhaps it would have been better if you had gone to the Rue
+Sainte-Anne. You would have found her."
+
+There was, then, a universal mania to send him to the Rue Sainte-Anne!
+
+They waited, but the conversation was difficult and slow between them.
+It was neither of Phillis nor of Florentin that Saniel thought; it was
+of himself and of his own fears; while Madame Cormier's thoughts ran to
+Phillis. Then there were long silences that Madame Cormier interrupted
+by going to the kitchen to look after her dinner, that had been ready
+since two o'clock.
+
+Not knowing what to say or do in the presence of Saniel's sombre face
+and preoccupation, which she could not explain, she asked him if he had
+dined.
+
+"Not yet."
+
+"If you will accept a plate of soup, I have some of yesterday's
+bouillon, that Phillis did not find bad."
+
+But he did not accept, which hurt Madame Cormier. For a long time Saniel
+had been a sort of god to her, and since he had shown so much zeal
+regarding Florentin, the 'culte' was become more fervent.
+
+At last Phillis's step was heard.
+
+"What! You came to tell mamma!" she exclaimed, on seeing Saniel.
+
+Ordinarily her mother listened to her respectfully, but now she
+interrupted her.
+
+"And Madame Dammauville?" she asked.
+
+"Madame Dammauville has excellent eyes. She is a woman of intellect,
+who, without the assistance of any business man, manages her fortune."
+
+Overcome, Madame Cormier fell into a chair.
+
+"Oh, the poor child!" she murmured.
+
+Exclamations of joy escaped her which contained but little sense.
+
+"It is as I thought," Saniel said; "but it would be imprudent to abandon
+ourselves to hopes to-day that to-morrow may destroy."
+
+While he spoke he escaped, at least, from the embarrassment of his
+position and from the examination of Phillis.
+
+"What did Monsieur Nougarde say?" she asked.
+
+"I will explain to you presently. Begin by telling us what you learned
+from Madame Dammauville. It is her condition that will decide our
+course, at least that which Nougarde counsels us to adopt."
+
+"When the concierge saw me return," Phillis began, "she showed a certain
+surprise; but she is a good woman, who is easily tamed, and I had not
+much trouble in making her tell me all she knows of Madame Dammauville.
+Three years ago Madame Dammauville became a widow without children. She
+is about forty years of age, and since her widowhood has lived in her
+house in the Rue Sainte-Anne. Until last year she was not ill, but she
+went every year to the springs at Lamoulon. It is a year since she was
+taken with pains that were thought to be rheumatic, following which,
+paralysis attacked her and confined her to her bed. She suffers so much
+sometimes that she cries, but these are spasms that do not last. In the
+intervals she lives the ordinary life, except that she does not get up.
+She reads a great deal, receives her friends, her sister-in-law--widow
+of a notary--her nephews and nieces, and one of the vicars of the
+parish, for she is very charitable. Her eyes are excellent. She has
+never had delirium or hallucinations. She is very reserved, detests
+gossip, and above everything seeks to live quietly. The assassination
+of Caffie exasperated her; she would let no one speak to her of him, and
+she spoke of it to no one. She even said that if she were in a condition
+to leave her house, she would sell it, so that she would never hear the
+name of Caffie."
+
+"How did she speak of the portrait and of the man she saw in Caffie's
+office?" Saniel asked.
+
+"That is exactly the question that the concierge was not able to answer;
+so I decided to go to see Madame Dammauville again."
+
+"You are courageous," the mother said with pride.
+
+"I assure you that I was not so on going up-stairs. After what I had
+heard of her character, it was truly audacious to go a second time,
+after an interval of two hours, to trouble her, but it was necessary.
+While ascending, I sought a reason to justify, or, at least, to explain
+my second visit, and I found only an adventurous one, for which I ought
+to ask your indulgence."
+
+She said this on turning toward Saniel, but with lowered eyes, without
+daring to look at him, and with an emotion that made him uneasy.
+
+"My indulgence?" he said.
+
+"I acted without having time to reflect, and under the pressure of
+immediate need. As Madame Dammauville expressed surprise at seeing me
+again, I told her that what she had said to me was so serious, and might
+have such consequences for the life and honor of my brother, that I had
+thought of returning the next day, accompanied by a person familiar with
+the affair, before whom she would repeat her story; and that I came to
+ask her permission to present this person. This person is yourself."
+"I!"
+
+"And that is why," she said feebly, without raising her eyes, "that I
+have need of your indulgence."
+
+"But I had told you--" he exclaimed with a violence that the
+dissatisfaction at being so disposed of was not sufficient to justify.
+
+"That you could not present yourself to Madame Dammauville in the
+character of a physician unless she sent for you. I did not forget that;
+and it is not as a physician that I wish to beg you to accompany me, but
+as a friend, if you permit me to speak thus; as the most devoted, the
+most firm, and the most generous friend that we have had the happiness
+to encounter in our distress."
+
+"My daughter speaks in my name, as in her own," Madame Cormier said
+with emotion; "I add that it is a respectful friendship, a profound
+gratitude, that we feel toward you."
+
+Although Phillis trembled to see the effect that she produced on Saniel,
+she continued with firmness:
+
+"You would accompany me, then, without doing anything ostensibly,
+without saying you are a doctor, and while she talks you could examine
+her. Madame Dammauville gave her consent to my request with extreme
+kindness. I shall return to her to-morrow, and if you think it useful,
+if you think you should accept the part that I claimed for you without
+consulting you, you can accompany me."
+
+He did not reply to these last words, which were an invitation as well
+as a question.
+
+"Did you not examine her as I told you?" he asked, after a moment of
+reflection.
+
+"With all the attention of which I was capable in my anguish. Her
+glance seemed to me straight and untroubled; her voice is regular, very
+rhythmical; her words follow each other without hesitation; her ideas
+are consecutive and clearly expressed. There is no trace of suffering on
+her pale face, which bears only the mark of a resigned grief. She
+moves her arms freely, but the legs, so far as I could judge under
+the bedclothes, are motionless. In many ways it seems to me that her
+paralysis resembles mamma's, though it is true that in others it does
+not. She must be extremely sensitive to the cold, for although the
+weather is not cold today, the temperature of her room seemed very
+high."
+
+"This is an examination," Saniel said, "that a physician could not have
+conducted better, unless he questioned the patient; and had I been
+with you during this visit we should not have learned anything more.
+It appears certain that Madame Dammauville is in possession of her
+faculties, which renders her testimony invulnerable."
+
+Madame Cormier drew her daughter to her and kissed her passionately.
+
+"I have, therefore, nothing to do with this lady," continued Saniel,
+with the precipitation of a man who has just escaped a danger. "But your
+part, Mademoiselle, is not finished, and you must return to her tomorrow
+to fulfil that which Nougarde confides to you."
+
+He explained what Nougarde expected of her.
+
+"Certainly," she said. "I will do all that I am advised to do for
+Florentin. I will go to Madame Dammauville; I will go everywhere. But
+will you permit me to express my astonishment that immediate profit is
+not made of this declaration to obtain the release of my brother?"
+
+He repeated the reasons that Nougarede had given him for not proceeding
+in this manner.
+
+"I would not say anything that resembles a reproach," said Madame
+Cormier, with more decision than she ordinarily put into her words; "but
+perhaps Monsieur Nougarde has some personal ideas in his advice. Our
+interest is that Florentin should return to us as quickly as possible,
+and that he should be spared the sufferings of a prison. But I
+understand that to an 'ordonnance de non-lieu', in which he does not
+appear, Monsieur Nougarde prefers the broad light of the court, where he
+could deliver a brilliant address, useful to his reputation."
+
+"Whether or not he has made this calculation," Saniel said, "things are
+thus. I, also, I should have preferred the 'ordonnance de non-lieu',
+which has the great advantage of finishing everything immediately.
+Nougarede does not believe that this would be a good plan to follow, so
+we must follow the one that he traces out for us."
+
+"We will follow it," Phillis said, "and I believe that it may bring
+about the result Monsieur Nougarede expects, as Madame Dammauville would
+have spoken to but few persons. When I tried to make her explain herself
+on this point, without asking her the question directly, she told me
+that she had only spoken to the concierge of the non-resemblance of the
+portrait to the man she saw draw the curtains, so that the concierge,
+who had often spoken to her of Florentin and of my efforts to save
+him, might warn me. I shall see, then, to-morrow, how far her story has
+spread, and I will go to see you about it at five o'clock, unless you
+prefer that I should go at once to see Monsieur Nougarede."
+
+"Begin with me, and we will go together to see him, if there is
+occasion. I am going to write to him."
+
+"If I understand Monsieur Nougarde's plan, it seems that it rests
+on Madame Dammauville's appearance in court. Will this appearance be
+possible? That is what I could not learn; only a physician could tell."
+
+Saniel did not wish to let it appear that he understood this new
+challenge.
+
+"I forgot to tell you," Phillis continued, "that the physician who
+attends her is Doctor Balzajette of the Rue de l'Echelle. Do you know
+him?"
+
+"A prig, who conceals his ignorance under dignified manners."
+
+No sooner had these words left his lips than he realized his error.
+Madame Dammauville should have an excellent physician, one who was so
+high in the estimation of his 'confreres' that, if he did not cure her,
+it was because she was incurable.
+
+"Then how can you hope that he will cure her in time for her to go to
+court?" Phillis asked.
+
+He did not answer, and rose to go. Timidly, Madame Cormier repeated her
+invitation, but he did not accept it, in spite of the tender glance that
+Phillis gave him.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVII. A NEW PERIL
+
+Would he be able to resist the pressure which from all sides at once
+pushed him toward the Rue Sainte Anne?
+
+It seemed that nothing was easier than not to commit the folly of
+yielding, and yet such was the persistence of the efforts that were
+united against him, that he asked himself if, one day, he would not
+be led to obey them in spite of himself. Phillis, Nougarede, Madame
+Cormier. Now, whence would come a new attack?
+
+For several months he had enjoyed a complete security, which convinced
+him that all danger was over forever. But all at once this danger burst
+forth under such conditions that he must recognize that there could
+never more be any security for him. To-day Madame Dammauville menaced
+him; tomorrow it would be some one else. Who? He did not know. Every
+one. And it was the anguish of his position to be condemned to live
+hereafter in fear, and on the defensive, without repose, without
+forgetfulness.
+
+But it was not tomorrow about which he need be uneasy at this moment, it
+was the present hour; that is to say, Madame Dammauville.
+
+That she should say, with so much firmness at the sight of a single
+portrait, that the man who drew the curtains was not Florentin, she must
+have an excellent memory of the eyes; at the same time a resolute mind
+and a decision in her ideas, which permitted her to affirm without
+hesitation what she believed to be true.
+
+If they should ever meet, she would recognize him, and recognizing him,
+she would speak.
+
+Would she be believed?
+
+This was the decisive question, and from what he had heard of her, it
+seemed that she would be.
+
+Denials would not suffice. He did not go to Caffie's at a quarter past
+five. Where was he at this moment? What witness could he call upon?
+Caffie's wound was made by a hand skilled in killing, and this learned
+hand was his, more even than that of a murderer. Every one knew that
+his position at that moment was desperate, financially speaking; and,
+suddenly, he paid his debts. Who would believe the Monte Carlo story?
+
+One word, one little hint, from this Madame Dammauville and he was lost,
+without defence, without possible struggles.
+
+Truly, and fortunately, since she was paralyzed and confined to her bed,
+he ran no risk of meeting her face to face at the corner of a street, or
+at the house of an acquaintance, nor of hearing the cry of surprise that
+she would not fail to give on recognizing him. But that was not enough
+to make him sleep in an imprudent security on saying to himself that
+this meeting was improbable. It was improbable, also, to admit that some
+one was exactly opposite to Caffies window at the moment when he
+drew the curtains; more improbable yet to believe that this fact,
+insignificant in itself, that this vision, lasting only an instant,
+would be so solidly engraved in a woman's memory as to be distinctly
+remembered after several months, as if it dated from the previous
+evening; and yet, of all these improbabilities, there was formed a
+reality which enclosed him in such a way that at any moment it might
+stifle him.
+
+Despite the importunities of Phillis, Madame Cormier, and Nougarede, and
+of all those which might arise, he would not be fool enough to confront
+the danger of a recognition in the room where this paralytic was
+confined--at least, that was probable, for, after what had happened, he
+was certain of nothing--but this recognition might take place elsewhere.
+
+In Nougarede's plan Madame Dammauville would come to court to make her
+declaration; he himself was a witness; they would, therefore, at a given
+moment, meet each other, and it was not impossible that before the court
+the recognition would occur with a 'coup de theatre' very different from
+that arranged by Nougarede.
+
+Without doubt there were chances that Madame Dammauville would not be
+able to leave her bed to go to court; but were there only one for her
+leaving it, he must foresee it and take precautions.
+
+A single one offered security: to render himself unrecognizable; to cut
+his beard and hair; to be no more the long-haired, curled, blond-bearded
+man that she remembered. Had he been like every one else she would not
+have remarked him; or, at least, she would have confounded him with
+others. A man can only permit himself to be original in appearance when
+he is sure beforehand that he will never have anything to fear.
+
+Assuredly, nothing was easier than to have his hair and beard cut; he
+had only to enter the first barber shop he came to; in a few minutes the
+change would be radical.
+
+Among his acquaintances he need not be uneasy at the curiosity that this
+change might produce; more than one would not remark it, and those who
+would be surprised at first would soon cease to think of it, without
+doubt; otherwise, he had an easy answer for them; on the eve of becoming
+a serious personage, he abandoned the last eccentricities of the old
+student, and passed the bridge without wish to return by the left bank.
+
+But it was not only to acquaintances that he must account; there
+were Phillis and Nougarde. Had not the latter already remarked the
+resemblance between him and the description, and would it not be
+imprudent to lead him to ask why this resemblance suddenly disappeared?
+
+It would be dangerous to expose himself to this question from the
+lawyer, but it would be much more dangerous coming from Phillis.
+Nougarede would only show surprise; Phillis might ask for an
+explanation.
+
+And he must reply to her so much the more clearly, because four or five
+times already he had almost betrayed himself as to Madame Dammauville,
+and if she had let his explanations or embarrassment pass, his
+hesitations or his refusal, without questioning him frankly, certainly
+she was not the less astonished. Should he appear before her with short
+hair and no beard, it would be a new astonishment which, added to the
+others, would establish suspicions; and logically, by the force of
+things, in spite of herself, in spite of her love and her faith, she
+would arrive at conclusions from which she would not be able to free
+herself. Already, five or six months before, this question of long hair
+and beard had been agitated between them. As he complained one day of
+the bourgeois who would not come to him, she gently explained to him
+that to please and attract these bourgeois it was, perhaps, not quite
+well to astonish those whom one does not shock. That overcoats less
+long, hats with less brim, and hair and beard shorter; in fact, a
+general appearance that more nearly approached their own, would be,
+perhaps, more agreeable. He became angry, and replied plainly that such
+concessions were not in keeping with his character. How could he now
+abruptly make these concessions, and at a time when his success at the
+examinations placed him above such small compromises? He resisted when
+he needed help, and when a patient was an affair of life or death to
+him; he yielded when he had need of no one, and when he did not care for
+patients. The contradiction was truly too strong, and such that it could
+not but strike Phillis, whose attention had already had only too much to
+arouse it.
+
+And yet, as dangerous as it was to come to the decision to make himself
+unrecognizable, it would be madness on his part to draw back; the sooner
+the better. His fault had been in not foreseeing, the day after Caffie's
+death, that circumstances might arise sooner or later which would force
+it upon him. At that moment it did not present the same dangers as now;
+but parting from the idea that he had not been seen by any one, that
+he could not have been seen, he had rejoiced in the security that this
+conviction gave him, and quietly become benumbed.
+
+The awakening had come; with his eyes open he saw the abyss to the edge
+of which his stupidity had brought him.
+
+How strong would he not be if during the last three months he had not
+had this long hair and beard, which was most terrible testimony against
+him? Instead of taking refuge in miserable makeshifts when Phillis and
+Nougarede asked him to see Madame Dammauville, he would have boldly held
+his own, and have gone to see her as they wished. In that case he would
+be saved, and soon Florentin would be also.
+
+And he believed himself intelligent! And he proudly imagined he could
+arrange things beforehand so well that he would never be surprised! What
+he should have foreseen would come to pass, nothing more; the lesson
+that experience taught him was hard, and this was not the first one;
+the evening of Caffie's death he saw very clearly that a new situation
+opened before him, which to the end of his life would make him the
+prisoner of his crime. To tell the truth, however, this impression
+became faint soon enough; but now it was stronger than ever, and to a
+certainty, never to be dismissed again.
+
+But it was useless to look behind; it was the present and the future
+that he must measure with a clear and firm glance, if he did not wish to
+be lost.
+
+After carefully examining and weighing the question, he decided to have
+his hair and beard cut. However adventurous this resolution was, however
+embarrassing it might become in provoking curiosity and questions, it
+was the only way of escaping a possible recognition.
+
+Mechanically, by habit, he bent his steps toward the Rue
+Neuve-des-Petits-Champs, where his barber lived, but he had taken only
+a few steps when reflection caused him to stop; it would be certainly
+a mistake to provoke the gossip of this man who, knew him, and who, for
+the pleasure of talking, would tell every one in the quarter that he had
+just cut the hair and beard of Dr. Saniel. He returned to the boulevard,
+where he was not known.
+
+But as he was about to open the door of the shop which he decided to
+enter, he changed his mind. He happened to find the explanation that he
+must give Phillis, and as he wished to avoid the surprise that she would
+not fail to show if she saw him suddenly without hair and beard, he
+would give this explanation before having them cut, in such a way that
+all at once and without looking for another reason, she would understand
+that this operation was indispensable.
+
+And he went to dinner, furious with himself and with things, to see to
+what miserable expedients he was reduced.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVIII. SANIEL VISITS A BARBER
+
+The following day at five o'clock when Phillis rang, he opened the door
+for her. Hardly had she entered when she was about to throw herself into
+his arms as usual, with a quickness that told how happy she was to see
+him. But he checked her with his hand.
+
+"What is the matter?" she asked paralyzed and full of fears.
+
+"Nothing; or, at least nothing much."
+
+"Against me?"
+
+"Certainly not, dear one."
+
+"You are ill?"
+
+"No, not ill, but I must take precautions which prevent me from
+embracing you. I will explain; do not be uneasy, it is not serious."
+
+"Quick!" she cried, examining him, and trying to anticipate his thought.
+
+"You have something to tell me?"
+
+"Yes, good news. But I beg of you, speak first; do not leave me in
+suspense."
+
+"I assure you that you need not be uneasy; and when I speak thus, you
+know that you should believe me. You see that I am not uneasy."
+
+"It is for others that you are alarmed, never for yourself."
+
+"Do you know what the pelagre is?"
+
+"No."
+
+"It is a special disease of the hair and beard, due to the presence in
+the epidermis of a kind of mushroom. Well, it is probable that I have
+this disease."
+
+"Is it serious?"
+
+"Troublesome for a man, but disastrous for a woman, because, before any
+treatment, the hair must be cut. You understand, therefore, that if I
+have the pelagre, as I believe I have, I am not going to expose you to
+the risk of catching it in embracing you. It is very easily transmitted,
+and in that case you would be obliged, probably, to do for yourself
+what I must do for myself; that is, to cut my hair. With me it is of no
+consequence; but with you it would be murder to sacrifice your beautiful
+hair."
+
+"You say 'probably.'"
+
+"Because I am not yet quite certain that I have the pelagre. For about
+two weeks I have felt a slight itching in my head and, naturally, I paid
+no attention to it. I had other things to do; and besides, I was not
+going to believe I was attacked with a parasitic malady merely on
+account of an itching. But, after some time, my hair became dry and
+began to fall out. I had no time to attend to it, and the days passed;
+besides, the excitement of my examinations was enough to make my hair
+fall. To-day, just before you came, I had a few minutes to spare, and
+I examined one of my hairs through a microscope; if I had not been
+disturbed I should have finished by this time."
+
+"Continue your examination."
+
+"It would take some time to do it thoroughly. If it is really the
+pelagre, as I have reason to believe, tomorrow you will see me without
+hair and beard. I would not hesitate, in spite of the astonishment that
+my appearance would cause."
+
+"What good will that do?"
+
+"I cannot tell people that I had my hair and beard cut because I have a
+parasitic disease. Every one knows it is contagious."
+
+"When the hair is cut, what will become of the disease?"
+
+"With energetic treatment it will rapidly disappear. Before long you may
+embrace me if--you do not find me too ugly."
+
+"O dearest!"
+
+"And now for you; you have come from Madame Dammauville?"
+
+He did not need to persist; Phillis accepted his story so readily that
+he felt reassured on her side; she would not alarm herself about it. As
+for others, the embarrassment of confessing a contagious malady would be
+a sufficient explanation, if he were ever obliged to furnish one.
+
+"What did she say to you?" he asked.
+
+"Good and kind words to begin with, which show what an excellent woman
+she is. After having presented myself twice at her house yesterday, you
+understand that I was not quite easy on asking her to receive me again
+to-day. As I tried to excuse myself, she said she was glad to see my
+devotion to my brother, that I need never excuse myself for asking
+her assistance, and that she would help me all she could. With this
+encouragement I explained what we want her to do, but she did not appear
+disposed to do it. Without giving her Monsieur Nougarede's reasons, I
+said we were obliged to conform to the counsels of those who directed
+the affair, and I begged her to help us. Finally she was won over,
+but reluctantly, and said she would do as we wished. But she could
+not assure me that her servants had not talked about it, nor could she
+promise to leave her bed to go to court, for she had not left her room
+for a year."
+
+"Does she expect to be able to rise soon?"
+
+"I repeat her words, to which I paid great attention in order not to
+forget them: 'I am promised that I shall be better next year, but who
+can tell? I will urge my doctor to give me an answer, and when you come
+again I will tell you what he says.' Profiting by the door that she
+opened to me, I kept the conversation on this doctor. It seems to me,
+but I am not certain, that she has but little confidence in him. He was
+the classmate of her husband and of her brother-in-law the notary; he is
+the friend of every one, curing those who can be cured, or letting them
+die by accident. You see what kind of a doctor he is."
+
+"I told you I knew him."
+
+"See if I deceive myself, and to what I tell you, add what you already
+know. Frightened to see in whose hands she is, I undertook to find out,
+and finished by learning--without asking her directly--that she has seen
+no other physician during the year. When she was taken with paralysis a
+consultation was held, and she has had Doctor Balzajette ever since. She
+says he is very kind, and takes care of her as well as another would."
+
+Saniel improved the opportunity to refer to his stupidity in frankly
+expressing his opinion on the solemn Balzajette.
+
+"It is probable," he said.
+
+"It is certain? Do you believe that during one year nothing has appeared
+in Madame Dammauville's disease that should demand new treatment? Do you
+think the solemn Balzajette is incapable of finding it all by himself?"
+
+"He is not so dull as you suppose."
+
+"It is you who speak of dulness."
+
+"To diagnose a disease and to treat it are two things. It is the
+consultation you speak of that settled the question of Madame
+Dammauville's disease, and prescribed the treatment that Balzajette had
+only to apply; and his capacity, I assure you, is sufficient for this
+task."
+
+As she appeared but little reassured, he persisted, for it would be
+an imprudence to let Phillis become enamored of the idea that if he
+attended Madame Dammauville, he would cure her, even if it required a
+miracle.
+
+"We have some time before us, since the 'ordonnance de renvoi' before
+the assizes is not yet given out. Madame Dammauville has promised to
+question her doctor, to learn if he hopes to put her in condition to
+leave her bed soon. Let us wait, therefore."
+
+"Would it not be better to act than to wait?"
+
+"At least let us wait for news from Balzajette. Either it will be
+satisfactory, and then we shall have nothing to do, or it will not be,
+and in that case I promise you to see Balzajette. I know him well enough
+to speak to him of your patient, which, above all, enables me, in
+making your brother intervene, to interest myself openly in his
+reestablishment."
+
+"O dearest, dearest!" she murmured, in a spirit of gratitude.
+
+"You cannot doubt my devotion to you first, and to your brother
+afterward. You asked me an impossible thing, that I was obliged to
+refuse, to my regret, precisely because it was impossible; but you know
+that I am yours, and will do all I can for your family."
+
+"Forgive me."
+
+"I have nothing to forgive; in your place I should think as you do, but
+I believe that in mine you would act as I do."
+
+"Be sure that I have never had an idea of blame in my heart for what is
+with you an affair of dignity. It is because you are high and proud that
+I love you so passionately."
+
+She rose.
+
+"Are you going?" he asked.
+
+"I want to carry Madame Dammauville's words to mamma; you can imagine
+with what anguish she awaits me."
+
+"Let us, go. I will leave you at the boulevard to go to see Nougarede."
+
+The interview with the advocate was short.
+
+"You see, dear friend, that my plan is good; bring Madame Dammauville to
+court, and we shall have some pleasant moments."
+
+This time Saniel had not the hesitation of the previous evening, and he
+entered the first barber-shop he saw. When he returned to his rooms
+he lighted two candles, and placing them on the mantle, he looked at
+himself in the glass.
+
+Coquetry had never been his sin, and often weeks passed without his
+looking in a mirror, so indifferent was he when making his toilet.
+However, as a young boy he sometimes looked in his small glass, asking
+himself what he would become, and he could now recall his looks--an
+energetic face with clearly drawn features, a physiognomy open and
+frank, without being pretty, but not disagreeable. His beard had
+concealed all this; but now that it was gone, he said to himself without
+much reflection that he would find again, without doubt, the boy he
+remembered.
+
+What he saw in the glass was a forehead lined transversely; oblique
+eyebrows, raised at the inside extremity, and a mouth with tightened
+lips turned down at the corners; furrows were hollowed in the cheeks;
+and the whole physiognomy, harassed, ravaged, expressed hardness.
+
+What had become of that of the young man of other days? He had before
+him the man that life had made, and of whom the violent contractions of
+the muscles of the face had modelled the expression.
+
+"Truly, the mouth of an assassin!" he murmured.
+
+Then, looking at his shaved head, he added with a smile:
+
+"And perhaps that of one condemned to death, whose toilet has just been
+made for the guillotine."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIX. A BROKEN NEGATIVE
+
+To have made himself unrecognizable was, without doubt, a safe
+precaution; but having started on this course, he would not be easy
+until he had destroyed all traces of himself in such a way that Madame
+Dammauville would never be able to find the man that she had seen so
+clearly under Caffie's lamp.
+
+Precisely because he was not vain and had no pretension to beauty, he
+had escaped the photograph mania. Once only he had been photographed
+in spite of himself, simply to oblige a classmate who had abandoned
+medicine for photography.
+
+But now this once was too much, for there was danger that this portrait
+taken three years before, and showing him with the hair and beard that
+he wished to suppress, might be discovered. Without doubt there were few
+chances that a copy of it would be seen by Madame Dammauville; but if
+there existed only one against a hundred thousand, he must arrange it so
+that he need have no fear.
+
+He had had a dozen copies of this photograph, but as his relatives were
+few, he kept the majority of them. One he sent to his mother, who was
+living at that time; another went to the priest of his village, and
+later he had given one to Phillis. He must, then, have nine in his
+possession. He found them and burned them immediately.
+
+Of the three that remained, only one might testify against him, the one
+belonging to Phillis. But it would be easy for him to get it again on
+inventing some pretext, while as to the others, truly he had nothing to
+fear.
+
+The real danger might come from the photographer, who perhaps had some
+of the photographs, and who undoubtedly preserved the negative. This was
+his first errand the next day.
+
+On entering the studio of this friend, he experienced a disagreeable
+feeling, which troubled him and made him uneasy; he had not given his
+name, and counting on the change made by the cutting of his hair and
+beard, he said to himself that his friend, who had not seen him for a
+long time, certainly would not recognize him.
+
+He had taken but a few steps, his hat in his hand, like a stranger who
+is about to accost another, when the photographer came toward him with
+outstretched hand, and a friendly smile on his face.
+
+"You, my dear friend! What good fortune is worth the pleasure of your
+visit tome? Can I be useful to you in any way?"
+
+"You recognize me, then?"
+
+"What! Do I recognize you? Do you ask that because you have cut
+your hair and beard? Certainly it changes you and gives you a new
+physiognomy; but I should be unworthy of my business if, by a different
+arrangement of the hair, I could not recognize you.
+
+"Besides, eyes of steel like yours are not forgotten; they are a
+description and a signature."
+
+Then this means in which he placed so much confidence was only a new
+imprudence, as the question, "You recognize me, then?" was a mistake.
+
+"Come, I will pose you at once," the photographer said. "Very curious,
+this shaved head, and still more interesting, I think, than with the
+beard and long hair. The traits of character are more clearly seen."
+
+"It is not for a new portrait that I have come, but for the old one.
+Have you any of the proofs?"
+
+"I think not, but I will see. In any case, if you wish some they are
+easily made, since I have the plate."
+
+"Will you look them up? For I have not a single proof left of those you
+gave me, and on looking at myself in the glass this morning I found such
+changes between my face of to-day and that of three years ago, that I
+would like to study them. Certain ideas came to me on the expression of
+the physiognomy, that I wish to study, with something to support them."
+
+The search for the proofs made by an assistant led to no results; there
+were no proofs.
+
+"Exactly; and for several days I have thought of making some," the
+photographer said. "Because your day of glory will come, when your
+portrait will be in a distinguished place in the shop-windows and
+collections. Every one talks of your 'concours'. Although I have
+abandoned medicine without the wish to return to it, I have not become
+indifferent to what concerns it, and I learned of your success. Which
+portrait shall we put in circulation? The old or the new?"
+
+"The new."
+
+"Then let us arrange the pose."
+
+"Not to-day; it is only yesterday that I was shaved, fearing an attack
+of pelagre, and the skin covered by the beard has a crude whiteness that
+will accentuate the hardness of my physiognomy, which is really useless.
+We will wait until the air has tanned me a little, and then I will
+return, I promise you."
+
+"How many proofs do you want of your old portrait?"
+
+"One will do."
+
+"I will send you a dozen."
+
+"Do not take the trouble; I will take them when I come to pose. But in
+the mean time, could you not show me the plate?"
+
+"Nothing easier."
+
+When it was brought, Saniel took the glass plate with great care,
+holding it with the tips of his fingers by the two opposite corners, in
+order not to efface the portrait. Then, as he was standing in the shadow
+of a blue curtain, he walked towards the chimney where the light was
+strong, and began his examination.
+
+"It is very good," he said; "very curious."
+
+"Only a photograph can have this documentary value."
+
+To compare this document with the reality, Saniel approached the chimney
+more closely, above which was a mirror. When his feet touched the
+marble hearth he stopped, looking alternately at the plate which he held
+carefully in his hands, and at his face reflected in the glass. Suddenly
+he made an exclamation; he let fall the plate, which, falling flat on
+the marble, broke into little pieces that flew here and there.
+
+"How awkward I am!"
+
+He showed a vexation that should not leave the smallest doubt in the
+photographer's mind as to its truth.
+
+"You must get one of the proofs that you have given away," his friend
+said, "for I have not a single one left."
+
+"I will try and find one."
+
+What he did try to find on leaving was whether or no he had succeeded
+in rendering himself unrecognizable, for he could not trust to
+this experience, weakened by the fact that this old friend was a
+photographer. With him it was a matter of business to note the typical
+traits that distinguish one face from another, and in a long practice he
+had acquired an accuracy Madame Dammauville could not possess.
+
+Among the persons he knew, it seemed to him that the one in the best
+condition to give certainty to the proof was Madame Cormier. He knew at
+this hour she would be alone, and as she had not been, assuredly, warned
+by her daughter that he intended to shave, the experiment would be
+presented in a way to give a result as exact as possible.
+
+In answer to his ring Madame Cormier opened the door, and he saluted her
+without being recognized; but as the hall was dark this was not of great
+significance. His hat in his hand, he followed her into the dining-room
+without speaking, in order that his voice should not betray him.
+
+Then, after she had looked at him a moment, with uneasy surprise at
+first, she began to smile.
+
+"It is Doctor Saniel!" she cried. "Mon Dieu! How stupid of me not to
+recognize you; it changes you so much to be shaved! Pardon me."
+
+"It is because I am shaved that I come to ask a favor."
+
+"Of us, my dear sir? Ah! Speak quickly; we should be so happy to prove
+our gratitude."
+
+"I would ask Mademoiselle Phillis to give me, if she has it, a
+photograph that I gave her about a year ago."
+
+As Phillis wished the liberty to expose this photograph frankly, in
+order to have it always before her, she had asked for it, and Saniel had
+given it to her, in her mother's presence.
+
+"If she has it!" exclaimed Mme. Cormier. "Ah! my dear sir, you do not
+know the place that all your goodness, and the services that you have
+rendered us, have made for you in our hearts."
+
+And passing into the next room, she brought a small velvet frame in
+which was the photograph. Saniel took it out, on explaining the study
+for which he wanted it, and after promising to bring it back soon, he
+returned to his rooms.
+
+Decidedly, everything was going well. The plate was destroyed, Phillis's
+proof in his hands; he had nothing more to fear from this side. As to
+the experiment made on the mother, it was decisive enough to inspire him
+with confidence. If Madame Cormier, who had seen him so often and for so
+long a time, and who thought of him at every instant, did not recognize
+him, how was it possible that Madame Dammauville, who had only seen him
+from a distance and for a few seconds, could recognize him after several
+months?
+
+Would he never accustom himself to the idea that his life could not have
+the tranquil monotony of a bourgeois existence, that it would experience
+shocks and storms, but that if he knew how to remain always master of
+his force and will, it would bring him to a safe port?
+
+The calm that was his before this vexation came back to him, and when
+the last proofs of his concours, confirming the success of the first,
+had given him the two titles that he so ardently desired and pursued
+at the price of so many pains, so many efforts and privations, he could
+enjoy his triumph in all security.
+
+He held the present in his strong hands, and the future was his.
+
+Now he could walk straight, boldly, his head high, jostling those who
+annoyed him, according to his natural temperament.
+
+Although these last months had been full of terrible agitation for
+him, on account of everything connected with the affair of Caffie and
+Florentin, and above all, on account of the fatigue, emotion, and the
+fever of his 'concours', yet he had not interrupted his special works
+for a day or even an hour, and his experiments followed for so many
+years had at length produced important results, that prudence alone
+prevented him from publishing. In opposition to the official teaching
+of the school, these discoveries would have caused the hair to stand
+upright on the old heads; and it was not the time, when he asked
+permission to enter, to draw upon himself the hostility of these
+venerable doorkeepers, who would bar the way to a revolutionist. But,
+now that he was in the place for ten or twelve years, he need take no
+precautions, either for persons or for ideas, and he might speak.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXX. PHILLIS PRECIPITATES MATTERS
+
+Saniel saw his colleague, the solemn Balzajette, and so adroitly as not
+to provoke surprise or suspicion, he spoke of Madame Dammauville, in
+whom he was interested incidentally; without persisting, and only to
+justify his question, he explained the nature of this interest.
+
+Although solemn, Balzajette was not the less a gossip, and it was his
+solemnity that made him gossip. He listened to himself talk, and when,
+his chest bulging, his pink chin freshly shaved resting on his white
+cravat, his be-ringed hand describing in the air noble and demonstrative
+gestures, one could, if one had the patience to listen to him, make
+him say all that one wished; for he was convinced that his interlocutor
+passed an agreeable moment, whose remembrance would never be forgotten.
+His patients might wait in pain or anguish, he did not hasten the
+majestic delivery of his high-sounding phrases with choice adjectives;
+and unless it was to go to a dinner-party, which he did at least five
+days in the week, he could not leave you until after he had made you
+partake of the admiration that he professed for himself.
+
+It was to an affection of the spinal cord that Mme. Dammauville's
+paralysis was due, and consequently it was perfectly curable; even
+Balzajette was astonished that with his treatment and his care the cure
+was delayed.
+
+"But what shall I say to you, young 'confrere'? You know better than I
+that with women everything is possible--above all the impossible."
+
+And during a half-hour he complaisantly related the astonishment that
+the fashionable women under his care had caused him, in spite of his
+knowledge and experience.
+
+"Well, to resume, what shall I tell you, young 'confrere'?"
+
+And he repeated and explained what he had already said and explained.
+
+Although Balzajette read only a morning paper, and never opened a book,
+he had heard of Saniel's reputation, and because he was young he thought
+he might manage this 'confrere', who seemed destined to make a good
+position. In spite of the high esteem that he professed for his own
+merits and person, he vaguely felt that the doctors of his generation
+who were eminent did not treat him with all the consideration that he
+accorded himself, and in order to teach his ancient comrades a lesson,
+he was glad to enter into friendly relations with a young one 'dans le
+mouvement'. He would speak of his young confrere Saniel: "You know the
+one who was appointed 'agrege'," and he would relate the advice that he,
+Balzajette, had given him.
+
+That Madame Dammauville would be well enough to go to court Saniel
+doubted, above all, after Balzajette had explained his treatment; and as
+far as he was concerned, he could not but rejoice. Doubtless, it would
+be hard for Florentin not to have this testimony, and not to profit by
+the 'coup de theatre' prepared by Nougarede; but for himself, he could
+only feel happy over it. In spite of all the precautions he had taken,
+it would be better not to expose himself to a meeting with Madame
+Dammauville in the witness-chamber, or even in court. They must depend
+upon a letter supported by Balzajette's deposition, and Florentin would
+be not the less acquitted. Only Nougarede would have to regret his 'coup
+de theatre'. But the satisfaction or disappointment of Nougarede was
+nothing to him.
+
+But he did not tell Phillis the ideas suggested by his interview with
+Balzajette; he summed up the conclusions of this interview. Balzajette
+said that Madame Dammauville would soon be on her feet, and one might
+have faith in his word; Florentin would be saved, and there was nothing
+to do but to let things go on as they were going.
+
+Phillis, Madame Cormier, Nougarede, Florentin himself, whom the Mazas
+cell had reconciled neither with hope nor with providential justice,
+were all delighted with this idea.
+
+Also, when the chamber of the prosecution sent Florent to the assizes,
+the emotion of Madame Cormier and Phillis would not be too violent.
+Madame Dammauville would be in a state to make her deposition, since the
+evening before she had been able to leave her bed; and although she left
+it for only an hour, and then to go from her bedroom to her parlor, that
+was enough. Nougarede said that the affair would come on at the second
+session in April; between then and now Madame Dammauville would be solid
+enough on her legs to appear before the jury and carry the acquittal.
+
+To Phillis, Saniel repeated that the cure was certain, and to her, also,
+he rejoiced aloud. But he was troubled about this cure. This meeting,
+only the idea of which had alarmed him to the point of losing his head,
+would be brought about, and under conditions that could not but affect
+him. Truly, the precautions he had taken should reassure him, but after
+all there remained no less a troublesome uncertainty. Who could tell? He
+preferred that she should not leave her room, and that Nougarede should
+find a way to obtain her deposition without taking her to court; he
+would then feel more reassured, more calm in mind, and with a more
+impassive face he could go to court.
+
+Was he really unrecognizable? This was the question that beset him now.
+Many times he compared his reflection in the glass with the photograph
+that he had given Phillis. The hair and beard were gone, but his eyes
+of steel, as his friend said, still remained, and nothing could change
+them. He might wear blue eyeglasses, or injure himself in a chemical
+experiment and wear a bandage. But such a disguise would provoke
+curiosity and questions just so much more dangerous, because it would
+coincide with the disappearance of his hair and beard.
+
+But these fears did not torment him long, for Phillis, who now passed a
+part of every day in the Rue Sainte-Anne with Madame Dammauville, came
+one evening in despair, and told him that that day the invalid had been
+able to leave her bed for a few minutes only.
+
+Then she would not go to court.
+
+This apprehension of meeting Madame Dammauville face to face had begun
+to exasperate him; he felt like a coward in yielding to it, and since he
+had not the force to shake it off, he was happy to be relieved from it
+by the intervention of chance, which, after having been against him so
+long, now became favorable. The wheel turned.
+
+"See Madame Dammauville often," he said to Phillis, "and note all that
+she feels; perhaps I shall find some way to repair this impediment,
+something that I may suggest to Balzajette without his suspecting it.
+Besides, it is reasonable to believe that the recrudescence of cold that
+we are suffering from now may have something to do with the change in
+her condition; it is probable that with the mild spring weather she may
+improve."
+
+He hoped by this counsel to quiet Phillis's uneasiness and to gain time.
+But it had the opposite effect. In her anguish, which increased as the
+time for the trial approached, it was not probabilities, any more than
+the uncertain influence of the spring, that Phillis could depend on; she
+must have something more and better; but fearing a refusal, she forbore
+to tell him what she hoped to obtain.
+
+It was only when she had succeeded that she spoke.
+
+Every day, on leaving Madame Dammauville, she came to tell him what she
+had learned, and for three successive days her story was the same:
+
+"She was not able to leave her bed."
+
+And each day he made the same reply:
+
+"It is the cold weather. Surely, we shall soon have a change; this frost
+and wind will not continue beyond the end of March."
+
+He was pained at her desolation and anguish, but what could he do? It
+was not his fault that this relapse occurred at a decisive moment; fate
+had been against him long enough, and he was not going to counteract it
+at the time when it seemed to take his side, by yielding to the desire
+that Phillis dared not express, but which he divined, and by going to
+see Madame Dammauville.
+
+When she entered his office on the fourth day, he knew at once by her
+manner that something favorable to Florentin had happened.
+
+"Madame Dammauville is up," he said.
+
+"No."
+
+"I thought she must be, by your vivacity and lightness." "It is because
+I am happy; Madame Dammauville wishes to consult you."
+
+He took her hands roughly and shook them.
+
+"You have done that!" he exclaimed.
+
+She looked at him frightened.
+
+"You! You!" he repeated with increasing fury.
+
+"At least listen to me," she murmured. "You will see that I have not
+compromised you in anything."
+
+Compromised! It was professional dignity of which he thought, truly!
+
+"I do not want to listen to you; I shall not go."
+
+"Do not say that."
+
+"It only needed that you should dispose of me in your own way."
+
+"Victor!"
+
+Anger carried him away.
+
+"I belong to you, then! I am your thing! You do with me what you wish!
+You decide, and I have only to obey! There is too much of this! You can
+go; everything is at an end between us."
+
+She listened, crushed; but this last word, which struck her in her
+love, gave her strength. In her turn she took his hands, and although he
+wished to withdraw them, she held them closely in her own.
+
+"You may throw in my face all the angry words you please; you may
+reproach me as much as you think I deserve it, and I will not complain.
+Without doubt, I have done you wrong, and I feel the weight of it on
+seeing how profoundly you are wounded; but to send me away, to tell me
+that all is over between us, no, Victor, you will not do that. You
+will not say it, for you know that never was a man loved as I love
+you, adored, respected. And voluntarily, deliberately, even to save my
+brother, that I should have compromised you!"
+
+He pushed her from him.
+
+"Go!" he said harshly.
+
+She threw herself on her knees, and taking his hands that he had
+withdrawn, she kissed them passionately.
+
+"But listen to me," she cried. "Before condemning me, hear my defence.
+Even if I were a hundred times more guilty than I really am, you could
+not drive me from you with this unmerciful hardness."
+
+"Go!"
+
+"You lose your head; anger carries you away. What is the matter? It is
+impossible that I, by my stupidity, through my fault, could put you in
+such a state of mad exasperation. What is the matter, my beloved?"
+
+These few words did more than Phillis's despair of her expressions of
+love. She was right, he lost his head. And however guilty she might be
+towards him, it was evident that she could not admit that the fault
+she committed threw him into this access of furious folly. It was not
+natural; and in his words and actions all must be natural, all must be
+capable of explanation.
+
+"Very well, speak!" he said. "I am listening to you. Moreover, it is
+better to know. Speak!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXI. THE APPOINTMENT
+
+"You should understand," she said with a little more calmness--for,
+since he permitted her to speak, she hoped to convince him--"that I have
+done all I could to bring Madame Dammauville to the idea of calling, in
+consultation with Monsieur Balzajette, a doctor--"
+
+"Which would be myself."
+
+"You or another; I have not mentioned any name. You should not think me
+awkward enough to put you forward clumsily; it would not be a good way
+to make you acceptable to an intelligent woman, and I value your dignity
+too much to lower it. I believed that another doctor than Monsieur
+Balzajette would find a remedy, some way, a miracle if you will, to
+enable Madame Dammauville to go to the Palais de justice, and I said
+it. I said it in every tone, in every way, with as much persuasion as
+I could put in my words. Was it not the life of my brother that I
+defended, our honor? At first, I found Madame Dammauville much opposed
+to this idea. She would be better soon, she felt it. Otherwise, if it
+were her duty to be carried to the Palais de justice, she would not
+hesitate."
+
+"She would do that?"
+
+"Assuredly. No one has a stronger sense of justice. She would feel
+guilty did she not give her testimony to save an innocent person; not to
+save him when she could would be to take the responsibility of his loss.
+It is therefore certain that if she cannot go to court alone, she will
+do all she can to go, no matter how--on M. Balzajette's arm, or on a
+stretcher. I was, then, easy enough on this side, but I was not for the
+stretcher. What would people think to see her in this condition? What
+impression would she make on the jury? Would not her appearance weaken
+the value of her testimony? As Madame Dammauville is fond of me, and
+very kind to me, I determined to profit by this kindness to urge a
+consultation, but without mentioning any name. I represented to her
+that, since M. Balzajette might say with every appearance of truth he
+had cured her, he should not be angry if she desired to ratify this
+cure. That besides, there was an imperative motive that would not permit
+her to wait, for it would be very disagreeable to her to present herself
+at the court of assizes in a theatrical way, which was not at all
+according to her character or habits. I easily discovered that the fear
+of giving pain to this old friend of her husband was the chief reason
+why she was opposed to this consultation. It was then that your name was
+pronounced."
+
+"You acknowledge it, then?"
+
+"You will see how, and you will not be angry about it. I have often
+spoken to Madame Dammauville of mamma, and, consequently, of how you
+cured her paralysis, that resembled hers. It was not wrong, was it, to
+say what you have done for us? And without letting any one suspect my
+love, I could praise you, which my gratitude prompted. She asked me many
+questions, and naturally, as usual when I speak of you, when I have
+the joy of pronouncing your name, I answered in detail. That is not a
+crime?"
+
+She waited a moment, looking at him. Without softening the hardness of
+his glance, he made a sign to her to continue.
+
+"When I persisted on the consultation, Madame Dammauville recalled what
+I had said, and she was the first--you hear?--the first to pronounce
+your name. As you had cured my mother, I had the right to praise you.
+With a nature like hers, she would not have understood if I had not done
+it; she would have believed me ungrateful. I spoke of your book on
+the diseases of the spinal cord, which was quite natural; and as she
+manifested a desire to read it, I offered to lend it to her."
+
+"Was that natural?"
+
+"With any but Madame Dammauville, no; but she is not frivolous. I took
+the book to her two days ago, and she has just told me that, after
+reading it, she has decided to send for you."
+
+"I shall certainly not go; she has her own physician."
+
+"Do not imagine that I have come to ask you to pay her a visit; all is
+arranged with Monsieur Balzajette, who will write to you or see you, I
+do not know which."
+
+"That will be very extraordinary on the part of Balzajette!"
+
+"Perhaps you judge him harshly. When Madame Dammauville spoke to him of
+you he did not raise the smallest objection; on the contrary, he praised
+you. He says that you are one of the rare young men in whom one may have
+confidence. These are his own words that Madame Dammauville told me."
+
+"What do I care for the opinion of this old beast!"
+
+"I am explaining how it happens that you are called into consultation;
+it is not because I spoke of you, but because you have inspired Monsieur
+Balzajette with confidence. However stupid he may be, he is just to you,
+and knows your value."
+
+It was come then, the time for the meeting that he did not wish to
+believe possible; and it was brought about in such a way that he did not
+see how he could escape it. He might refuse Phillis; but Balzajette? A
+colleague called him in consultation, and why should he not go? Had he
+foreseen this blow he would have left Paris until the trial was over,
+but he was taken unawares. What could he say to justify a sudden
+absence? He had no mother or brothers who might send for him, and with
+whom he would be obliged to remain. Besides, he wished to go to court;
+and since his testimony would carry considerable weight with the jury,
+it was his duty to be present on account of Florentin. It would be a
+contemptible cowardice to fail in this duty, and more, it would be an
+imprudence. In the eyes of the world he must appear to have nothing to
+fear, and this assurance, this confidence in himself, was one of the
+conditions of his safety. Now, if he went to court, and from every point
+of view it was impossible that he should not go, he would meet Madame
+Dammauville, as she intended to be carried there if she were unable to
+go in any other way. Whether it was at her house, or at the Palais de
+justice, the meeting was then certain, and in spite of what he had done,
+circumstances stronger than his will had prepared it and brought it
+about; nothing that he could do would prevent it.
+
+The only question that deserved serious consideration just now was to
+know where this meeting would be the least dangerous for him--at Madame
+Dammauville's or at the Palais?
+
+He reflected silently, paying no more attention to Phillis than if she
+were not present, his eyes fixed, his brow contracted, his lips tightly
+closed, when the doorbell rang. As Joseph was at his post, Saniel did
+not move.
+
+"If it is a patient," Phillis said, who did not wish to go yet, "I will
+wait in the dining-room."
+
+And she rose.
+
+Before she could leave the room, Joseph entered.
+
+"Doctor Balzajette," he said.
+
+"You see!" Phillis cried.
+
+Without replying, Saniel made a sign to Joseph to admit Doctor
+Balzajette, and while Phillis silently disappeared, he went toward the
+parlor.
+
+Balzajette came forward with both hands extended.
+
+"Good-day, my young 'confrere'. I am enchanted to meet you."
+
+The reception was benevolent, amicable, and protecting, and Saniel
+replied at his best.
+
+"Since we met the other day," Balzajette continued, "I have thought
+of you. And nothing more natural than that, for you inspired me with
+a quick sympathy. The first time you came to see me you pleased me
+immediately, and I told you you would make your way. Do you remember?"
+
+Assuredly he remembered; and of all the visits that he made to the
+doctors and druggists of his quarter, that to Balzajette was the
+hardest. It was impossible to show more pride, haughtiness, and disdain
+than Balzajette had put into his reception of the then unknown young
+man.
+
+"I told you what I thought of you," continued Balzajette. "It is with
+regard to this patient of whom you spoke to me; you remember?"
+
+"Madame Dammauville?"
+
+"Exactly. I put her on her feet, as I told you, but since then this bad
+weather has compelled her to take to her bed again. Without doubt, it
+is only an affair of a few days; but in the mean time, the poor woman is
+irritable and impatient. You know women, young 'confrere'. To calm
+this impatience, I spontaneously proposed a consultation, and naturally
+pronounced your name, which is well known by your fine work on the
+medullary lesions. I supported it, as was proper, with the esteem that
+it has acquired, and I have the satisfaction to see it accepted."
+
+Saniel thanked him as if he believed in the perfect sincerity of this
+spontaneous proposition.
+
+"I like the young, and whenever an occasion presents itself, I shall be
+happy to introduce you to my clientage. For Madame Dammauville, when can
+you go with me to see her?"
+
+As Saniel appeared to hesitate, Balzajette, mistaking the cause of his
+silence, persisted.
+
+"She is impatient," he said. "Let us go the first day that is possible."
+
+He must reply, and in these conditions a refusal would be inexplicable.
+
+"Will to-morrow suit you?" he asked.
+
+"To-morrow, by all means. At what hour?"
+
+Before replying, Saniel went to his desk and consulted an almanac, which
+appeared perfectly ridiculous to Balzajette.
+
+"Does he imagine, the young 'confrere', that I am going to believe his
+time so fully occupied that he must make a special arrangement to give
+me an hour?"
+
+But it was not an arrangement of this kind that Saniel sought. His
+almanac gave the rising and the setting of the sun, and it was the exact
+hour of sunset that he wished: "26 March, 6h. 20m." At this moment
+it would not be dark enough at Madame Dammauville's for lamps to be
+lighted, and yet it would be dark enough to prevent her from seeing him
+clearly in the uncertain light of evening.
+
+"Will a quarter past six suit you? I will call for you at six o'clock."
+
+"Very well. Only I shall ask you to be very exact; I have a dinner at
+seven o'clock in the Rue Royale."
+
+Saniel promised promptness. The dinner was a favorable circumstance,
+enabling him to escape from Madame Dammauville's before the lamps would
+be lighted.
+
+When Balzajette was gone, he rejoined Phillis in the dining-room.
+
+"A consultation is arranged for to-morrow at six o'clock, at Madame
+Dammauville's."
+
+She threw herself on his breast.
+
+"I knew that you would forgive me."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXII. THE FATAL LIGHT
+
+It was not without emotion that the next day Saniel saw the afternoon
+slip away, and although he worked to employ his time, he interrupted
+himself at each instant to look at the clock.
+
+Sometimes he found the time passing quickly, and then all at once it
+seemed to stand still.
+
+This agitation exasperated him, for calmness had never been more
+necessary than at this moment. A danger was before him, and it was only
+in being master of himself that he could be saved. He must have the
+coolness of a surgeon during an operation, the glance of a general in a
+battle; and the coolness and the glance were not found among the nervous
+and agitated.
+
+Could he escape from this danger?
+
+This was the question that he asked himself unceasingly, although he
+knew the uselessness of it. What good was it to study the chances for or
+against him?
+
+Either he had succeeded in rendering himself unrecognizable or he had
+not; but it was done, and now he could do nothing more. He did the best
+he could in choosing an hour when the dim evening light put the chances
+on his side; for the rest he must trust to Fortune.
+
+All day he studied the sky, because for the success of his plan it
+must be neither too bright nor too dark: if it were too bright Madame
+Dammauville could see him clearly; if it were too dark the lamps would
+be lighted. He remembered that it was by lamplight she had seen him.
+Until evening the weather was uncertain, with a sky sometimes sunny,
+sometimes cloudy; but at this hour the clouds were driven away by a wind
+from the north, and the weather became decidedly cold, with the pink and
+pale clearness of the end of March when it still freezes.
+
+On examining himself he had the satisfaction to feel that he was calmer
+than in the morning, and that as the moment of attack approached, his
+agitation decreased; decision, firmness, and coolness came to him; he
+felt master of his will, and capable of obeying it.
+
+At six o'clock precisely he rang at Balzajette's door, and they started
+immediately for the Rue Sainte-Anne. Happy to have a complaisant
+listener, Balzajette did all the talking, so that Saniel had only to
+reply "yes" or "no" from time to time, and of course it was not
+of Madame Dammauville that he spoke, but other matters--of a first
+representation on the previous evening at the Opera Comique; of
+politics; of the next salon.
+
+At exactly a quarter past six they reached the house in the Rue
+Sainte-Anne, where Saniel had not been since Caffies death. On passing
+the old concierge's lodge he felt satisfied with himself; his heart
+did not beat too quickly, his ideas were firm and clear. Should danger
+arrive, he felt assured of mastery over himself, without excitement, as
+without brutality.
+
+Balzajette rang the bell, and the door was opened by a maid, who was,
+evidently, placed in the vestibule to await their arrival. Balzajette
+entered first, and Saniel followed him, giving a hasty glance at the
+rooms through which they passed. They reached a door at which Balzajette
+knocked twice.
+
+"Enter," replied a feminine voice in a firm tone.
+
+This was the decisive moment; the day was everything that could be
+wished, neither too light nor too dark. What would Madame Dammauville's
+first glance mean?
+
+"My confrere, Doctor Saniel," Balzajette said on going toward Madame
+Dammauville, and taking her hand.
+
+She was lying on the little bed of which Phillis had spoken, but not
+against the windows, rather in the middle of the room, placed there
+evidently after the experience of a sick person who knows that to be
+examined she must be easily seen.
+
+Profiting by this arrangement, Saniel immediately passed between the
+bed and the windows in such a way that the daylight was behind him, and
+consequently his face was in shadow. This was done naturally, without
+affectation, and it seemed that he only took this side of the bed
+because Balzajette took the other.
+
+Directed by Saniel, the examination commenced with a clearness and
+a precision that pleased Balzajette. He did not lose himself in idle
+words, the young 'confrere', any more than in useless details. He went
+straight to the end, only asking and seeking the indispensable; and as
+Madame Dammauville's replies were as precise as his questions, while
+listening and putting in a word from time to time he said to himself
+that his dinner would not be delayed, which was the chief point of his
+preoccupation. Decidedly, he understood life, the young 'confrere'; he
+might be called in consultation with his heavy appearance and careless
+toilet, there was no danger of rivalry.
+
+However, when Madame Dammauville began to speak of being sensitive
+to cold, Balzajette found that Saniel let her lose herself in minute
+details.
+
+"Have you always been sensitive to cold?"
+
+"Yes; and with a deplorable disposition to take cold if the temperature
+is lowered one or two degrees."
+
+"Did you exercise in the open air?"
+
+"Very little."
+
+"Were you ever advised to try shower-baths of cold water?"
+
+"I should not have been able to bear it."
+
+"I must tell you," Balzajette interrupted, "that before occupying this
+house that belongs to her, Madame Dammauville lived in a more modern
+apartment which was heated by a furnace, and where consequently it was
+easier to maintain an even temperature to which she was accustomed."
+
+"On coming to live in this house, where it is not possible to have a
+furnace," Madame Dammauville went on, "I employed every means to shelter
+me from the cold, which I am sure is my great enemy. You can see that I
+have had weather-strips put at the doors, as well as at the windows."
+
+In spite of this invitation and the gesture which accompanied it, Saniel
+was careful not to turn his head toward the window; he kept his face
+in the shadow, contenting himself with looking at the door which was
+opposite to him.
+
+"At the same time," she continued, "I had hangings put on the walls,
+carpets on the floors, thick curtains at the windows and doors, and in
+spite of the large fire in my fireplace, often I am unable to get warm."
+
+"Do you also have a fire in this little stove?" Saniel asked, pointing
+to a small movable stove at the corner of the fireplace.
+
+"Only at night, so that my servants need not get up every hour to
+replenish the fire in the chimney. The fire is made in the evening
+just before I go to sleep; the pipe is placed in the chimney, and it
+maintains sufficient heat until morning."
+
+"I think it will be expedient to suppress this mode of heating, which
+must be very inconvenient," Saniel said; "and my 'confrere' and myself
+will consider the question whether it will not be possible to give you
+the heat you need with this chimney, without fatiguing your servants,
+and without waking you too often to take care of the fire. But let us
+continue."
+
+When he reached the end of his questions he rose to examine the patient
+on her bed, but without turning round, and in such a way as still to
+keep his back to the light.
+
+As little by little the reflection of the setting sun faded, Balzajette
+proposed asking for a lamp: without replying too hastily, Saniel
+refused; it was useless, the daylight was sufficient.
+
+They passed into the parlor, where they very quickly came to an amicable
+conclusion, for at everything that Saniel said Balzajette replied:
+
+"I am happy to see that you partake of my opinion. That is it. Truly,
+that is so!"
+
+And, besides, each had his reasons for hurrying--Saniel, for fear of
+the lamps; Balzajette, uneasiness for his dinner. The diagnosis and the
+treatment were rapidly settled; Saniel proposed, Balzajette approved.
+The question of the movable stove was decided in two words: for the
+night a grate would be placed in the chimney; a fire of coal covered
+with damp coal-dust would keep the fire until morning.
+
+"Let us return," Balzajette said, who took the initiative and decided on
+all material things.
+
+Saniel, who kept his eyes on the windows, was calm; it was yet too light
+to need lamps, besides, during their tete-a-tete, no servant had crossed
+the salon to enter Madame Dammauville's room.
+
+But when Balzajette opened the door to return to the patient, a flood
+of light filled the parlor and enveloped them. A lamp with a shade was
+placed on the little table near the bed, and two other lighted lamps
+with globes were on the mantel, reflecting their light in the
+mirror. How had he not foreseen that there was another door to Madame
+Dammauville's room besides the door from the parlor? But if he had
+foreseen it, it would not have lessened the danger of the situation.
+
+He would have had time to prepare himself, that was all. But to prepare
+himself for what? Either to enter the room and brave this danger, or to
+fly. He entered.
+
+"This is what we have decided," Balzajette said, who never lost an
+occasion to put himself forward and to speak.
+
+While he spoke, Madame Dammauville seemed not to listen to him. Her eyes
+were on Saniel, placed between her and the chimney with his back to the
+lamps, and she looked at him with a characteristic fixedness.
+
+Balzajette, who listened to himself, observed nothing; but Saniel, who
+knew what there was behind this glance, could not but be struck with
+it. Happily for him, he had only to let Balzajette talk, for if he had
+spoken he would surely have betrayed himself by the quivering of his
+voice.
+
+However, Balzajette seemed coming to the end of his explanations.
+Suddenly Saniel saw Madame Dammauville extend her hand toward the lamp
+on the table, and raise the shade by lowering it toward her in such a
+way as to form a reflector that threw the light on him. At the same time
+he received a bright ray full on his face.
+
+Madame Dammauville uttered a small, stifled cry.
+
+Balzajette stopped; then his astonished eyes went from Madame
+Dammauville to Saniel, and front Saniel to Madame Dammauville.
+
+"Are you suffering?" he asked.
+
+"Not at all."
+
+What, then, was the matter? But it was seldom that he asked for an
+explanation of a thing that astonished him, preferring to divine and to
+explain it himself.
+
+"Ah! I understand it," he said with a satisfied smile.
+
+"The youth of my young 'confrere' astonishes you. It is his fault. Why
+the devil did he have his long hair and his light curled beard cut?"
+
+If Madame Dammauville had not released the lampshade, she would have
+seen Saniel turned pale and his lips quiver.
+
+"Mais voila!" continued Balzajette. "He made this sacrifice to his new
+functions; the student has disappeared before the professor."
+
+He might have continued along time. Neither Madame Dammauville nor
+Saniel listened to him; but, thinking of his dinner, he was not going
+to launch into a discourse that at any other moment he would not have
+failed to undertake. He rose to go.
+
+As Saniel bowed, Madame Dammauville stopped him with a movement of her
+hand.
+
+"Did you not know this unfortunate who was assassinated opposite?" she
+asked, pointing to the windows.
+
+So serious as was an acknowledgment, Saniel could not answer in the
+negative.
+
+"I was called in to prove his death," he said.
+
+And he took several steps toward the door, but she stopped him again.
+
+"Had you business with him?" she asked.
+
+"I saw him several times."
+
+Balzajette cut short this conversation, which was idle talk to him.
+
+"Good evening, dear Madame. I will see you tomorrow, but not in the
+morning, for I go to the country at six o'clock, and shall not return
+until noon."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXIII. SUSPENSE
+
+"Did you observe how I cut the conversation short?" Balzajette said, as
+they went down-stairs. "If you listen to women they will never let you
+go. I cannot imagine why she spoke to you of this assassinated man, can
+you?"
+
+"No."
+
+"I believe that this assassination has affected her brain to a certain
+point. In any case, it has given her a horror of this house."
+
+He continued thus without Saniel listening to what he said. On reaching
+the Rue Neuve-des-Petits-Champs, Balzajette hailed a passing cab.
+
+"You have had the kindness not to delay me," he said, pressing the hand
+of his young 'confrere', "but I feel that I must hurry. 'Au revoir'."
+
+A good riddance! This babbling gave Saniel the vertigo.
+
+He must recover himself, look the situation in the face, and consider
+that which might, which must, happen.
+
+The situation was plain; Madame Dammauville's cry revealed it. When the
+lamplight struck him full in the face, she found in him the man whom
+she had seen draw Caffies curtains. If, in her amazement, she at first
+refused to believe it, her questions regarding Caffie, and Balzajette's
+explanations about his hair and beard, destroyed her hesitation and
+replaced doubt by the horror of certainty. He was the assassin; she knew
+it, she had seen him. And such as she revealed herself to him, it seemed
+that she was not the woman to challenge the testimony of her eyes, and
+to let the strength of her memory be shaken by simple denials, supported
+by Balzajette's words.
+
+With a vivid clearness he saw to the bottom of the abyss open before
+him; but what he did not see was in what way she would push him into
+this giddy whirlpool, that is, to whom she would reveal the discovery
+that she had made. To Phillis, to Balzajette, or to the judge?
+
+It was almost a relief to think that for this evening, at least, it
+would not be to Phillis, for at this moment she would be at his rooms,
+anxiously awaiting his return. He felt a sadness and a revulsion at the
+thought that she might be the first to learn the truth. He did not wish
+that, and he would prevent it.
+
+This preoccupation gave him an object; he reached the Rue Louis-le-Grand
+thinking more of Phillis than of himself. What distress when she should
+know all! How could she support this blow, and with what sentiments
+would it inspire her, with what judgment for the man whom she loved?
+Poor girl! He grew tender at the thought. As for him, he was lost,
+and it was his fault; he bore the penalty of his own stupidity. But
+Phillis--it would be a blow to her love that she must bear. And what a
+blow to this sensitive heart, to this proud and noble soul!
+
+Perhaps he would now see her for the last time, for this one hour, and
+never again. Then he would be kind to her, and leave her a memory that,
+later, would be an alleviation to her sorrow, a warm, bright ray in her
+time of mourning. During these last few days he had been hard, brutal,
+irritable, strange, and with her habitual serenity she had overlooked
+it all. When he pushed her from him with his heavy hand, she had
+kissed this hand, fastening on him her beautiful, tender eyes, full of
+passionate caresses. He must make her forget that, and she must carry
+from their last interview a tender impression that would sustain her.
+
+What could he do for her? He remembered how happy she had been at their
+impromptu dinners six months before, and he would give her this same
+pleasure. He would see her happy again, and near her, under her glance,
+perhaps he would forget tomorrow.
+
+He went to the caterer who furnished him with breakfast, and ordered two
+dinners to be sent to his rooms immediately.
+
+Before he could put the key in the lock, his door was opened by Phillis,
+who recognized his step on the landing.
+
+"Well?"
+
+"Your brother is saved."
+
+"Madame Dammauville will go to court?"
+
+"I promise you that he is saved."
+
+"By you?"
+
+"Yes, by me--exactly."
+
+In her access of joy, she did not notice the accent on these last words.
+
+"Then you forgive me?"
+
+He took her in his arms, and kissing her with deep emotion said:
+
+"With all my heart, I swear it!"
+
+"You see it was written that you should see Madame Dammauville, in spite
+of yourself, in spite of all; it was providential."
+
+"It is certain that your friend Providence could not interfere more
+opportunely in my affairs."
+
+This time she was struck by the tone of his voice; but she imagined that
+it was only this allusion to superior intervention that had vexed him.
+
+"It was of ourselves that I thought," she said, "not of you."
+
+"I understood. But do not let us talk of that; you are happy, and I do
+not wish to shadow your joy. On the contrary, I thought to associate
+myself with it by giving you a surprise: we are going to dine together."
+
+"Oh, dearest!" she exclaimed, trembling, "how-good you are! I will set
+the table," she added joyously, "and you light the fire; for we must
+have a bright fire to enliven us and to keep our dinner warm. What have
+you ordered?"
+
+"I do not know; two dinners."
+
+"So much the better! We will have surprises. We will leave the dishes
+covered before the fire, and we will take them anyhow. Perhaps we shall
+eat the roast before the entree, but that will be all the more funny."
+
+Light, quick, busy, graceful, and charming, she came and went around the
+table.
+
+When the dinner came, the table was ready, and they sat down opposite to
+each other.
+
+"What happiness to be alone!" she said. "To be able to talk and to look
+at each other freely!"
+
+He looked at her with a tenderness in his eyes that she had never before
+seen, with a depth of serious contemplation that overwhelmed her. From
+time to time little cries of happiness escaped her.
+
+"Oh! Dearest, dearest!" she murmured.
+
+Yet she knew him too well not to see that a cloud of sadness often
+veiled these eyes full of love, and that also they were often without
+any expression, as if they looked within. Suddenly she became quiet;
+but she could not long remain silent when she was uneasy. Why this
+melancholy at such a moment?
+
+"What a difference between this dinner," she said, "and those of the
+end of October! At that time you were harassed by the most trying
+difficulties, at war with creditors, menaced on all sides, without hope;
+and now all is smooth. No more creditors, no more struggles. The cares
+that I brought you are nearly at an end. Life opens easy and glorious.
+The end that you pursued is reached; you have only to walk straight
+before you, boldly and proudly. Yet there is a sadness in your face that
+torments me. What is the matter? Speak, I beg you! To whom should you
+confess, if not to the woman who adores you?"
+
+He looked at her a long time without replying, asking himself if, for
+the peace of his own heart, this confession would not be better than
+silence; but courage failed him, pride closed his lips.
+
+"What should be the matter?" he said. "If my face is sad, it does not
+indicate faithfully what I feel; for what I feel at this moment is an
+ineffable sentiment of tenderness for you, an inexpressible gratitude
+for your love, and for the happiness that you have given me. If I have
+been happy in my rough and struggling life, it is through you. What I
+have had of joy, confidence, hope, memories, I owe to you; and if we
+had not met I should have the right to say that I have been the most
+miserable among the miserable. Whatever happens to us, remember these
+words, my darling, and bury them in the depths of your heart, where you
+will find them some day when you would judge me."
+
+"To judge you--I!"
+
+"You love me, therefore you do not know me. But the hour will come when
+you will wish to know exactly the man whom you have loved; when that
+time comes remember this evening."
+
+"It is too radiant for me to forget it."
+
+"Whatever it may be, remember it. Life is so fragile and so ephemeral a
+thing, that it is beautiful to be able to concentrate it, to sum it up
+by remembrance, in one hour that marks it and gives it its scope.
+Such an hour is this one, which passes while I speak to you with deep
+sincerity."
+
+Phillis was not accustomed to these 'elanas', for, in the rare effusions
+to which he sometimes abandoned himself, Saniel always observed a
+certain reserve, as if he feared to commit himself, and to let her read
+his whole nature. Many times he rallied her when she became sentimental,
+as he said, and "chantait sa romance;" and now he himself sang it--this
+romance of love.
+
+Great as was her happiness to listen to him, she could not help
+feeling an uneasy astonishment, and asked herself under what melancholy
+impression he found himself at this moment.
+
+He read her too well not to divine this uneasiness. Not wishing to
+betray himself, he brought a smile to his eyes, and said:
+
+"You do not recognize me, do you? I am sure you are asking yourself if I
+am not ill."
+
+"Oh, dearest, do not jest, and do not harden yourself against the
+sentiment that makes such sweet music on your lips! I am happy, so
+happy, to hear you speak thus, that I would like to see your happiness
+equal to mine; to dissipate the dark cloud that veils your glance. Will
+you never abandon yourself? At this hour, above all, when everything
+sings and laughs within us as about us! Nothing was more natural than
+that you should be sad six months ago; but today what more do you want
+to make you happy?"
+
+"Nothing, it is true."
+
+"Is not the present the radiant morning of a glorious future?"
+
+"What will you? There are sad physiognomies as there are happy ones;
+mine is not yours. But let us talk no more of that, nor of the past, nor
+of the future; let us talk of the present."
+
+He rose, and, taking her in his arms, made her sit next to him on the
+sofa.
+
+The sound of the doorbell made Saniel jump as if he had received an
+electric shock.
+
+"You will not open the door?" Phillis said. "Do not let any one take our
+evening from us."
+
+But soon another ring, more decided, brought him to his feet.
+
+"It is better to know," he said, and he went to open the door, leaving
+Phillis in his office.
+
+A maid handed him a letter.
+
+"From Madame Dammauville," she said; "there is an answer."
+
+He left her in the vestibule, and returned to his office to read the
+letter. The dream had not lasted long; reality seized him with its
+pitiless hands. This letter, certainly, would announce the blow that
+menaced him.
+
+   "If Dr. Saniel is disengaged, I beg that he will come to see me this
+   evening on an urgent affair; I will wait for him until ten o'clock.
+   If not, I count on seeing him to-morrow morning after nine o'clock.
+
+                       "A. DAMMAUVILLE."
+
+He returned to the vestibule.
+
+"Say to Madame. Dammauville that I shall be there in a quarter of an
+hour."
+
+When he reentered the office he found Phillis before the glass, putting
+on her hat.
+
+"I heard," she said. "What a disappointment! But I cannot wish you to
+stay, since it is for Florentin that you leave me."
+
+As she walked toward the door he stopped her.
+
+"Embrace me once more."
+
+Never had he pressed her in such a long and passionate embrace.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXIV. ON THE RACK
+
+He had not a second of doubt; Madame Dammauville did not wish a
+professional visit from him. She wished to speak to him of Caffie, and,
+in the coming crisis, he said to himself that perhaps it was fortunate
+that it was so; at least he would be first to know what she had decided
+to do, and he could defend himself. Nothing is hopeless as long as a
+struggle is possible.
+
+He rang the bell with a firm hand, and the door was opened by the maid
+who brought the letter. With a small lamp in her hand, she conducted him
+through the dining-room and the salon to Madame Dammauville's bedroom.
+
+At the threshold, a glance showed him that some changes had been made in
+the arrangement of the furniture. The small bed where he had seen Madame
+Dammauville was placed between the two windows, and she was lying in a
+large bed with canopy and curtains. Near her was a table on which were
+a shaded lamp, some books, a blotting-book, a teapot, and a cup; on the
+white quilt rested an unusually long bellrope, so that she might pull it
+without moving. The fire in the chimney was out, but the movable stove
+sent out a heat that denoted it was arranged for the night.
+
+Saniel felt the heat, and mechanically unbuttoned his overcoat.
+
+"If the heat is uncomfortable, will you not remove your overcoat?"
+Madame Dammauville said.
+
+While he disposed of it and his hat, placing them on a chair by the
+fireplace, he heard Madame Dammauville say to her maid:
+
+"Remain in the salon, and tell the cook not to go to bed."
+
+What did this mean? Was she afraid that he would cut her throat?
+
+"Will you come close to my bed?" she said. "It is important that we
+should talk without raising our voices."
+
+He took a chair and seated himself at a certain distance from the bed,
+and in such a way that he was beyond the circle of light thrown by the
+lamp. Then he waited.
+
+A moment of silence, which he found terribly long, slipped away before
+she spoke.
+
+"You know," she said at last, "how I saw, accidentally, from this
+place"--she pointed to one of the windows--"the face of the assassin of
+my unfortunate tenant, Monsieur Caffie."
+
+"Mademoiselle Cormier has told me," he replied in a tone of ordinary
+conversation.
+
+"Perhaps you are astonished that at such a distance I saw the face
+clearly enough to recognize it after five months, as if it were still
+before me."
+
+"It is extraordinary."
+
+"Not to those who have a memory for faces and attitudes; with me this
+memory has always been strongly developed. I remember the playmates of
+my childhood, and I see them as they were at six and ten years of age,
+without the slightest confusion in my mind."
+
+"The impressions of childhood are generally vivid and permanent."
+
+"This persistency does not only apply to my childish impressions. Today,
+I neither forget nor confound a physiognomy. Perhaps if I had had many
+acquaintances, and if I had seen a number of persons every day, there
+might be some confusion in my mind; but such is not the case. My
+delicate health has obliged me to lead a very quiet life, and I remember
+every one whom I have met. When I think of such a one, it is not of the
+name at first, but of the physiognomy. Each time that I have been to
+the Senate or to the Chamber, I did not need to ask the names of
+the deputies or senators who spoke; I had seen their portraits and I
+recognized them. If I go into these details it is because they are of
+great importance, as you will see."
+
+It was not necessary for her to point out their importance; he
+understood her only too well.
+
+"In fine, I am thus," she continued. "It is, therefore, not astonishing
+that the physiognomy and the attitude of the man who drew the curtains
+in Monsieur Caffie's office should not leave my memory. You admit this,
+do you not?"
+
+"Since you consult me, I must tell you that the operations of the memory
+are not so simple as people imagine. They comprise three things: the
+conservation of certain states, their reproduction and localization in
+the past, which should be reunited to constitute the perfect memory.
+Now this reunion does not always take place, and often the third is
+lacking."
+
+"I do not grasp your meaning very well. But what is the third thing?"
+
+"Recognition."
+
+"Well, I can assure you that in this case it is not lacking!"
+
+The action beginning in this way, it was of the utmost importance for
+Saniel that he should throw doubts in Madame Dammauville's mind, and
+should make her think that this memory of which she felt so sure was
+not, perhaps, as strong or as perfect as she imagined.
+
+"It is," he said, "exactly this third thing that is the most delicate,
+the most complex of the three, since it supposes, besides the state of
+consciousness, some secondary states, variable in number and in degree,
+which, grouped around it, determine it."
+
+Madame Dammauville remained silent a moment, and Saniel saw that she
+made an effort to explain these obscure words to herself.
+
+"I do not understand," she said at last.
+
+This was exactly what he wished; yet, as it would not be wise to let her
+believe that he desired to deceive or confuse her, he thought he might
+be a little more precise.
+
+"I wish to ask," he said, "if you are certain that in the mechanism of
+the vision and that of the recognition, which is a vision of the past,
+there is no confusion?"
+
+She drew a long breath, evidently satisfied to get rid of these
+subtleties that troubled her.
+
+"It is exactly because I admit the possibility of this confusion, at
+least in part, that I sent for you," she said, "in order that you might
+establish it."
+
+Saniel appeared not to comprehend.
+
+"I, Madame?"
+
+"Yes. When you came herewith Monsieur Balzajette a few hours ago,
+you must have observed that I examined you in a way that was scarcely
+natural. Before the lamps were lighted, and when you turned your back
+to the daylight, I tried in vain to remember where I had seen you. I was
+certain that I found in you some points of resemblance to a physiognomy
+I had known, but the name attached to this physiognomy escaped me. When
+you returned, and I saw you more clearly by lamplight, my recollections
+became more exact; when I raised the lamp-shade the light struck you
+full in the face, and then your eyes, so characteristic, and at the same
+time a violent contraction of your features, made me recall the name.
+This physiognomy, these eyes, this face, belonged to the man whom from
+this place" she pointed to the window--"I saw draw Monsieur Caffies
+curtains."
+
+Saniel did not flinch.
+
+"This is a resemblance that would be hard for me," he said, "if your
+memory were faithful."
+
+"I tell myself that it may not be. And after the first feeling of
+surprise which made me cry out, I was confirmed in this thought on
+recalling the fact that you did not wear the long hair and blond beard
+that the man wore who drew the curtains; but at that moment Monsieur
+Balzajette spoke of the hair and beard that you had had cut. I was
+prostrated. However, I had the strength to ask if you had had any
+business with Monsieur Caffie. Do you remember your answer?"
+
+"Perfectly."
+
+"After your departure I experienced a cruel anguish. It was you whom I
+had seen draw the curtains, and it could not be you. I tried to think
+what I ought to do--to inform the judge or to ask you for an interview.
+For a long time I wavered. At length I decided on the interview, and I
+wrote to you."
+
+"I have come at your call, but I declare that I do not know what to
+reply to this strange communication. You believe that you recognize in
+me the man who drew the curtains."
+
+"I recognize you."
+
+"Then what do you wish me to say? It is not a consultation that you ask
+of me?"
+
+She believed she understood the meaning of this reply and divined its
+end.
+
+"The question does not concern me," she said, "neither my moral nor
+mental state, but yourself. My eyes, my memory, my conscience, bring a
+frightful accusation against you. I cannot believe my eyes or my memory.
+I challenge my conscience, and I ask you to reduce this accusation to
+nothing."
+
+"And how, Madame?"
+
+"Oh, not by protestations!"
+
+"How can you expect that a man in my position will lower himself to
+discuss accusations that rest on an hallucination?"
+
+"Do you believe that I have hallucinations? If you do, call one of your
+'confreres' to-morrow in consultation. If he believes as you do, I will
+submit; if not, I shall be convinced that I saw clearly, and I shall act
+accordingly."
+
+"If you saw clearly, Madame, and I am ready to concede this to you, it
+proves that there is some one somewhere who is my double."
+
+"I said this to myself; and it is exactly this idea that made me write
+to you. I wished to give you the opportunity of proving that you could
+not be this man."
+
+"You will agree that it is difficult for me to admit a discussion on
+such an accusation."
+
+"One may find one's self accused by a concourse of fatal circumstances,
+and be not less innocent. Witness the unfortunate boy imprisoned for
+five months for a crime of which he is not guilty. And I pass from your
+innocence as from his, to ask you to prove that the charges against you
+are false."
+
+"There are no charges against me."
+
+"There may be; that depends upon yourself. Your hair and beard may have
+been cut at the time of the assassination; in that case it is quite
+certain that the man I saw was not you, and that I am the victim of an
+hallucination. Were they or were they not?"
+
+"They were not; it is only a few days since I had them cut on account of
+a contagious disease."
+
+"It may be," she continued, without appearing to be impressed by this
+explanation, "that the day of the assassination, at the hour when I saw
+you, you were occupied somewhere in such a way that you can prove you
+could not have been in the Rue Sainte-Anne, and that I was the victim
+of an hallucination. And again, it may be that at the time your position
+was not that of a man at the last extremity, forced to crime by misery
+or ambition, and that consequently you had no interest in committing the
+crime of a desperate man. What do I know? Twenty other means of defence
+may be in your hands."
+
+"You cited the example of this poor boy who is imprisoned, although
+innocent. Would it not be applicable to me if you did not recognize the
+error of your eyes or your memory? Would he not be condemned without
+your testimony? Should I not be if I do not find one that destroys your
+accusation? And I see no one from whom I can ask this testimony. Have
+you thought of the infamy with which such an accusation will cover me?
+If I repel it, and I shall repel it, will it not have dishonored me,
+ruined me forever?"
+
+"It is just because I thought of this that I sent for you, to the end
+that by an explanation that you would give, it seemed to me, you would
+prevent me from informing the judge of this suspicion. This explanation
+you do not give me; I must now think only of him whose innocence is
+proved for me, and take his side against him whose guilt is not less
+proved. To-morrow I shall inform the judge."
+
+"You will not do that!"
+
+"My duty compels me to; and whatever might come, I have always done
+my duty. For me, in this horrible affair, there is the cause of the
+innocent and of the guilty, and I place myself on the side of the
+innocent."
+
+"I can prove to you that it was an aberration of vision--"
+
+"You will prove it to the judge; the law will appreciate it."
+
+He rose brusquely. She put her hand on the bellcord. They looked at each
+other for a moment, and what their lips did not express their eyes said:
+
+"I do not fear you; my precautions are taken."
+
+"That bell will not save you."
+
+At last he spoke in a hoarse and quivering voice:
+
+"To you the responsibility of whatever happens Madame."
+
+"I accept it before God," she said, with a calm firmness. "Defend
+yourself."
+
+He went to the armchair on which he had placed his coat and hat, and
+bending down to take them, he noiselessly turned the draught of the
+stove.
+
+At the same time Madame Dammauville pulled the bellcord; the maid opened
+the door of the salon.
+
+"Show Doctor Saniel to the door."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXV. A SECOND VICTIM
+
+On returning to his room Saniel was very much cast down, and without
+lighting a candle, he threw himself on the divan, where he remained
+prostrated.
+
+The frightful part of the affair was the rapidity with which he
+condemned this poor woman to death, and without hesitation executed her.
+To save himself she must die; she should die. This time the idea did not
+turn and deviate as in Caffie's case. Is it not true then, that it is
+the first crime that costs, and in the path that he had entered, would
+he go on to the end sowing corpses behind him?
+
+A shudder shook him from head to foot as he thought that this victim
+might not be the last that his safety demanded. When she threatened to
+warn the judge, he only saw a threat; if she spoke he was lost; he had
+closed her mouth. But had not this mouth opened before he closed it? Had
+she not already spoken? Before deciding on this interview she may
+have told all to some one of her friends, who, between the time of his
+departure with Balzajette and his return, might have visited her, or to
+some one for whom she had sent for advice. In that case, those also were
+condemned to death.
+
+A useless crime, or a series of crimes?
+
+The horror that rose within him was so strong that he thought of running
+to the Rue Sainte-Anne; he would awake the sleeping household, open the
+doors, break the windows, and save her. But between his departure and
+this moment the carbonic acid and the oxide of carbon had had time to
+produce asphyxiation, and certainly he would arrive after her death; or,
+if he found her still living, some one would discover that the draught
+of the stove had been turned, and seeing it, he would betray himself as
+surely as by an avowal.
+
+After all, the maid might have discovered that the draught was turned,
+and in that case she was saved and he was lost. Chance would decide
+between them.
+
+There are moments when a shipwrecked man, tired of swimming, not knowing
+to which side to direct his course, without light, without guide, at the
+end of strength and hope, floats on his back and lets himself be tossed
+by the waves, to rest and wait for light. This was his case; he could do
+nothing but wait.
+
+He would not commit the insane folly of wishing to see and know, as in
+Caffie's case; he would know the result soon enough, too soon.
+
+Rising, he lighted a candle, and paced up and down his apartment like a
+caged animal. Then it occurred to him that those underneath would hear
+his steps; doubtless they would remark this agitated march, would be
+surprised, and would ask an explanation. In his position he must take
+care not to give cause for any remark that could not be explained. He
+took off his boots and continued his walk.
+
+But why had she spoken to him of double weatherstrips at the doors and
+windows, of hangings on the walls, of thick curtains? It was she who
+thus suggested to him the idea of the draught of the stove, which would
+not have come to him spontaneously.
+
+The night passed in such agitating thoughts; at times the hours seemed
+to stand still, and again they flew with astounding rapidity. One moment
+the perspiration fell from his forehead on his hands; at another he felt
+frozen.
+
+When his windows grew light with the dawn, he threw himself prostrated
+and shuddering on the divan, and leaning on a cushion he detected the
+odor of Phillis; burying his head in it he remained motionless and
+slept.
+
+A ring of the bell woke him, horrified, frightened; he did not know
+where he was. It was broad daylight, carriages rumbled through the
+street. A second ring sounded stronger, more violent. Shivering, he
+went to open the door, and recognized the maid who the previous evening
+brought a note from Madame Dammauville. He did not need to question her:
+fate was on his side. His eyes became dim; without seeing her he heard
+the maid explain why she had come.
+
+She had been to Monsieur Balzajette; he was in the country. Her mistress
+was nearly cold in her bed; she neither spoke nor breathed, yet her face
+was pink.
+
+"I will go with you."
+
+He did not need to learn more. That rosy color, which has been observed
+in those asphyxiated by oxide of carbon, decided it. However, he
+questioned the maid.
+
+Nothing had occurred; she had talked with the cook in the kitchen, who,
+near midnight, went to her room in the fifth story, and then she went to
+bed in a small room contiguous to that of her mistress. During the night
+she heard nothing; in the morning she found her mistress in the state
+she mentioned, and immediately went for Monsieur Balzajette.
+
+Continuing his questions, Saniel asked her what Madame Dammauville did
+after the consultation with Monsieur Balzajette.
+
+"She dined as usual, but less than usual, eating almost nothing; then
+she received a visit from one of her friends, who remained only a few
+minutes, before starting on a voyage."
+
+This was what he dreaded: Madame Dammauville might have told this
+friend. If this were so, his crime would be of no use to him; where
+would it carry him?
+
+After a few moments, and in a tone that he tried to render indifferent,
+he asked the name of this friend.
+
+"A friend of her youth, Madame Thezard, living at No. 9, in the Rue des
+Capucines, the wife of a consul."
+
+Until he reached the house in the Rue Sainte-Anne he repeated this name
+and address to himself, which he could not write down, and which he
+must not forget, for it was from there now that the danger would come if
+Madame Dammauville had spoken.
+
+For a long time he had been habituated to the sight of death, but when
+he found himself in the presence of this woman stretched on her bed as
+if she slept, a shiver seized him.
+
+"Give me a mirror and a candle," he said to the maid and the cook who
+stood at the door, not daring to enter.
+
+While they went in search of these things he walked over to the stove;
+the draught remained as he had turned it on the previous evening; he
+opened it and returned to the bed.
+
+His examination was not long; she had succumbed to asphyxiation caused
+by the gas from the charcoal. Did it proceed from the construction of
+the stove, or from a defect in the chimney? The inquest would decide
+this; as for him, he could only prove the death.
+
+On leaving him the evening before, Phillis, uneasy, told him that she
+would come early in the morning to know what Madame Dammauville wished.
+When he told her she was dead she was prostrated with despair; in that
+case Florentin was lost. He tried to reassure her, but without success.
+
+Nougarede, also, was in despair, and regretted that he had not proceeded
+otherwise. And he tried to reassure Phillis; the prosecution rested on
+the button and the struggle that had torn it off. Saniel would destroy
+this hypothesis; he counted on him.
+
+Saniel became, then, as he had been before the intervention of Madame
+Dammauville, the only hope of Phillis and her mother, and to encourage
+them he exaggerated the influence that his testimony would have.
+
+"When I shall have demonstrated that there was no struggle, the
+hypothesis of the torn button will crumble by itself."
+
+"And if it is sustained, how and with what shall we overthrow it?"
+
+If he had appeared as usual, she would have shared the confidence with
+which he tried to inspire her; but since the death of Madame Dammauville
+he was so changed, that she could not help being uneasy. Evidently it
+was Madame Dammauville's death that made him so gloomy and irritable
+that he would submit to no opposition. He saw the dangers of the
+situation that this death created for Florentin, and with his usual
+generosity he reproached himself for not having consented to take care
+of her sooner; he would have saved her, certainly, as he had begun by
+demanding the removal of the stove, and Florentin would have been saved
+also.
+
+The day of the trial arrived without a word from Madame Thezard, which
+proved that Madame Dammauville had said nothing to her friend. It was
+six months since the assassination occurred, and the affair had lost all
+interest for the Parisian public; in the provinces it was still spoken
+of, but at Paris it was a thing of the past. There is no romance about a
+clerk who cuts the throat of his employer to rob him; there is no woman
+in the case, no mystery.
+
+Saniel preferred that Phillis should remain at home with her mother, but
+in spite of his wishes and prayers she insisted on going to court. She
+must be there so that Florentin would see her and take courage; he would
+defend himself better if she were there.
+
+He defended himself badly, or at least indifferently, like a man who
+gives up because he knows beforehand that whatever he may say will be
+useless.
+
+Until Saniel's deposition the witnesses who testified were insignificant
+enough, and revealed nothing that was not already known; only Valerius,
+with his pretensions to a professional secret, which he developed
+slowly, amused the audience. This deposition Saniel made brief and
+exact, contenting himself with repeating his report. But then Nougarede
+rose, and begged the president to ask the witness to explain the
+struggle which should have taken place between the victim and his
+assassin; and the president, who had commenced by arguing, before the
+insistence of the defence, decided to ask this question. Then Saniel
+slowly explained how the position of the body in the armchair and his
+condition were scientific proof that there was no struggle.
+
+"This is an opinion," said the president dryly; "the jury will
+appreciate it."
+
+"Perfectly," replied Nougarede, "and I intend to make the jury feel the
+weight that it carries on the authority of him who formulated it."
+
+This phrase for effect was destined to invalidate in advance the
+contradictions that the prosecution would, he believed, raise against
+the testimony; but nothing of the kind occurred, and Saniel could go and
+take his place beside Phillis without being called to the bar to sustain
+his opinion against a physician whose scientific authority would be
+opposed to his.
+
+In default of Madame Dammauville, Nougarede had summoned the concierge
+of Rue Sainte-Anne, as well as the maid and the cook, who had heard
+their mistress say that the man who drew Caffies curtains did not
+resemble Florentin's portrait; but this was only gossip repeated by
+persons of no importance, who could not produce the effect of the 'coup
+de theatre' on which he had based his defence.
+
+When the advocate-general pronounced his address, it was evident why
+Saniel's opinion on the absence of a struggle was not contradicted.
+Although the prosecution believed in this struggle, it wished to abandon
+it a moment, having no need of this hypothesis to prove that the button
+had not been torn off on falling from a ladder; it had been done in the
+act of assassination, in the effort made to cut the throat of the victim
+who had violently extended the right arm, and, by the shock to the
+suspenders, the button was torn off. The effect of Saniel's deposition
+was destroyed, and that one produced by the testimony of Madame
+Dammauville's maids, far less strong, was also destroyed when the
+advocate-general proved that this gossip turned against the accused. She
+had seen, it was said, a man with long hair and curled beard, draw the
+curtains; very well! Does this description apply to the accused? To
+tell the truth, it was said that she did not recognize him in a portrait
+published by an illustrated paper. Well, it was because this portrait
+did not resemble him. Besides, was it possible to admit that a woman of
+Madame Dammauville's character would not have informed the judge if
+she believed her testimony important and decisive? The proof that she
+considered it insignificant was the fact that she had kept silent.
+
+Nougarede's eloquent appeal did not destroy these two arguments,
+any more than it effaced the impression produced by the money-lender
+relative to the theft of forty-five francs. The jury brought in
+a verdict of "Guilty," but without premeditation, and admitting
+extenuating circumstances.
+
+On hearing the decree that condemned Florentin to twenty years of forced
+labor, Phillis, half suffocated, clung to Saniel's arm; but he could not
+give her the attention he wished, for Brigard, who came to the trial to
+assist at the triumph of his disciple, accosted him.
+
+"Receive my felicitations for your deposition, my dear friend; it is
+an act of courage that does you honor. If this poor boy could have been
+saved, it would have been by you; you may well say you are the man of
+conscience."
+
+
+
+
+BOOK 4.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXVI. CONSCIENCE ASSERTS ITSELF
+
+During the first years of his sojourn in Paris, Saniel had published in
+a Latin Quarter review an article on the "Pharmacy of Shakespeare"--the
+poison of Hamlet, and of Romeo and Juliet; and although since his choice
+of medicine he read but little besides books of science, at that time
+he was obliged to study the plays of his author. From this study there
+lingered in his memory a phrase that for ten years had not risen to his
+lips, and which all at once forced itself uppermost in his mind with
+exasperating persistency. It was the words of Macbeth:
+
+       "Macbeth does murder sleep, the innocent sleep;
+        Sleep, that knits up the ravell'd sleeve of care,
+        The death of each day's life, sore labor's bath,
+        Balm of hurt minds."
+
+He also had lost it, "the innocent sleep, sore labor's bath, balm
+of hurt minds." He had never been a great sleeper; at least he had
+accustomed himself to the habit, hard at first, of passing only a few
+hours in bed. But he employed these few hours well, sleeping as the
+weary sleep, hands clenched, without dreaming, waking, or moving; and
+the thought that occupied his mind in the evening was with him on waking
+in the morning, not having been put to flight by others, any more than
+by dreams.
+
+After Caffie's death this tranquil and refreshing sleep continued the
+same; but suddenly, after Madame Dammauville's death, it became broken.
+
+At first it did not bother him. He did not sleep, so much the better! He
+would work more. But one can no more work all the time than one can live
+without eating. Saniel knew better than any one that the life of every
+organ is composed of alternate periods of repose and activity, and
+he did not suppose that he would be able to work indefinitely without
+sleep. He only hoped that after some days of twenty hours of work daily,
+overcome by fatigue, he would have, in spite of everything, four hours
+of solid sleep, that Shakespeare called "sore labor's bath."
+
+He had not had these four hours, and the law that every state of
+prolonged excitement brings exhaustion that should be refreshed by a
+functional rest, was proved false in his case. After a hard day's work
+he would go to bed at one o'clock in the morning and would go to sleep
+immediately. But very soon he awoke with a start, suffocating, covered
+with perspiration, in a state of extreme anxiety, his mind agitated by
+hallucinations of which he could not rid himself all at once. If he
+did not wake suddenly, he dreamed frightful dreams, always of Madame
+Dammauville or Caffie. Was it not curious that Caffie, who until then
+had been completely effaced from his memory, was resuscitated by Madame
+Dammauville in the night, ghost of the darkness that the daylight
+dissipated?
+
+Believing that one of the causes of these dreams was the excitement of
+the brain, occasioned by excessive work at the hour when he should not
+exercise it, but on the contrary should allow it to rest, he decided to
+change a plan which produced so little success. Instead of intellectual
+work he would engage in physical exercise, which, by exhausting his
+muscular functions, would procure him the sleep of the laboring class;
+and as he could not roll a wheelbarrow nor chop wood, every evening
+after dinner he walked seven or eight miles rapidly.
+
+Physical work succeeded no better than intellectual; he endured the
+fatigue of butchers and wood-choppers, but he did not obtain their
+sleep. Decidedly, bodily fatigue was worth no more than that of the
+brain. It was worth even less. At his table, plunged in his books, or
+in his laboratory over his microscope, he absorbed himself in his work,
+and, by the force of a will that had been long exercised and submissive
+to obedience, he was able to keep his thoughts on the subject in hand,
+without distraction as without dreams. Time passed. But when walking
+in the streets of Paris, in the deserted roads on the outskirts, by the
+Seine or Marne, his mind wandered where it would; it was the mistress,
+and it always dwelt on Madame Dammauville, Caffie, and Florentin. It
+seemed as if the heat of walking started his brain. When he returned in
+this state, after many hours of cerebral excitability, how could he
+find the tranquil and refreshing sleep, complete and profound, of the
+laboring classes who work only with their muscles?
+
+Never having been ill, he had never examined nor treated himself:
+medicine was good for others but useless for him. With a machine
+organized like his he need fear only accidents, and until now he had
+been spared them; a true son of peasants, he victoriously resisted
+Paris life as the destroyer of the intellect. But the time had come
+to undertake an examination and to try a treatment that would give
+him rest. He was not a sceptical doctor, and he believed that what he
+ordered for others was good for himself.
+
+The misfortune was that he could not find in himself any of the causes
+which resolve into insomnia; he had neither meningitis nor brain fever,
+nor anything that indicated a cerebral tumor; he was not anaemic; he ate
+well; he did not suffer with neuralgia, nor with any acute or chronic
+affection that generally accompanied the absence of sleep; he drank
+neither tea nor alcohol; and without this state of over-excitement of
+the encephalic centres, he might have said that he was in good health, a
+little thin, but that was all.
+
+It was this excitement that he must cure, and as there are many remedies
+for insomnia, he tried those which, it seemed to him, were suitable to
+his case; but bromide of potassium, in spite of its hypnotic properties,
+produced no more effect than the over-working of the brain and body.
+When he realized this he replaced it with chloral; but chloral, which
+should create a desire to sleep, after several days had no more effect
+than the bromide. Then he tried injections of morphine.
+
+It was not without a certain uneasiness that he made this third trial,
+the first two having met with so little success; and since it is
+acknowledged that chloral produces a calmer sleep than morphine, it
+seemed as if the latter would prove as useless as the former. However,
+he slept without being tormented by dreams or wakings, and the next day
+he still slept.
+
+But he knew too well the effects produced by a prolonged use of these
+injections to continue them beyond what was strictly indispensable; he
+therefore omitted them, and sleep left him.
+
+He tried them again; then, soon, as the small doses lost their efficacy,
+he gradually increased them. At the end of a certain time what he feared
+came to pass--his leanness increased; he lost his appetite, his
+muscular force, and his moral energy; his pale face began to wear the
+characteristic expression of the morphomaniac.
+
+Then he stopped, frightened.
+
+Should he continue, he would become a morphomaniac in a given time, and
+the apathy into which he fell prevented him from resisting the desire
+to absorb new doses of poison, a desire as imperious, as irresistible
+in morphinism as that of alcohol for the alcoholic, and more terrible in
+its effects--the perversion of the intellectual faculties, loss of will,
+of memory, of judgment, paralysis, or the mania that leads to suicide.
+
+If he did not continue, and these sleepless nights or the agitated
+sleep which maddened him should return, and following them, this
+over-excitement of the brain in troubling the nutrition of the
+encephalic mass, it might be the prelude of some grave cerebral
+affection.
+
+On one side the morphine habit; on the other, dementia from the constant
+excitement and disorganization of the brain.
+
+Between a fatally certain result and one that was possible he did not
+hesitate. He must give up morphine, and this choice forced itself upon
+him with so much more strength, because if morphine assured him sleep at
+night, it by no means gave him tranquil days--quite the contrary.
+
+He began to use this remedy at night when he fell under the influence
+of certain ideas; during the day when applying himself to work, by
+an effort of will he escaped from these ideas, and was the man he had
+always been, master of his strength and mind. But the action of the
+morphine rapidly weakened this all-powerful will, so much so, that when
+these ideas crossed his mind during his working hours he had not the
+energy to drive them away. He tried to shake them off, but in vain; they
+would not leave his brain, to which they clung and encompassed it with
+increasing strength.
+
+Truly, those two corpses troubled him horribly. Was it not exasperating
+for a man who had seen and dissected so many, that there should be
+always two before his eyes, even when they were closed--that of this old
+rascal and of this unfortunate woman? In order not to complicate this
+impression with another that humiliated him, he got rid of the packages
+of bank bills taken from Caffie, by sending them "as restitution" to the
+director of public charities. But this had no appreciable effect.
+
+The thought of Florentin troubled him also; and if he saw Caffie lying
+in his chair, Madame Dammauville motionless and pink on her bed, to him
+it was not less cruel to see Florentin between the decks of the vessel
+that would soon carry him to New Caledonia.
+
+The ideas on conscience that he had expressed at Crozat's, and those
+that he explained to Phillis about remorse, were still his; but he was
+not the less certain that these two dead persons and the condemned one
+weighed upon him with a terrible weight, frightful, suffocating, like
+a nightmare. It was not in accordance with his education nor with his
+environment to have these corpses behind him and this victim before him.
+
+But where his former ideas were overthrown, since these dead bodies
+seized hold of his life, was in his confidence in his strength.
+
+The strong man that he believed himself, he who follows his ambition
+regardless of things and of persons, looking only before him and never
+behind, master of his mind as of his heart and of his arm, was not at
+all the one that reality revealed.
+
+On the contrary, he had been weak in action and yet weaker afterward.
+
+And it was not only humiliation in the present that he felt in
+acknowledging this weakness, it was also in uneasiness for the future;
+for, if he lacked this strength that he attributed to himself before
+having tested it, he should, if his beliefs were true, succumb some day.
+
+Evidently, if he were perfectly strong he would not have complicated his
+life with love. The strong walk alone because they need no one. And he
+needed a woman; and so great was the need that it was through her
+only, near her, when he looked at her, when he listened to her, that he
+experienced a little calm.
+
+Was he weak and cowardly on account of this? Perhaps not, but only
+human.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXVII. ATTEMPTED REPARATION
+
+Because he felt calm when with Phillis, Saniel wished that she might
+never leave him.
+
+But, as happy as she was in her sorrow to see that instead of avoiding
+her--which a less generous man would have done, perhaps--he sought to
+draw nearer each day, she could not give up her lessons and her work,
+which was her daily bread, to give all her time to her love, any more
+than she could leave her mother entirely alone, crushed with shame, who
+had never needed so much as now to be cheered and sustained.
+
+She did not let a day pass without going to see Saniel; but in spite of
+her desire she could not remain with him as long as she wished and he
+asked. When she rose to go and he detained her, she remained, but it was
+only for a few minutes; they were short, and the time soon came when,
+after ten attempts, she was obliged to leave him.
+
+At all times these separations had been full of despair to her, the
+apprehension of which, from the moment of her arrival, paralyzed her;
+but now they were still more cruel. Formerly, on leaving him, she
+often saw him deep in his work before she opened the door; now, on the
+contrary, he conducted her to the vestibule, detained her, and only let
+her leave him when she tore herself from his embrace, after promising
+and repeating her promise to come early the next day and stay longer.
+Formerly, also, she was calm when she left him, not thinking of his
+health, nor asking herself how she would find him at their next meeting,
+strong and powerful, as sound in body as in mind. On the contrary, now
+she worried herself, wondering how she would find him on the occasion of
+each visit. Would the sadness, melancholy, and dejection still remain?
+Would he be thinner and paler? It was her care, her anguish, to try
+to divine the causes of the change in him, which manifested itself
+as strongly in his sentiments as in his person. Was it not truly
+extraordinary that he was more grave and uneasy now that his life was
+assured than during the hard times when he was so worried that he never
+knew what the morrow would bring? He had obtained the position that his
+ambition coveted; he had sufficient money for his wants; he admitted
+that his experiments had succeeded beyond his expectations; the essays
+that he published on his experiments were loudly discussed, praised by
+some, contested by others; it seemed that he had attained his object;
+and he was sad, discontented, unhappy, more tormented than when he
+exhausted himself with efforts, without other support than his will. At
+last, when frightened to see him thus, she questioned him as to how he
+felt, he became angry, and answered brutally--
+
+"Ill? Why do you think that I am--ill? Am I not better able than any
+one to know how I am? I am overworked, that is all; and as my life of
+privation does not permit me to repair my forces, I have become anaemic;
+it is not serious. It is strange, truly, that you ask for explanations
+of what is natural. Count the teeth of the polytechnicians and look at
+their hair after their examinations, and tell me what you think of them.
+Why do you think anything else is the matter with me? One cannot expend
+one's self with impunity; that would be too good. Everything must be
+paid for in this world."
+
+She was obliged to believe that he was right and understood his
+condition; however, she could not help worrying. She knew nothing of
+medicine; she did not know the meaning of the medical terms he used,
+but she found that this was not sufficient to explain all--neither his
+roughness of temper and excess of anger without reason, any more than
+his sudden tenderness, his weakness and dejection, his preoccupation and
+absence of mind.
+
+She discovered the effect she produced on him, and how, merely by her
+presence, she cheered this gloomy fancy and raised this depression by
+not asking him stupid questions on certain subjects which she had not
+yet determined on, but which she hoped to avoid. Also, she did not wish
+to leave him, and ingeniously invented excuses to go to see him twice
+a day; in the morning on going to her lessons, and in the afternoon or
+evening.
+
+Late one evening she rang his bell with a hand made nervous with joy.
+
+"I have come to stay till to-morrow," she said, in triumphant tones.
+
+She expected that he would express his joy by an embrace, but he did
+nothing.
+
+"Are you going out?"
+
+"Not at all; I am not thinking of myself, but of your mother."
+
+"Do you think that I would have left her alone in her weak and nervous
+state? A cousin of ours arrived from the country, who will occupy my
+bed, and I profited by it quick enough, saying that I would remain at
+the school. And here I am."
+
+In spite of his desire for it, he had never dared ask her to pass the
+night with him. During the day he would only betray himself by his sad
+or fantastic temper; but at night, with such dreams as came to him,
+might not some word escape that would betray him?
+
+However, since she was come it was impossible to send her away; he could
+not do it for her nor for himself. What pretext could he find to say,
+"Go! I do not want you?" He wanted her above all; he wanted to look at
+her, to listen to her, to hear her voice that soothed and lulled his
+anguish, to feel her near him--only to have her there, and not be face
+to face with his thoughts.
+
+She examined him secretly, asking herself the cause of this singular
+reception, standing at the entrance of the office, not daring to remove
+her hat. How could her arrival produce an effect so different from what
+she expected?
+
+"You do not take off your hat?" he said.
+
+"I was asking myself if you had to work."
+
+"Why do you ask yourself that?"
+
+"For fear of disturbing you."
+
+"What a madness you have for always asking something!" he exclaimed
+violently. "What do you expect me to say? What astonishes you? Why
+should you disturb me? In what? 'Voyons', speak, explain yourself!"
+
+The time was far distant when these explosions surprised her, though
+they always pained her.
+
+"I speak stupidly," she said. "What will you? I am stupid; forgive me."
+
+These words, "forgive me," were more cruel than numberless reproaches,
+for he well knew that he had nothing to forgive in her, since she was
+the victim and he the criminal. Should he never be able to master these
+explosions, as imprudent as they were unjust?
+
+He took her in his arms and made her sit by him.
+
+"It is for you to forgive," he said.
+
+And he was as tender and caressing as he had been brutal. He was a fool
+to imagine that she could have suspicions, and the surest way to give
+birth to them was to show fear that she had them. To betray himself
+by such awkwardness was as serious as to let a cry escape him while
+sleeping.
+
+But for this night he had a way which was in reality not difficult, that
+would not expose him to the danger of talking in his sleep-he would
+not sleep. After having passed so many nights without closing his eyes,
+without doubt he could keep them open this entire night.
+
+But he deceived himself; when he heard the calm and regular respiration
+of Phillis with her head on his shoulder, and felt the mild warmth of
+her body penetrate his, in the quiet imposed upon him, without being
+conscious of it, believing himself far from sleep, and convinced that he
+required no effort to keep awake, he suddenly slept. When he awoke a ray
+of pale sunlight filled the room, and leaning her elbow on the bolster,
+Phillis was watching him. He made a brusque movement, throwing himself
+backward. "What is the matter?" he cried. "What have I said?" Instantly
+his face paled, his lips quivered; he felt his heart beat tumultuously
+and his throat pressed by painful constriction. "But nothing is the
+matter," she answered, looking at him tenderly. "You have said nothing."
+To come to the point, why should he have spoken? During his frightful
+dreams, his nights of disturbed sleep, he might have cried out, but he
+did not know if he had ever done so. And besides, he had not just waked
+from an agitated sleep. All this passed through his mind in an instant,
+in spite of his alarm. "What time is it?" he asked. "Nearly six
+o'clock." "Six o'clock!" "Do you not hear the vehicles in the street?
+The street-venders are calling their wares." It must have been about
+one o'clock when he closed his eyes; he had then slept five hours,
+profoundly, and he felt calm, rested, refreshed, his body active and his
+mind tranquil, the man of former times, in the days of his happy youth,
+and not the half-insane man of these last frightful months.
+
+He breathed a sigh.
+
+"Ah, if I could have you always!" he murmured, as much to himself as to
+her.
+
+And he gave her a long look mingled with a sad smile; then, placing his
+arm around her shoulders, he pressed her to him.
+
+"Dear little wife!"
+
+She had never heard so profound, so vibrating, a tenderness in his
+voice; never had she been able, until hearing these words, to measure
+the depth of the love that she had inspired in him; and it even seemed
+that this was the declaration of a new love.
+
+Pressing her passionately to him, he repeated:
+
+"Dear little wife!"
+
+Distracted, lost in her happiness, she did not reply.
+
+All at once he held her from him gently, and looking at her with the
+same smile:
+
+"Does this word tell you nothing?"
+
+"It tells me that you love me."
+
+"And is that all?"
+
+"What more can I wish? You say it, I feel it. You give me the greatest
+joy of which I can dream."
+
+"It is enough for you?"
+
+"It would be enough if it need never be interrupted. But it is the
+misfortune of our life that we are obliged to separate at the time when
+the ties that unite us are the most strongly bound."
+
+"Why should we separate?"
+
+"Alas! Mamma? And daily bread?"
+
+"If you did not leave your mother. If you need no longer worry about
+your life?"
+
+She looked at him, not daring to question him, not betraying the
+direction of her thoughts except by a trembling that she could not
+control in spite of her efforts.
+
+"I mean if you become my wife."
+
+"Oh, my beloved!"
+
+"Will you not?"
+
+She threw herself in his arms, fainting; but after a moment she
+recovered.
+
+"Alas! It is impossible," she murmured.
+
+"Why impossible?"
+
+"Do not ask me; do not oblige me to say it."
+
+"But, on the contrary, I wish you to tell me."
+
+She turned her head away, and in a voice that was scarcely perceptible,
+in a stifled sigh:
+
+"My brother--"
+
+"It is greatly on account of your brother that I wish this marriage."
+
+Then, suddenly: "Do you think me the man to submit to prejudiced
+blockheads?"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXVIII. THE IMPORTANT QUESTION
+
+Saniel had not waited until this day to acknowledge the salutary
+influence that Phillis's presence exercised over him, yet the idea
+of making her his wife never occurred to him. He thought himself
+ill-adapted to marriage, and but little desirous of being a husband.
+Until lately he had had no desire for a home.
+
+This idea came to him suddenly and took strong hold of him; at least as
+much on account of the calmness he felt in her presence, as by the charm
+of her manner, her health, happiness, and gayety.
+
+It was not only physical calm that she gave him by a mysterious affinity
+concerning which his studies told him nothing, but of which he did not
+the less feel all the force; it was also a moral calm.
+
+There were duties he owed her, and terribly heavy were those he owed her
+mother and Florentin.
+
+He did all he could for Florentin, but this was not all that he owed
+them. Florentin was in prison; Madame Cormier fell into a mournful
+despair, growing weaker each day; and Phillis, in spite of her
+elasticity and courage, bent beneath the weight of injustice.
+
+How much the situation would be changed if he married her--for them, and
+for him!
+
+When Phillis was a little recovered from her great surprise, she asked
+him:
+
+"When did you decide on this marriage?"
+
+He did not wish to prevaricate, and he answered that it was at that
+instant that the idea came to him, exact enough and strong enough to
+give form to the ideas that had been floating in his brain for several
+months.
+
+"At least, have you considered it? Have you not yielded to an impulse of
+love?"
+
+"Would it be better to yield to a long, rational calculation? I marry
+you because I love you, and also because I am certain that without you
+I cannot be happy. Frankly, I acknowledge that I need you, your
+tenderness, your love, your strength of character, your equal temper,
+your invincible faith in hope, which, for me as I am organized, is worth
+the largest dot."
+
+"It is exactly because I have no dot to bring you. When you were at the
+last extremity, desperate and crushed, I might ask to become the wife of
+the poor village doctor that you were going to be; but to-day, in your
+position, above all in the position that you will soon occupy, is poor
+little Phillis worthy of you? You give me the greatest joy that I can
+ever know, of which I have only dreamed in telling myself that it
+would be folly to hope to have it realized. But just that gives me the
+strength to beg you to reflect, and to consider whether you will ever
+regret this moment of rapture that makes me so happy."
+
+"I have reflected, and what you say proves better than anything that
+I do not deceive myself. I want a wife who loves me, and you are that
+wife."
+
+"More than I can tell you at this moment, wild with happiness, but not
+more than I shall prove to you in the continuance of our love."
+
+"Besides, dearest, do not have any illusions on the splendors of this
+position of which you speak; it is more than probable that they will
+never be realized, for I am not a man of money, and will do nothing to
+gain any. If it does not come by itself--"
+
+"It will come."
+
+"That is not the object for which I work. What I wish I have obtained
+partly; if now I make money and obtain a rich practice, the jealousy of
+my confreres will make me lose, or wait too long, for what my ambition
+prefers to a fortune. For the moment this position will be modest; my
+four thousand francs of salary, that which I gain at the central bureau
+while waiting to have the title of hospital physician, and five hundred
+francs a month more that my editor offers me for work and a review of
+bacteriology, will give us nearly twelve thousand francs, and we must
+content ourselves with that for some time."
+
+"That is a fortune to me."
+
+"To me also; but I thought I ought to tell you."
+
+"And when do you wish our marriage to take place?"
+
+"Immediately after the necessary legal delay, and as soon as I am
+settled in a new apartment; for you could not come here as my wife,
+where you have been seen so often. It would not be pleasant for you or
+for me."
+
+"And we will not be so foolish as to put ourselves in the hands of an
+upholsterer; the first one cost enough."
+
+He said these last words with fierce energy, but continued immediately:
+
+"What do we need? A parlor for the patients, if they come; an office for
+me, which will do also as a laboratory; a bedroom for us, and one for
+your mother."
+
+"You wish--"
+
+"But certainly. Do you think that I would ask you to separate from her?"
+
+She took his hand, and kissing it with a passionate impulse: "Oh, the
+dearest, the most generous of men!"
+
+"Do not let us talk of that," he said with evident annoyance. "In your
+mother's condition of mental prostration it would kill her to be left
+alone; she needs you, and I promise to help you to soften her grief. We
+will make her comfortable; and although my nature is not very tender,
+I will try to replace him from whom she is separated. It will be a
+happiness to her to see you happy."
+
+For a long time he enlarged upon what he wished, feeling a sentiment of
+satisfaction in talking of what he would do for Madame Cormier, in whom
+at this time he saw the mother of Florentin more than that of Phillis.
+
+"Do you think you can make her forget?" he asked from time to time.
+
+"Forget? No. Neither she nor I can ever forget; but it is certain our
+sorrow will be drowned in our happiness, and this happiness we shall owe
+to you. Oh, how you will be adored, respected, blessed!"
+
+Adored, respected! He repeated these words to himself. One could, then,
+be happy by making others happy. He had had so little opportunity until
+this time to do for others, that this was in some sort the revelation
+of a sentiment that he was astonished to feel, but which, for being new,
+was only the sweeter to him.
+
+He wished to give himself the satisfaction of tasting all the sweetness.
+
+"Where are you going this morning?" he asked.
+
+"I return to the school to help my pupils prepare their compositions for
+the prize."
+
+"Very well; while you are at the school this morning, I will go to see
+your mother. The process of asking in marriage that we make use of is
+perhaps original, and conforms to the laws of nature, if nature admits
+marriage, which I ignore; but it certainly is not the way of those of
+the world. And now I must address this request to your mother."
+
+"What joy you will give her!"
+
+"I hope so."
+
+"I should like to be there to enjoy her happiness. Mamma has a mania for
+marriage; she spends her time marrying the people she knows or those
+she does not know. And she has felt convinced that I should die in the
+yellow skin of an old maid. At last, this evening she will have the
+happiness of announcing to me your visit and your request. But do not
+make this visit until the afternoon, because then our cousin will be
+gone."
+
+Saniel spent his morning in looking for apartments, and found one in a
+quarter of the Invalides, which he engaged.
+
+It was nearly one o'clock when he reached Madame Cormier's. As usual,
+when he called, she looked at him with anxious curiosity, thinking of
+Florentin.
+
+"It is not of him that I wish to speak to you to-day," he said, without
+pronouncing any name, which was unnecessary. "It is of Mademoiselle
+Phillis--"
+
+"Do you find her ill?" Madame Cormier said, who thought only of
+misfortune.
+
+"Not at all. It is of her and of myself that I wish to speak. Do not
+be uneasy. I hope that what I am going to say will not be a cause of
+sadness to you."
+
+"Pardon me if I always see something to fear. We have been so
+frightfully tried, so unjustly!"
+
+He interrupted her, for these complaints did not please him.
+
+"For a long time," he said quickly, "Mademoiselle Phillis has inspired
+me with a deep sentiment of esteem and tenderness; I have not been
+able to see her so courageous, so brave in adversity, so decided in her
+character, so good to you, so charming, without loving her, and I have
+come to ask you to give her to me as my wife."
+
+At Saniel's words, Madame Cormier's hands began to tremble, and the
+trembling increased.
+
+"Is it possible?" she murmured, beginning to cry. "So great a happiness
+for my daughter! Such an honor for us, for us, for us!"
+
+"I love her."
+
+"Forgive me if happiness makes me forget the conventionalities, but I
+lose my head. We are so unhappy that our souls are weak against joy.
+Perhaps I should hide my daughter's sentiments; but I cannot help
+telling you that this esteem, this tenderness of which you speak, is
+felt by her. I discovered it long ago, although she did not tell me.
+Your request, then, can only be received with joy by mother, as well as
+daughter."
+
+This was said brokenly, evidently from an overflowing heart. But all at
+once her face saddened.
+
+"I must talk to you sincerely," she said. "You are young, I am not;
+and my age makes it a duty for me not to yield to any impulse. We
+are unfortunates, you are one of the happy; you will soon be rich
+and famous. Is it wise to burden your life with a wife who is in my
+daughter's position?"
+
+With the exception of a few words, this was Phillis's answer. He
+answered the mother as he had answered the daughter.
+
+"It is not for you that I speak," said Madame Cormier. "I should not
+permit myself to give you advice; it is in placing myself at the point
+of view of my daughter that I, her mother, with the experience of my
+age, should watch over her future. Is it certain that in the struggles
+of life you will never suffer from this marriage, not because my
+daughter will not make you happy--from this side I am easy--but because
+the situation that fate has made for us will weigh on you and fetter
+you? I know my daughter-her delicacy; her uneasy susceptibility, that
+of the unfortunate; her pride, that of the irreproachable. It would be a
+wound for her that would make happiness give way to unhappiness, for she
+could not bear contempt."
+
+"If that is in human nature, it is not in mine; I give you my word."
+
+He explained how he meant to arrange their life, and when she understood
+that she was to live with them, she clasped her hands and exclaimed,
+
+"Oh, my God, who hast taken my son, how good thou art to give me
+another!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXIX. CONCESSION TO CONSCIENCE
+
+He asked nothing better than to be a son to this poor woman; in reality
+he was worth much more than this unfortunate boy, effeminate and
+incapable. What did this maternal hunger require? A son to love. She
+would find one in her son-in-law. In seeing her daughter happy, how
+could she help being happy herself?
+
+Evidently they would be happy, the mother and daughter; and whatever
+Phillis might think, still under the influence of the shameful blow,
+they would forget. They would owe him this.
+
+It was a long time since he had worked with so much serenity as on this
+day; and when in the evening he went to bed, uneasy as usual about the
+night, he slept as calmly as if Phillis were resting her charming head
+on his shoulder and he breathed the perfume of it.
+
+Decidedly, to make others happy was the best thing in the world, and
+as long as one could have this satisfaction there was no fear of being
+unhappy. To create an atmosphere of happiness for others is to profit by
+it at the same time.
+
+He waited for Phillis impatiently, for she would bring him an echo of
+her mother's joy, and it was a recompense that she owed him.
+
+She arrived happy, smiling, penetrated with tenderness; but he observed
+that she was keeping something from him, something that embarrassed her,
+and yet she would not tell him what it was.
+
+He was not disposed to admit that she could conceal anything from him,
+and he questioned her.
+
+"What are you keeping from me?"
+
+"How can you suppose that I should keep anything from you?"
+
+"Well, what is the matter? You know, do you not, that I read all your
+thoughts in your eyes? Very well your eyes speak when your lips are
+silent."
+
+"I have a request to make of you, a prayer."
+
+"Why do you not tell me?"
+
+"Because I do not dare."
+
+"Yet it does not seem to me that I show a disposition to make you
+believe that I could refuse you anything."
+
+"It is just that which is the cause of my embarrassment and reserve; I
+fear to pain you at the moment when I would show you all the gratitude
+and love in my heart."
+
+"If you are going to give me pain, it is better not to make me wait."
+
+She hesitated; then, before an impatient gesture, she decided to speak.
+
+"I wish to ask you how you mean to be married?"
+
+He looked at her in surprise.
+
+"But, like every one else!"
+
+"Every one?" she asked, persistently.
+
+"Is there any other way of being married?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"I do not in the least understand this manner of asking conundrums; if
+you are alluding to a fashionable custom of which I know nothing, say so
+frankly. That will not wound me, since I am the first to declare that I
+know nothing of it. What do you wish?"
+
+She felt his irritation increase, and yet she could not decide to say
+what she wished.
+
+"I have begun badly," she said. "I should have told you at first that
+you will always find in me a wife who will respect your ideas and
+beliefs, who will never permit herself to judge you, and still less to
+seek to contend with them or to modify them. That you feel, do you not,
+is neither a part of my nature nor of my love?"
+
+"Conclude!" he said impatiently.
+
+"I think, then," she said with timid hesitation, "that you will not say
+that I fail in respect to your ideas in asking that our marriage take
+place in church."
+
+"But that was my intention."
+
+"Truly!" she exclaimed. "O dearest! And I feared to offend you!"
+
+"Why should you think it would offend me?" he asked, smiling.
+
+"You consent to go to confession?"
+
+Instantly the smile in his eyes and on his lips was replaced by a gleam
+of fury.
+
+"And why should I not go to confession?" he demanded.
+
+"But--"
+
+"Do you suppose that I can be afraid to confess? Why do you suppose
+that? Tell me why?"
+
+He looked at her with eyes that pierced to her heart, as if they would
+read her inmost thoughts.
+
+Stupefied by this access of fury, which burst forth without any warning,
+since he had smilingly replied to her request for a religious marriage,
+she could find nothing to say, not understanding how the simple word
+"confess" could so exasperate him. And yet she could not deceive
+herself: is was indeed this word and no other that put him in this
+state.
+
+He continued to look at her, and wishing to explain herself, she said:
+"I supposed only one thing, and that is that I might offend you by
+asking you to do what is contrary to your beliefs."
+
+The mad anger that carried him away so stupidly began to lose its first
+violence; another word added to what had already escaped him would be an
+avowal.
+
+"Do not let us talk of it anymore," he said. "Above all, do not let us
+think of it."
+
+"Permit me to say one word," she replied. "Had I been situated like
+other people I would have asked nothing; my will is yours. But for
+you, for your future and your honor, you should not appear to marry in
+secret, as if ashamed, with a pariah."
+
+"Be easy. I feel as you do, more than you, the necessity of consecrated
+ceremonies for us."
+
+She understood that on this path he would go farther than she.
+
+To destroy the impression of this unfortunate word, he proposed that
+they should visit the apartment he had engaged the previous day.
+
+For the first time they walked together boldly, with heads held high,
+side by side in the streets of Paris, without fear of meeting others.
+How proud she was! Her husband! It was on her husband's arm that she
+leaned! When they crossed the Tuileries she was almost surprised that
+people did not turn to see them pass.
+
+In her present state of mind she could not but find the house he chose
+admirable; the street was admirable, the house was admirable, the
+apartment was admirable.
+
+As it contained three bedrooms opening on a terrace, where he would keep
+the animals for his experiments, Saniel wished to have her decide which
+one she would choose; as she would share it with him she wished to take
+the best, but he would not accept this arrangement.
+
+"I want you to choose between the two little ones," he said. "The
+largest and best must be reserved for your mother, who, not being able
+to go out, needs more space, air, and light than we do."
+
+She was transported with his kindness, delicacy, and generosity. Never
+would she be able to love him enough to raise herself up to him.
+
+Fortunately the principal rooms, the parlor and the office, were about
+the same size as those in the Rue Louis-le-Grand, so there need be but
+little change in furnishing; and they would bring their furniture from
+the Rue des Moines.
+
+This feminine talk, interrupted by passionate exclamations and glances,
+charmed Saniel, who had forgotten the incident of the confession and
+his anger, thinking only of Phillis, seeing only her, ravished by her
+gayety, her vivacity, his whole being stirred by the tender caresses of
+her beautiful dark eyes.
+
+How could he not be happy with this delicious woman who held such
+sway over him, and who loved him so ardently? For him a single danger
+henceforth--solitude. She would preserve him from it. With her gayety,
+good temper, courage, and love, she would not leave him to his thoughts;
+work would do the rest.
+
+After the question of furniture was decided, they settled that of the
+marriage ceremony, and she was surprised to find that his ideas were the
+same as hers.
+
+She decided upon her toilet, a silk gown as simple as possible, and
+she would make it herself, as she made all her gowns. And then they
+discussed the witnesses. "We have no friends," Phillis said.
+
+"You had some formerly; your father had friends and comrades."
+
+"I am no longer the daughter of my father, I am the sister of my
+brother; I would not dare to ask them to witness my marriage."
+
+"It is just because you are the sister of your brother that they cannot
+refuse you; it would be cruelty added to rudeness. Cruelty may be
+overlooked, but rudeness! Among the men of talent, who was your father's
+best friend?"
+
+"Cintrat."
+
+"Is he not a bohemian, a drunkard?"
+
+"My father regarded him as the greatest painter of our time, the most
+original."
+
+"It is not a question of talent, but of name; I am sure that he is not
+even decorated. Your father had other friends, more successful, more
+commonplace, if you wish."
+
+"Glorient."
+
+"The member of the Institute?"
+
+"Casparis, the sculptor."
+
+"An academician, also; that is what we want, and both are
+'archi-decore'. You will write them, and tell them who I am, assistant
+professor of the school of medicine, and doctor of the hospitals. I
+promise you they will accept. I will ask my old master Carbonneau,
+president of the academy of medicine; and Claudet, the ancient minister,
+who, in his quality of deputy of my department, could not decline any
+more than the others. And that will give us decorated witnesses, which
+will look well in the newspapers."
+
+It was not only in the newspapers they looked well, but also in the
+church of Sainte-Marie des Batignolles.
+
+"Glorient! Casparis! Carbonneau! Claudet! Art, science, and politics."
+
+But the beauty and charm of the bride were not eclipsed by these
+glorious witnesses. She entered on Glorient's arm, proud in her modesty,
+radiant with grace.
+
+While the priest celebrated mass at the altar, outside, before the door,
+a man dressed in a costume of chestnut velvet, and wearing a felt hat,
+walked up and down, smoking a pipe. It was the Count de Brigard, whose
+principles forbade him to enter a church for either a wedding or a
+funeral, and who walked up and down on the sidewalk with his disciples,
+waiting to congratulate Saniel. When he appeared the Count rushed up to
+him, and taking his hand pressed it warmly on separating him from his
+wife, and saying:
+
+"It is good, it is noble. Circumstances made this marriage; without them
+it would not have taken place. I understand and I excuse it; I do more,
+I applaud it. My dear friend, you are a man."
+
+And as it was Wednesday, in the evening at Crozat's, he publicly
+expressed his approbation, which, in the conditions in which it had been
+offered, did not satisfy his conscience.
+
+"Gentlemen, we have assisted to-day at a grand act of reparation, the
+marriage of our friend Saniel to the sister of this poor boy, victim of
+an injustice that cries for vengeance. One evening in this same room, I
+spoke lightly of Saniel, some of you remember, perhaps, in spite of
+the time that has passed. I wish to make this public reparation to him.
+To-day he has shown himself a man of duty and of conscience, bravely
+putting himself above social weaknesses."
+
+"Is it not a social weakness," asked Glady, "to have chosen as witnesses
+of this act of reparation persons who seem to have been selected for the
+decorative side of their official positions?"
+
+"Profound irony, on the contrary!" said Brigard. "It is a powerful and
+fruitful lesson, which makes even those who are professional defenders
+concur in the demolition of the prejudiced. Saniel is a man!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XL. PHILLIS IS SURPRISED
+
+The Sunday following her marriage, Phillis experienced a surprise
+on which she reflected a long time without finding a satisfactory
+explanation.
+
+As she was dressing, Saniel entered her room.
+
+"What are you going to do to-day?" he asked.
+
+"That which I do every day."
+
+"You are not going to mass?"
+
+She looked at him astonished, not being able to control her surprise,
+and as usual, when she appeared to wish to read his thoughts, he showed
+temper.
+
+"In what way is my question extraordinary?"
+
+"Mass is not exactly the usual subject of your thoughts, it seems to
+me."
+
+"It may become so, especially when I think of others, as is the case
+just now. Do you not often go to mass?"
+
+"When I can."
+
+"Very well, you can go to-day if you wish. Listen to what I have to say
+to you. I have not forgotten the promise you made to respect my ideas
+and beliefs. I wish to make you the same; it is very simple."
+
+"All that is good and generous seems simple to you."
+
+"Well?"
+
+"I will go at once."
+
+"Now? At once? It is not eight o'clock. Go to high mass, it is more
+fashionable."
+
+Fashionable! What a strange word in his mouth! It was not out of respect
+to fashion that she went to church, but because there was in her a
+depth of religious sentiment and of piety, a little vague perhaps, which
+Florentin's misfortunes had revived.
+
+"I will go to high mass," she said, without letting it appear that this
+word had suggested anything to her, and continuing her dressing.
+
+"Are you going to wear this frock?" he asked, pointing to one that lay
+on a chair.
+
+"Yes; at least if it does not displease you."
+
+"I find it rather simple."
+
+In effect it was of extreme simplicity, made of some cheap stuff,
+its only charm being an originality that Phillis gave it on making it
+herself.
+
+"Do not forget," he continued, "that Saint-Francois-Xavier is not a
+church for working people; when a woman is as charming as you are she is
+always noticed. People will ask who you are."
+
+"You are right; I will wear the gown I wore at the distribution of the
+prices."
+
+"That is it; and your bonnet, will you not, instead of the round hat?
+The first impression should be the best."
+
+This mixture of religious and worldly things was surprising in him. Had
+she not understood him, then, until now? After all, perhaps it was only
+an exception.
+
+But these exactions regarding her dress were repeated. Although before
+her marriage Phillis had only crossed Saniel's path, she knew him well
+enough to know that he was entirely given up to work, without thought of
+anything else, and she believed that after marriage he would continue
+to work in the same way, not caring for amusements or society. She was
+correct about his work, but not so regarding society. A short time after
+their marriage the minister Claudet was cured opportunely of an attack
+of facial neuralgia by Saniel, for whom he conceived a great friendship.
+He invited Saniel and his wife to all his reunions and fetes, and Saniel
+accepted all his invitations.
+
+At first her wedding gown answered very well, but it would not do
+always. It had to be trimmed, modified, three or four toilets made of
+one gown; but, however ingenious Phillis might be in arranging several
+yards of tulle or gauze, she could not make combinations indefinitely.
+
+And besides, they did not please Saniel; they were too simple. He liked
+lace, beads, flowers, something shining and glittering, such as he saw
+other women wear.
+
+How could she please him with the small resources at her disposal? In
+her household expenses she was as economical as possible; Joseph was
+dismissed, and replaced by a maid who did all the work; the table was
+extremely simple. But these little economies, saved on one side, were
+quickly spent on the other in toilets and carriages.
+
+When she expressed a wish to work, to paint menus, he would not consent,
+and when she insisted he became angry.
+
+He only permitted her to paint pictures. As she had formerly painted for
+amusement in her father's studio, she might do so now. If trade were a
+disgrace, art might be honorable. If she had talent he would be glad of
+it; and if she should sell her pictures it would be original enough to
+cause her to be talked about.
+
+The salon was partly transformed into a studio, and Phillis painted
+several little pictures, which, without having any pretensions to great
+art, were pleasing and painted with a certain dash. Glorient admired
+them, and made a picture-dealer buy two of them and order others, at a
+small price it is true, but it was much more than she expected.
+
+With the courage and constancy that women put into work that pleases
+them, she would willingly have painted from morning till night; but the
+connections that Saniel had made did not leave her this liberty. Through
+Claudet they made many acquaintances and accepted invitations that
+placed her under social obligations, so that almost every day she had a
+visit to pay, a funeral or a marriage to attend, besides an occasional
+charity fair, and her own day at home, when she listened for three hours
+to feminine gossip of no interest to her.
+
+As for him, what pleasure could he take in dressing after a hard day's
+work to go to a reception? He, son of a peasant, and a peasant himself
+in so many ways, who formerly understood nothing of fashionable life and
+felt only contempt for it, finding it as dull as it was ridiculous.
+
+She tried to find a cause for this change, and when lightly, in a
+roundabout way, she brought him to explain himself, she could only draw
+one answer from him, which was no answer to her:
+
+"We must be of the world."
+
+Why did he care so much about society? Was it because she was the sister
+of a criminal that he wished to take her everywhere and make people
+receive her? She understood this up to a certain point, although the
+part he made her play was the most cruel that he could give her, and
+entirely contrary to what she would have chosen if she had been free.
+
+But this was all there was in his desire to be of the world. Because
+he had married her he was not the brother of a criminal, and on close
+observation it might be seen that all he desired of these persons in
+high places whom he sought was their consideration, a part of their
+importance and honor. But he did not need this; he was some one by
+himself. The position that he had made was worthy of his merit. His name
+was honored. His future was envied.
+
+And yet, as if he did not realize this, he sought small satisfactions,
+unworthy of a serious ambition. One evening she was very much surprised
+when he told her that the decoration of a Spanish republic was offered
+to him, and although she had formed a habit of watching over her words
+she could not help exclaiming:
+
+"What will you do with that?"
+
+"I could not refuse it."
+
+Not only had he not refused it, but he had accepted others, blue, green,
+yellow, and tricolored; he wore them in his buttonhole, around his neck,
+and on his breast. What good could those decorations do that belittled
+him? And how could a man of his merit hasten to obtain the Legion of
+Honor before it fell to him naturally?
+
+All this was astonishing, mysterious, and silly, and her mind dwelt
+upon it when she was alone before her easel; while near her in his
+laboratory, he continued his experiments, or wrote an article in his
+office for the Review.
+
+But it was not without a struggle that she permitted herself to judge
+him in this way. One does not judge those whom one loves, and she loved
+him. Was it not failing in respect to her love that she did not admire
+him in every way? When these ideas oppressed her she left her easel and
+went to him. Close to him they disappeared. At first, in order not to
+disturb him, she entered on tiptoe, walking softly and leaning over his
+shoulder, embraced him before he saw or heard her; but he betrayed such
+horror, such fear, that she gave up this way of greeting him.
+
+She continued to go to his room, but in a different way. Instead of
+surprising him she announced her presence by rattling the handle of
+the door, and walking noisily, and instead of receiving her with uneasy
+manner he welcomed her joyfully.
+
+"You have finished painting?"
+
+"I have come to see you for a little while."
+
+"Very well, stay with me, do not go away immediately; I am never so
+happy, I never work so well, as when I have you near me."
+
+She felt that this was true. When she was with him, whether she spoke or
+not, her presence made him happy.
+
+And still she must appear not to look at him too attentively, as if
+with the manifest intention of studying him; for she did this during the
+first days of their marriage, and angered him so much that he exclaimed:
+
+"Why do you examine me thus? What do you look for in me?"
+
+She learned to watch herself carefully, and when with him to preserve a
+discreet attitude that should not offend him. No curious looks, and no
+questions. But this was not always easy, so she asked leave to assist
+him in his work, and sometimes drew in larger size the designs that he
+made for his microscopical studies. In this way the time passed rapidly.
+If he were but willing to pass the evening hours in this sweet intimacy,
+without a word about going out, how happy she would be! But he never
+forgot the hour.
+
+"Allons," he said, interrupting himself, "we must go."
+
+She had never dared to ask the true reason for this "must."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XLI. A TROUBLED SOUL
+
+If she dared not frankly ask him this question: Why must we go out? any
+more than the others: Why is it proper that I should go to mass to
+be seen? Why should I wear gowns that ruin us? Why do you accept
+decorations that are valueless in your eyes? Why do you seek the society
+of men who have no merit but what they derive from their official
+position or from their fortune? Why do we take upon ourselves social
+duties that weary both of us, instead of remaining together in a tender
+and intelligent intimacy that is sweet to us both? she could not ask
+herself.
+
+They all appertained to this order of ideas, that she, without doubt,
+found explained them: disposition of character; the exactions of
+an ambition in haste to realize its desires; susceptibility or
+overshadowing pride; but there were others founded on observation or
+memory, having no connection with those, or so it seemed to her.
+
+She began to know her husband the day following their marriage, having
+believed that he was always such as he revealed himself to her; but this
+was not the case, and the man she had loved was so unlike the man whose
+wife she had become, that it might almost be thought there were two.
+
+To tell the truth, it was not marriage that made the change in his
+temper that distressed her; but it was not less characteristic by that,
+that it dated back to a period anterior to this marriage.
+
+She remembered the commencement with a clearness that left no place for
+doubt or hesitation; it was at the time when pursued by creditors he
+entered into relations with Caffie. For the first time he, always
+so strong that she believed him above weakness, had had a moment of
+discouragement on announcing that he would probably be obliged to leave
+Paris; but this depression had neither the anger nor weakness that he
+had since shown. It was the natural sadness of a man who saw his future
+destroyed, nothing more. The only surprise that she then felt was caused
+by the idea of strangling Caffie and taking enough money from his safe
+to clear himself from debt, and also because he said--as a consequence
+of this act--speaking of the remorse of an intelligent man, that his
+conscience would not reproach him, since for him conscience did not
+exist. But this was evidently a simple philosophical theory, not a trait
+of character; a jest or an argument for the sake of discussion.
+
+Relieved from his creditors with the money won at Monaco, he returned
+to his usual calm, working harder than ever, passing his 'concours', and
+when it seemed excusable that he might be nervous, violent, unjust, he
+remained the man that he had been ever since she knew him. Then, all at
+once, a short time before Florlentin went to the assizes, occurred these
+strange explosions of temper, spasms of anger, and restlessness that she
+could not explain, manifesting themselves exactly at the time when, by
+Madame Dammauville's intervention, she hoped Florentin would be saved.
+She had not forgotten the furious anger, that was inexplicable
+and unjustifiable, with which he refused her request to see Madame
+Dammauville. He had thrust her away, wishing to break with her, and
+until she was a witness of this scene she never imagined that any one
+could put such violence into exasperation. Then to this scene succeeded
+another, totally opposed, which had not less impressed her, when, at
+their little dinner by the fire, he showed such profound desolation on
+telling her to keep the memory of this evening when she should judge
+him, and announcing to her, in a prophetic sort of way, that the hour
+would come when she would know him whom she loved.
+
+And now this hour, the thought of which she had thrown far from her, had
+sounded; she sought to combine the elements of this judgment which then
+appeared criminal to her, and now forced itself upon her, whatever she
+might do to repel it.
+
+How many times this memory returned to her! It could almost be said that
+it had never left her, sweet and sad at the same time, less sweet and
+more sad, according as new subjects for uneasiness were added to the
+others, in deepening the mysterious and troublous impression that it
+left with her.
+
+To judge him! Why did he wish that she should judge him? And on what?
+
+And yet with him it was not an insignificant word, but the evidence of a
+particular state of conscience, which many times since asserted itself.
+Was it not, in effect, to this order of ideas that the cry belonged that
+escaped him in the night when, waking suddenly, he asked with emotion,
+with fright: "What have I said?" And also to the same appertained
+the anger that carried him away when, 'a propos' of their religious
+marriage, she spoke of confession: "Why do you think that I should be
+afraid to go to confession?"
+
+How could he imagine that she could admit the idea of fear in connection
+with him? The idea never occurred to her mind until this moment; and if
+now the memory of her astonishment came to her, it was because of other
+little things added to those of the past that evoked it.
+
+How numerous and significant they were, these things: his constant
+uneasiness on seeing himself watched by her; his invitation when he
+thought she was going to question him; his access of passion when,
+through heedlessness or forgetfulness, or simply by chance, she asked
+him a question on certain subjects, and immediately the tenderness
+that followed, so sudden that they appeared rather planned in view of a
+determined end than natural or spontaneous.
+
+It was a long time before she admitted the calculation under the sweet
+words that made her so happy; but in the end it was well that she should
+open her eyes to the evidence, and see that they were with him the
+consequences of the same and constant preoccupation, that of not
+committing himself.
+
+It was only one step from this to ask him what he did not wish to yield
+up.
+
+Yet, as short as it was, she resisted for a long time the curiosity that
+possessed her. It was her duty as a loving and devoted wife not to seek
+beyond what he showed her, and this duty was in perfect accord with
+the dispositions of her love; but the power of things seen carried her
+beyond will and reason. She could not apply her mind to search for that
+which agonized her, and she could not close her eyes and ears to what
+she saw and heard.
+
+And what struck them were the same observations, turning always in the
+same circle, applied to the same subjects and persons:
+
+Caffie's name irritated him; Madame Dammauville's angered him;
+Florentin's made him positively unhappy.
+
+As for the two former, she might have prevented the pronunciation of
+them when she saw the effect they infallibly produced on him.
+
+But she could not prevent the utterance of Florentin's name, even had
+she wished it. How could she tell her mother never to speak the name of
+him who was constantly in their thoughts?
+
+In spite of Saniel's efforts and solicitations, supported by
+Nougarede's, Florentin had embarked for New Caledonia, whence he wrote
+as often as he could. His letters related all his sufferings in the
+terrible galleys, where he was confined during the voyage, and since his
+arrival they were a series of long complaints, continued from one to the
+other, like a story without end, turning always on the same subject,
+his physical sufferings, his humiliation, his discouragement, and his
+disgust in the midst of the unfortunates whose companion he was.
+
+The arrival of these letters filled the mother and sister with anguish
+that lasted for several days; and this anguish, that neither of them
+could dissimulate, angered Saniel.
+
+"What would you do if he were dead?" he asked Phillis.
+
+"Would it not be better for him?"
+
+"But he will return."
+
+"In what condition?"
+
+"Are we the masters of fate?"
+
+"We weep, we do not complain."
+
+But he complained of the weeping faces that surrounded him, the tears
+they concealed from him, the sighs they stifled. Ordinarily he was
+tender and affectionate to his mother-in-law, with attention and
+deference which in some ways seemed affected, as if he were so by will
+rather than by natural sentiment; but at these times he forgot this
+tenderness, and treated her with hardness so unjust, that more than once
+Madame Cormier spoke of it to her daughter.
+
+"How can your husband, who is so good to me, be so merciless regarding
+Florentin? One would say that our sadness produces on him the effect of
+a reproach that we would address to him."
+
+One day when things had gone farther than usual, she had the courage to
+speak to him plainly: "Forgive me for burdening you with the weariness
+of our disgrace," she said to him. "When I complain of everything, of
+men and things, you should remember that you are the exception, you who
+have done everything to save him."
+
+But these few words which she believed would calm the irritation of her
+son-in-law, had on the contrary exasperated him; he left her, furious.
+
+"I do not understand your husband at all," she said to her daughter.
+"Will you not explain to me what the matter is with him?"
+
+How could she give her mother the explanation that she could not give
+herself? Having reached an unfathomable abyss, she dared not even lean
+over to look into its depths; and instead of going on in the path where
+she was pledged in spite of herself, she made every effort to return, or
+at least to stop.
+
+What good would it do to find out why he was so peculiar, and what
+it was that he took so much pains to conceal? This could only be idle
+curiosity on her part, for which she would be punished sooner or later.
+
+Turning these thoughts over continually in her mind she lost her gayety,
+her power to resist blows of fate, such as the small trials of life,
+which formerly made her courageous; her vigorous elasticity sunk under
+the heavy weight with which it was charged, and her smiling eyes now
+more often expressed anxiety than happiness and confidence.
+
+In spite of her watchfulness over herself she was not able to hide the
+change from Saniel, for it manifested itself in everything--in her face
+formerly so open, but which now bore the imprint of a secret sadness; in
+her concentrated manner, in her silence and abstraction.
+
+What was the matter with her? He questioned her, and she replied with
+the prudence that she used in all her conversation with him. He examined
+her medically, but found nothing to indicate a sickly condition which
+would justify the change in her.
+
+If she did not wish to answer his questions, and he had the proof that
+she did not wish to; if, on the other hand, she was not ill, and he was
+convinced that she was not--there must be something serious the matter
+to make the woman whom but lately he read so easily become an enigma
+that made him uneasy.
+
+And this thing--if it were that whose crushing weight he himself carried
+on his bent shoulders? She divined, she understood, if not all, at least
+a part of the truth.
+
+What an extraordinary situation was hers, and one which might truly
+destroy her reason.
+
+Nothing to fear from others, everything from himself. Justice, law, the
+world--on all sides he was let alone; nothing was asked of him; that
+which was owed was paid; but he by a sickly aberration was going to
+awake the dead who slept in their tomb, from which no one thought of
+taking them, and to make spectres of them which he alone saw and heard.
+
+And he believed himself strong. Fool that he was, and still more foolish
+to have taken such a charge when by the exercise of his will he did
+not place himself in a condition to carry it! To will! But he had not
+learned how to will.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XLII. THE POWER OF HYPNOTISM
+
+The relative calm that Saniel had felt since his marriage he owed to
+Phillis; to the strength, the confidence, the peace that he drew from
+her. Phillis without strength, without confidence, without interior
+peace, such as she was now, could not give him what she no longer had
+herself, and he returned to the distracted condition that preceded
+his marriage, and felt the same anguish, the same agitation, the same
+madness. The beautiful relations, worldly consideration, success,
+decorations, honors, were good for others; but for his happiness he
+required the tranquillity and serenity of his wife, and her good moral
+health which passed into him when she slept on his shoulder. In that
+case there were no sudden awakenings, no sleeplessness; at the sound of
+her gentle respiration he was reassured, and the spectres remained in
+their tomb.
+
+But now that this respiration was agitated, and he no longer felt in her
+this tranquillity and serenity, he was no longer calm; she was weak and
+uneasy, and she communicated her fever to him, not her sleep.
+
+"You do not sleep. Why do you not sleep?"
+
+"And you?"
+
+He must know.
+
+He persisted in his questions, but she was always on her guard, so that
+he was unable to draw anything from her, checked as he was by the fear
+of betraying himself, which seemed easy at the point he believed she
+had reached. An awkward word, too much persistence, would let a flood of
+light into her mind.
+
+He also affected to speak as a physician when questioning her, and to
+look for medical explanations of her condition.
+
+"If you do not sleep it is because you suffer. What is this suffering?
+From what does it proceed?"
+
+Having no reasons to give to justify it, since she did not even dare to
+speak of her brother, she denied it obstinately.
+
+"But nothing is the matter with me, I assure you," she repeated. "What
+do you think is the matter?"
+
+"That is what I ask you."
+
+"Then I ask you: What do you think I conceal from you?"
+
+He could not say that he suspected her of concealing anything from him.
+
+"You do not watch yourself properly."
+
+"I can do nothing."
+
+"I will force you to watch yourself and to speak."
+
+"How?"
+
+"By putting you to sleep."
+
+The threat was so terrible that she was beside herself.
+
+"Do not do that!" she cried.
+
+They looked at each other for a few moments in silence, both equally
+frightened, she at the threat, he at what he would learn from her. But
+to show this fright was on his side to let loose another proof even more
+grave.
+
+"Why should I not seek to discover in every way the cause of this
+uneasiness which escapes my examination as well as yours? For that
+somnambulism offers us an excellent way."
+
+"But since I am not ill, what more could I tell you when I am asleep
+than when I am awake?"
+
+"We shall see."
+
+"It is an experiment that I ask you not to attempt. Would you try a
+poison on me?"
+
+"Somnambulism is not a poison."
+
+"Who knows?"
+
+"Those who have made use of it."
+
+"But you have not."
+
+"Still I know enough to know that you will run no danger in my hands."
+
+She believed that he opened a door of escape to her.
+
+"Never mind, I am too much afraid. If you ever want to make me talk in
+a state of forced somnambulism, ask one of your 'confreres' in whom you
+have confidence to put me to sleep."
+
+Before a 'confrere' she was certain he would not ask her dangerous
+questions.
+
+He understood that she wished to escape him.
+
+"Afraid of what?" he asked. "That I shall ask you questions about the
+past, concerning your life before we knew each other, and demand a
+confession that would wound my love?"
+
+"O Victor!" she cried, distracted. "What more cruel wound could you give
+me than these words? My confession! It comprises three words: I love
+you; I have never loved any one but you; I shall never love any one but
+you. I have no past; my life began with my love."
+
+He could not press it without showing the importance that he attached to
+it.
+
+"I do not insist," he said; "it is a way like any other, but better. You
+do not wish it, and we will not talk of it."
+
+But he yielded too quickly for her to hope that he renounced his
+project, and she remained under the influence of a stupefying terror.
+What would she say if he made her talk? Everything, possibly. She did
+not even know what thoughts were hidden in the depths of her brain, and
+she knew absolutely nothing of this forced somnambulism with which she
+was threatened.
+
+At this time the works of the school of Nancy on sleep, hypnotism,
+and suggestion, had not yet been published, or at least the book which
+served as their starting-point was not known, and she knew nothing of
+processes that were employed to provoke the hypnotic sleep. As soon as
+her husband left the house she looked for some book in the library that
+would enlighten her. But the dictionary that she found gave only obscure
+or confused instructions in which she floundered. The only exact point
+that struck her was the method employed to produce sleep; to make
+the subject look at a brilliant object placed from fifteen to twenty
+centimetres in front of the eyes. If this were true she had no fear of
+ever being put to sleep.
+
+However, she was not reassured; and when a few days later at a dinner
+she found herself seated next to one of her husband's 'confreres', who
+she knew interested himself in somnambulism, she had the courage to
+conquer her usual timidity concerning medicine, and questioned him.
+
+"Are there not persons with certain diseases who can be put into a state
+of somnambulism?"
+
+"It was formerly believed by the public and by many physicians that only
+persons afflicted with hysteria and nervous troubles could be put to
+sleep in this way, but it was a mistake; artificial somnambulism may be
+produced on many subjects who are perfectly healthy."
+
+"Is the will preserved in sleep?"
+
+"The subject only preserves the spontaneity and will that his hypnotizer
+leaves him, who at his pleasure makes him sad, gay, angry, or tender,
+and plays with his soul as with an instrument."
+
+"But that is frightful."
+
+"Curious, at least. It is certain that there is a local paralysis of
+such or such a cell, the study of which is the starting-point of many
+interesting discoveries."
+
+"When he wakes, does the subject remember what he has said?"
+
+"There is a difference of opinion on this point. Some say yes, and
+others no. As for me, I believe the memory depends upon the degree of
+sleep: with a light sleep there is remembrance, but with a profound
+sleep the subject does not remember what he has said or heard or done."
+
+She would have liked to continue, and her companion, glad to talk of
+what interested him, would willingly have said more, but she saw her
+husband at the other end of the table watching them by fits and starts,
+and fearing that he would suspect the subject of their conversation she
+remained silent.
+
+What she had just learned seemed to her frightful. But, at least, as
+she would not let herself be hypnotized she had nothing to fear; and
+remembering what she had read, she promised herself that she would never
+let him place her in a position where he could put her to sleep. It was
+during the sleep that the will of the hypnotizer controlled that of the
+subject, not before.
+
+Resting on this belief, and also on his not having again spoken of
+sending her to sleep, she was reassured. Was not this a sign that he
+accepted her opposition and renounced his idea of provoked somnambulism?
+
+But she deceived herself.
+
+One night when she had gone to bed at her usual hour while he remained
+at his work, she awoke suddenly and saw him standing near her, looking
+at her with eyes whose fixed stare frightened her.
+
+"What is the matter? What do you want?"
+
+"Nothing, I want nothing; I am going to bed."
+
+In spite of the strangeness of his glance she did not persist; questions
+would have taught her nothing. And besides, now that he no longer went
+to bed at the same time as she did, there was nothing extraordinary in
+his attitude.
+
+But a few days from that she woke again in the night with a feeling of
+distress, and saw him leaning over her as if he would envelop her in his
+arms.
+
+This time, frightened as she was, she had the strength to say nothing,
+but her anguish was the more intense. Did he then wish to hypnotize her
+while she slept? Was it possible? Then the dictionary had deceived her?
+
+In truth it was while she slept that Saniel tried to transform her
+natural into an artificial sleep. Would he succeed? He knew nothing
+about it, for the experience was new. But he risked it.
+
+The first time, instead of putting her into a state of somnambulism, he
+awoke her; the second, he succeeded no better; the third, when he saw
+that after a certain time she did not open her eyes, he supposed that
+she was asleep. To assure himself, he raised her arm, which remained
+in the air until he placed it on the bed. Then taking her two hands, he
+turned them backward, and withdrawing his own, the impulsion which he
+gave lasted until he checked it. Her face had an expression of calmness
+and tranquillity that it had not had for a long time; she was the pretty
+Phillis of other days, with the sprightly glance.
+
+"To-morrow I will make you sleep at the same time," he said, "and you
+will talk."
+
+The next night he put her to sleep even more easily, but when he
+questioned her she resisted.
+
+"No," she said, "I will not speak; it is horrible. I will not, I
+cannot."
+
+He insisted, but she would not.
+
+"Very well, so be it," he said; "not to-day, to-morrow. But to-morrow I
+wish you to speak, and you shall not resist me; I will it!"
+
+If he did not insist it was not only because he knew that habit was
+necessary to make her submit to his will without being able to defend
+herself, but because he was ignorant whether, when she awoke, she had
+any memory of what happened in her sleep, which was an important point.
+
+The next night she was the same as she had been the previous evening,
+and nothing indicated that she was conscious of her provoked sleep, any
+more than what she said in this sleep. He could then continue.
+
+This time she went to sleep sooner and more easily than usual, and her
+face took the expression of tranquillity and repose he had seen the
+night before. Would she answer? And if she consented, would she speak
+sincerely, without attempting to weaken or falsify the truth? Emotion
+made his voice tremble when he put the first question; it was his life,
+his peace, the happiness of both which decided him.
+
+"Where do you suffer?" he asked.
+
+"I do not suffer."
+
+"Yet you are agitated, often melancholy or uneasy; you do not sleep
+well. What troubles you?"
+
+"I am afraid."
+
+"Afraid of what? Of whom?"
+
+"Of you!"
+
+He trembled.
+
+"Afraid of me! Do you think that I could hurt you?"
+
+"No."
+
+His tightened heart relaxed.
+
+"Then why are you afraid?"
+
+"Because there are things in you that frighten me."
+
+"What things? Be exact."
+
+"The change that has taken place in your temper, your character, and
+your habits."
+
+"And how do these changes make you uneasy?"
+
+"They indicate a serious situation."
+
+"What situation?"
+
+"I do not know; I have never stated exactly."
+
+"Why not?"
+
+"Because I was afraid; and I closed my eyes so that I might not see."
+
+"See what?"
+
+"The explanation of all that is mysterious in your life."
+
+"When did you notice the mystery in my life?"
+
+"At the time of Caffie's death; and before, when you told me that you
+could kill him without any remorse."
+
+"Do you know who killed Caffie?"
+
+"No."
+
+His relief was so great that for several moments he forgot to continue
+his interrogations. Then he went on: "And after?"
+
+"A little before Madame Dammauville's death, when you became irritable
+and furious without cause; when you told me to go because you did not
+wish to see Madame Dammauville; when, the night before her death, you
+were so tender, and asked me not to judge you without recalling that
+hour."
+
+"Yet you have judged me."
+
+"Never. When worry urged me, my love checked me."
+
+"What provoked this uneasiness outside of these facts?"
+
+"Your manner of living since our marriage; your accesses of anger and of
+tenderness; your fear of being observed; your agitation at night; your
+complaints--"
+
+"I talked?" he cried.
+
+"Never distinctly; you groan often, and moan, pronouncing broken words
+without sense, unintelligible--"
+
+His anguish was violent; when he recovered he continued:
+
+"What is it in this way of living that has made you uneasy?"
+
+"Your constant care not to commit yourself--"
+
+"Commit myself how?"
+
+"I do not know--"
+
+"What else?"
+
+"The anger that you show, or the embarrassment, when the name of Caffie
+is pronounced, Madame Dammauville's, and Florentin's--"
+
+"And you conclude that my anger on hearing these three names--"
+
+"Nothing--I am afraid--"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XLIII. THE TERRIBLE REVELATION
+
+This confession threw him into a state of confusion and agitation,
+for if it did not go beyond what he feared, yet it revealed a terrible
+situation.
+
+Clearly, as in an open book, he read her; if she did not know all, she
+was but one step from the truth, and if she had not taken this step, it
+was because her love restrained her. If her love had been less strong,
+less powerful, she certainly would not have withstood the proofs that
+pressed on her from all sides.
+
+But because she had held back so long, he must not conclude that the
+struggle would be continued in this way, and that a more violent blow,
+a stronger proof than the others, would not open her eyes in spite of
+herself.
+
+It only needed an imprudence, a carelessness on his part, and unluckily
+he could no longer be relied on.
+
+From what he had just learned it would be easy to watch himself closely,
+and to avoid dangerous subjects, those that she described to him; but
+if he could guard his words and looks during the day, neither saying
+nor letting anything appear that was an accusation, not confirming the
+suspicions against which she struggled, he could not do it at night.
+
+He had not talked, and when she answered negatively to his question, she
+lifted a terribly heavy weight from his heart. But he had groaned and
+moaned, he had pronounced broken words without sense and unintelligible,
+and there was the danger.
+
+What was necessary to make these sighs, these groans, these broken and
+unintelligible words become distinct and take a meaning? A nothing, an
+accident, since his real cerebral tendency placed him up to a certain
+point in a somnambulistic state. Was this tendency congenital with him
+or acquired? He did not know. Before the agitated nights after Madame
+Dammauville's death and Florentin's condemnation, the idea had never
+occurred to him that he might talk in his sleep. But now he had the
+proof that the vague fears which had tormented him on this subject were
+only too well founded; he had talked, and if the words that escaped were
+not now comprehensible, they might become so.
+
+Without having made a special study of sleep, natural or induced, he
+knew that in the case of natural somnambulists a hypnotic sleep is
+easily produced, and that while holding a conversation with a subject
+who talks in his sleep one may readily hypnotize him. Without doubt he
+need not fear this from Phillis; but it was possible that some night
+when incoherent words escaped him she would not be able to resist the
+temptation to enter into a conversation with him, and to lead him to
+confess what she wished to know--what the love that she felt for her
+brother would drive her to wish to learn.
+
+If this opportunity presented itself, would the love for her brother or
+for her husband carry her away? If she questioned him, what would he not
+say?
+
+For the first time he asked himself if he had done right to marry,
+and if, on the contrary, he had not committed a mad imprudence in
+introducing a woman into a life so tormented as his. He had asked
+calmness from this woman, and now she brought him terror.
+
+To tell the truth, she was dangerous only at night; and if he found a
+way to occupy another room he would have nothing to fear from her during
+the day, on condition that he held himself rigorously on the defensive.
+Loving him as she did, she would resist the curiosity that drew her; if
+uneasiness drove her, her love would restrain her, as she herself had
+said; little by little this uneasiness and curiosity, being no longer
+excited, would die out, and they would again enjoy the sweet days that
+followed their marriage.
+
+But in the present circumstances this way was difficult to find, for to
+propose another room to Phillis would be equal to telling her that he
+was afraid of her, and consequently it would give her a new mystery to
+study. He reflected, and starting with the idea that the proposition of
+two rooms must come from Phillis, he arranged a plan which, it seemed to
+him, would accomplish what he wished.
+
+Ignorant of the fact that she had been hypnotized, and not remembering
+that she had talked, without doubt Phillis still feared that he would
+hypnotize her; he would threaten it again, and surely she would find a
+way to defend herself and escape from him.
+
+This is what happened. The next day, when he told her decidedly that he
+wished to put her to sleep in order that he might learn what troubled
+her, she showed the same fright as on the first time.
+
+"All that you have asked of me, everything that you have desired, I have
+wished as you and with you; but I will never consent to this."
+
+"Your resistance is absurd; I will not yield to it."
+
+"You shall not put me to sleep against my will."
+
+"Easily."
+
+"It is not possible."
+
+Without replying, he took a book from the library, and turning over
+the leaves, he read: "Is it possible to make a sleeping person, without
+awaking him, pass from the natural to the hypnotic sleep? The thing is
+possible, at least with certain subjects."
+
+Then handing her the book:
+
+"You see that to put you to sleep artificially I need only the
+opportunity of finding you sleeping naturally. It is very simple."
+
+"That would be odious."
+
+"Those are merely words."
+
+He threw her into such a state of terror that she kept awake all night,
+and as he would not sleep for fear of talking, he felt that she exerted
+every faculty to keep awake. But had he not gone too far? And by this
+threat would he not drive her to some desperate act? If she should
+escape, if she deserted him--what would become of him without her? Was
+she not his whole life? But he reassured himself by saying that she
+loved him too much ever to consent to a separation. Without doubt, she
+herself would come to think as he wished her to think.
+
+And yet when he returned home in the evening she told him that her
+mother was not well, and begged him to examine her. This examination
+proved that Madame Cormier was in her usual health; but she complained
+that her breath failed her--during the day she had feared syncope.
+
+"If you are willing," Phillis said, "I will sleep near mamma. I am
+afraid of not hearing her at night, and she is suffering."
+
+He began by refusing, then he consented to this arrangement; and to
+thank him for it she stayed with him in his office, affectionate, full
+of tenderness and caresses, until he went to his room.
+
+He was then free to sleep or not; whether he groaned or talked she could
+not hear him, since there was no communicating door between his room and
+that of his mother-in-law; his voice certainly would not penetrate the
+partition.
+
+Who could have told him on the night that he decided to marry, that he
+would come to such a pass--to be afraid, to hide himself from her who
+brought him the calmness of sleep; and that by his fault, by a chain of
+imprudences and stupidities, as if it were written that in everything
+he would owe his sufferings to himself, and that if he ever succumbed to
+the whirlwind that swept him along, it would be by his own deed, by his
+own hand? At last he had assured the tranquillity of his nights, and as
+a further precaution, although he did not fear that Phillis would enter
+his room while he slept, to surprise him--she who dared not look in the
+face what suspicion showed her--he locked his door. Naturally, Phillis
+could not always sleep with her mother; but he would find a way to
+suggest frankly their sleeping apart, and surely he could find one in
+the storehouse of medicine.
+
+These cares and similar fears were not of a nature to dispose him to
+sleep, and besides for a long time he had suffered from an exasperating
+nervous insomnia. As the night was warm he thought a little fresh air
+would calm him, and he opened the window; if this freshness did not calm
+him, at least it would make him sleep.
+
+Obliged to improvise a bed in her mother's room, Phillis placed it
+against the partition that separated her from her husband, but without
+preconcerted intention, simply by accident, because it was the only
+place where she could put the bed. A little after midnight an unusual
+noise awoke her; she sat up to listen and to recover herself. It seemed
+as if this noise came from her husband's room. Alarmed, she placed
+her ear against the partition. She was not deceived; they were stifled
+groans, moans that were repeated at short intervals.
+
+Carefully yet quickly she left her bed, and as the dawn was already
+shining in the windows, she was able to leave the room without making
+any noise. Reaching the door of her husband's room she listened; she was
+not deceived; they were indeed groans, but louder and sadder than those
+she had so often heard during the night. She tried the door, but it was
+evidently locked on the inside. What was the matter with him? She must
+know, must go to him, and give him relief. She thought of knocking, of
+shaking the door; but as he did not reply when she tried to open it, it
+was because he did not hear or did not wish to hear. Then she thought
+of the terrace; from there she could see what happened, and if it were
+necessary she would break a pane to enter.
+
+She found the window open and saw her husband on the bed, sleeping,
+his head turned toward her; she stopped and asked herself if she should
+cross the threshold and wake him.
+
+At this moment, with closed lips, he pronounced several words
+more distinctly than those that had so many times escaped him:
+"Phillis--forgive."
+
+He dreamed of her. Poor, dear Victor! for what did he wish her to pardon
+him? Doubtless for having threatened to hypnotize her:
+
+Overcome by this proof of love she put her head through the opening of
+the window to give him a look before returning to her mother, but
+on seeing his face in the full white light of the morning, she was
+frightened; it expressed the most violent sorrow, the features convulsed
+with anguish and horror at the same time. Surely he was ill. She must
+wake him. Just as she took a step toward him he began to speak: "Your
+brother--or me?"
+
+She stopped as if thunderstruck, then instinctively she drew back and
+clung to the window in the vestibule to keep herself from falling,
+repeating those two words that she had just heard, not understanding,
+not wishing to understand.
+
+Instead of returning to her mother, trembling and holding on to the wall
+she entered the parlor and let herself fall into a chair, prostrated,
+crushed.
+
+"Your brother--or me?"
+
+This was, then, the truth, the frightful truth that she had never wished
+to see.
+
+She stayed there until the noises in the street warned her that it
+was getting late, and she might be surprised. Then she returned to her
+mother.
+
+"I am going out," she said; "I will return at half-past eight or nine
+o'clock."
+
+"But your husband will not see you before going to the hospital."
+
+"You will tell him that I have gone out."
+
+She returned at half-past nine. Madame Cormier had finished dressing.
+
+"At last you have come," she said.
+
+But at sight of her daughter's face she saw that something had happened.
+"My God! What is the matter?" she asked, trembling.
+
+"Something serious--very serious, but unfortunately it is irreparable.
+We must leave here, never to return."
+
+"Your husband--"
+
+"You must never speak to me of him. This the only thing I ask of you."
+
+"Alas! I understand. It is what I foresaw, what I said would happen. You
+cannot bear the contempt that he shows us on account of your brother."
+
+"We must hereafter be strangers to each other, and this is why we leave
+this house."
+
+"My God! At my age, to drag my bones--"
+
+"I have engaged a lodging at the Ternes; a wagon will come to take the
+furniture that belongs to us, what we brought here, only that. We will
+tell the concierge that we are going to the country. As for Josephine,
+you need not fear indiscreet questions, for I have given her a day off."
+
+"But the money?"
+
+"I have two hundred francs from the sale of my last picture; that is
+enough for the present. Before they are gone I shall have painted and
+sold another; do not worry, we shall have all we need."
+
+All this was said in a hard but resolute tone.
+
+A ring of the bell interrupted them. It was the express wagon.
+
+"See that they do not take what does not belong to us," Phillis said.
+"While they fill their wagon I will write in the parlor."
+
+At the end of an hour the wagon was ready. Madame Cormier entered the
+parlor to tell her daughter.
+
+"I have finished," Phillis said.
+
+Having placed her letter in an envelope, she laid it in full view on
+Saniel's desk.
+
+"Now let us go," she said.
+
+And as her mother sighed, while walking with difficulty
+
+"Lean on me, dear mamma, you know I am strong."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XLIV. AFTER LONG YEARS
+
+Saniel did not return until quite late in the afternoon. When he opened
+the door with his key he was surprised at not seeing his wife run to him
+and kiss him.
+
+"She is painting," he said to himself, "she did not hear me."
+
+He passed into the parlor, convinced that he would find her at her
+easel; but he did not see her, and the easel was not in its usual place,
+there nor anywhere else.
+
+He knocked at the door of Madame Cormier's room; there was no reply; he
+knocked louder a second time, and after waiting a moment he entered. The
+room was empty; there was no bed, no furniture, no one.
+
+Stupefied, he looked around him, then returning to the vestibule he
+called: "Phillis! Phillis!"
+
+There was no reply. He ran to the kitchen, no one was there; he went
+into his office, no one there. But as he looked about him, he saw
+Phillis's letter on his desk, and his heart leaped; he grasped it
+eagerly, and opened it with a trembling hand. It was as follows:
+
+   "I have gone, never to return. My despair and disgust of life are
+   such, that without my mother and the poor being who is so far away,
+   I should kill myself; but in spite of the horror of my position I
+   was obliged to reflect, and I do not wish to aggravate by folly the
+   wickedness that is going on about me. My mother is no longer young;
+   she is ill and has suffered cruelly. Not only do I owe it to her to
+   brighten her old age by my presence, by the material and moral
+   support that I can give her, but she must have faith that I am there
+   to replace her, and to open my arms to her son, to my brother. The
+   least that I can do for them is to wait courageously for him; and,
+   however weary, terrible, or frightful my life may be hereafter, I
+   shall bear it so that the unfortunate, the pariah, whom a pitiless
+   fate has pursued, will find on his return a hearth, a home, a
+   friend. This will be my only object, my reason for living; and in
+   order to save myself from sluggishness and weariness, my thoughts
+   will always be on the time when he will return, he whom I will call
+   my child, and whom my love must save and cure. I know that long
+   years separate me from that day, and that until it comes my broken
+   heart will never have a moment of repose; but I shall employ this
+   time in working for him, for the brother, for the child, for the
+   cherished being who will come to me aged and desperate; and I wish
+   that he may yet believe in something good, that he will not imagine
+   everything in this world is unjust and infamous, for he will return
+   to me weighed down by twenty years of shame, of degrading and
+   undeserved shame. How will he bear these twenty years? What
+   efforts must I not make to prove to him that he should not abandon
+   himself to despair, and that life often offers the remedy,
+   compassion to the most profound, to the most unjust human sorrows?
+   How can I make him believe that? How lead his poor heart, closed to
+   confidence, to feeling, to the tears that alone can relieve it? God
+   who has so sorely tried me, without doubt will come to my aid, and
+   will inspire me with words of consolation, will show me the path to
+   follow, and give me the strength to persevere. Have I not already
+   to thank Him for being alone in the world, outside of a mother and
+   brother who will not betray me? I have no children, and I am spared
+   the terror of seeing a soul growing in evil, an intelligence
+   escaping from me to follow the path of infamy or dishonor. I leave,
+   then, as I came. I was a poor girl, I go away a poor woman. I have
+   taken the clothing and personal effects that I brought into our
+   common home, nothing that was bought with your money; and I forbid
+   you to interfere with my wish in this question of material things,
+   as well as in my resolution to fly from you. Nothing can ever
+   reunite us; nothing shall reunite us, no consideration, no
+   necessity. I reject the past, this guilty past, the responsibility
+   of which weighs so heavily on my conscience, and I should like to
+   lose the memory of the detested time. It would be impossible for me
+   to accept the struggle, or supplications, if you think it expedient
+   to make any. I have cut our bonds, and hereafter we shall be as far
+   apart as if one of us were dead, or even farther. Have no scruples,
+   then, in leaving me alone to face a new life, a beginning that may
+   appear difficult to one not situated as I am. The trials of former
+   times were good for me, since they accustomed me to the difficulties
+   of work. The desolation of to-day will sustain me, in the sense
+   that having suffered all I can suffer, I no longer fear some
+   discouraging catastrophe that will check me in my resolutions. In
+   order not to compromise you, and more fully to become myself again,
+   I shall take my family name--a dishonored name--but I shall bear it
+   without shame. I shall live obscurely, absorbed in work and in
+   trying to forget your existence; do the same yourself. If you think
+   of the past, you will find, perhaps, that I am hard; yet this
+   departure is not an egotistic desertion. I am no good to you, and
+   the repose that you want would shun you hereafter in my presence.
+   On the contrary, strive for forgetfulness, as I shall. If you
+   contrive to wipe out of your life the part that is associated with
+   me, perhaps you will be able to banish the remainder, and to recover
+   some of the calm of other days. I can no longer remember that I
+   have loved you, for my position is such that I have not the refuge
+   of memory; at my age I must remain without a past as without a
+   future; the consolation of the unfortunate is lost to me with
+   everything else. I cannot rise out of my sorrow to try to find one
+   hour when life was sweet to me; those hours, on the contrary, make
+   me tremble, and I reproach myself for them as if they were a crime.
+   Thus, whichever way I turn, I find only sadness and sharp regrets;
+   everything is blighted, dishonored for me."
+
+Standing in the middle of his office he read this hastily written letter
+breathlessly. Arrived at the end he looked about him vaguely. His
+chair was near his desk; he let himself fall into it and remained there
+prostrated, holding the letter in his shaking hand.
+
+"Alone!"
+
+It was an October afternoon, dark and muddy; in the Rue des
+Saints-Peres, in front of the houses that hide the Charity Hospital,
+coupes were standing, and their long line extended to the Boulevard
+Saint-Germain, where the coachmen, having left their seats, talked
+together like persons who were accustomed to meet each other. At
+half-past four o'clock, in the deepening twilight, men with grave
+looks and dark clothes--members of the Academy of Medicine--the Tuesday
+sitting over, issued from the porch, and entered their carriages. Some
+of them walked alone, briskly, in a great hurry; others demonstrated
+a skilful tardiness, stopping to talk politely to a journalist, and to
+give him notes of the day's meeting, or continuing, with a 'confrere'
+who was not an Academician, the conversation begun in the room of the
+'pas-perdus'; it was the Bourse of consultations that was just closed.
+Not all the members of the Academy have, in truth, a long list of
+patients to visit; but each one has a vote to give, and they are those
+whom the candidates surround, trying to win them.
+
+One of the Academicians who appeared the last at the top of the steps
+was a man of great height but bent figure, with hollow cheeks and pale
+face lighted by pale blue eyes with a strange expression, both hard and
+desolate at the same time. He advanced alone, and his heavy gait and
+dragging step gave him the appearance of a man sixty years of age, while
+in other ways he retained a certain youthfulness. It was Saniel, twenty
+years older.
+
+Without exchanging a bow or a hand-shake with any one, he descended to
+the pavement and walked to the boulevard, where he opened the door of a
+coups whose interior showed a complete ambulant library--a writing table
+with paper, ink, and lamp, pockets full of books and pamphlets.
+
+Just as he was about to enter, a voice stopped him.
+
+He turned; it was one of his old pupils, who had recently become a
+physician in the suburb of Gentilly.
+
+"What is it?" asked Saniel.
+
+"I want to ask you to come and assist me in a curious case of spasms,
+where your intervention may be decisive."
+
+"Where?"
+
+"At the Maison-Blanche, a poor woman. What day could you give me?"
+
+"Is it urgent?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"In that case I will go at once. Give the address to my coachman, and
+get in with me."
+
+But at this moment a white-haired man dressed in chestnut velvet,
+wearing a felt hat and sabots, came toward them, accompanied by two
+young men with whom he discoursed in a loud tone while gesticulating.
+People turned to look at them, so original was the appearance of old
+Brigard, the same man from head to foot that he had always been.
+
+He came to Saniel with outstretched hands, and Saniel, taking off his
+hat, received him with marked respect.
+
+"Enchanted to meet you," Brigard said, "for I went to your office
+yesterday and did not find you."
+
+"Why did you not send me word beforehand? If you need me I am at your
+disposal."
+
+"Thanks, but happily I do not need your advice, neither for myself nor
+my family; it was simply that I wished to see you. Arriving at your
+house before your office hours, I waited in your reception-room and
+several patients came after me--a young woman who appeared to suffer
+cruelly, an old lady who was extremely anxious, and lastly a man who
+had some nervous disease that would not permit him to sit still. And,
+looking at them, I said to myself that as I was only making a friendly
+visit I would not remain and prolong the waiting of these unfortunates
+who counted the minutes, so I came away."
+
+"May I ask to what do I owe the honor of this visit?"
+
+The two young men who accompanied Brigard, and Saniel's old pupil
+discreetly withdrew.
+
+"The desire to present you my congratulations. When I learned of your
+candidature to the Academy of Medicine I said to myself: Here is one who
+has no chance; friend Saniel has originality and force; he has succeeded
+brilliantly; but these qualities are not exactly academic. I was
+deceived. You have broken open the doors, which is the only way that
+I understand of entering these places. That is why I congratulate you.
+And, besides, I did you wrong formerly--"
+
+"Wrong? You?"
+
+"I accused you of believing yourself stronger than life; in truth you
+were. My compliments!"
+
+After warmly pressing Saniel's hands, he went on his way with his two
+disciples, preaching to them.
+
+The young doctor approached Saniel.
+
+"He is an original," he said.
+
+"A happy man!" was the only reply.
+
+
+     ETEXT EDITOR'S BOOKMARKS:
+
+     As ignorant as a schoolmaster
+     As free from prejudices as one may be, one always retains a few
+     Confidence in one's self is strength, but it is also weakness
+     Conscience is a bad weighing-machine
+     Conscience is only an affair of environment and of education
+     Find it more easy to make myself feared than loved
+     For the rest of his life he would be the prisoner of his crime
+     Force, which is the last word of the philosophy of life
+     He did not sleep, so much the better! He would work more
+     I believed in the virtue of work, and look at me!
+     In his eyes everything was decided by luck
+     Intelligent persons have no remorse
+     It is the first crime that costs
+     It is only those who own something who worry about the price
+     Leant--and when I did not lose my friends I lost my money
+     Leisure must be had for light reading, and even more for love
+     Looking for a needle in a bundle of hay
+     Neither so simple nor so easy as they at first appeared
+     One does not judge those whom one loves
+     People whose principle was never to pay a doctor
+     Power to work, that was never disturbed or weakened by anything
+     Reason before the deed, and not after
+     Repeated and explained what he had already said and explained
+     She could not bear contempt
+     The strong walk alone because they need no one
+     We are so unhappy that our souls are weak against joy
+     We weep, we do not complain
+     Will not admit that conscience is the proper guide of our action
+     You love me, therefore you do not know me
+
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Conscience, Complete, by Hector Malot
+
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