The Project Gutenberg EBook of Original Short Stories of Maupassant,
Volume 3, by Guy de Maupassant

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Title: Original Short Stories of Maupassant, Volume 3

Author: Guy de Maupassant

Release Date: August 16, 2006 [EBook #3079]

Language: English

Character set encoding: ASCII

*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MAUPASSANT SHORT STORIES ***




Produced by David Widger





GUY DE MAUPASSANT

ORIGINAL SHORT STORIES

Translated by
ALBERT M. C. McMASTER, B.A.
A. E. HENDERSON, B.A.
MME. QUESADA and Others




VOLUME III.


MISS HARRIET
LITTLE LOUISE ROQUE
THE DONKEY
MOIRON
THE DISPENSER OF HOLY WATER
THE PARRICIDE
BERTHA
THE PATRON
THE DOOR
A SALE
THE IMPOLITE SEX
A WEDDING GIFT
THE RELIC




MISS HARRIET

There were seven of us on a drag, four women and three men; one of the
latter sat on the box seat beside the coachman. We were ascending, at a
snail's pace, the winding road up the steep cliff along the coast.

Setting out from Etretat at break of day in order to visit the ruins of
Tancarville, we were still half asleep, benumbed by the fresh air of the
morning. The women especially, who were little accustomed to these early
excursions, half opened and closed their eyes every moment, nodding their
heads or yawning, quite insensible to the beauties of the dawn.

It was autumn. On both sides of the road stretched the bare fields,
yellowed by the stubble of wheat and oats which covered the soil like a
beard that had been badly shaved. The moist earth seemed to steam. Larks
were singing high up in the air, while other birds piped in the bushes.

The sun rose at length in front of us, bright red on the plane of the
horizon, and in proportion as it ascended, growing clearer from minute to
minute, the country seemed to awake, to smile, to shake itself like a
young girl leaving her bed in her white robe of vapor. The Comte
d'Etraille, who was seated on the box, cried:

"Look! look! a hare!" and he extended his arm toward the left, pointing
to a patch of clover. The animal scurried along, almost hidden by the
clover, only its large ears showing. Then it swerved across a furrow,
stopped, started off again at full speed, changed its course, stopped
anew, uneasy, spying out every danger, uncertain what route to take, when
suddenly it began to run with great bounds, disappearing finally in a
large patch of beet-root. All the men had waked up to watch the course of
the animal.

Rene Lamanoir exclaimed:

"We are not at all gallant this morning," and; regarding his neighbor,
the little Baroness de Serennes, who struggled against sleep, he said to
her in a low tone: "You are thinking of your husband, baroness. Reassure
yourself; he will not return before Saturday, so you have still four
days."

She answered with a sleepy smile:

"How stupid you are!" Then, shaking off her torpor, she added: "Now, let
somebody say something to make us laugh. You, Monsieur Chenal, who have
the reputation of having had more love affairs than the Due de Richelieu,
tell us a love story in which you have played a part; anything you like."

Leon Chenal, an old painter, who had once been very handsome, very
strong, very proud of his physique and very popular with women, took his
long white beard in his hand and smiled. Then, after a few moments'
reflection, he suddenly became serious.

"Ladies, it will not be an amusing tale, for I am going to relate to you
the saddest love affair of my life, and I sincerely hope that none of my
friends may ever pass through a similar experience.

"I was twenty-five years of age and was pillaging along the coast of
Normandy. I call 'pillaging' wandering about, with a knapsack on one's
back, from inn to inn, under the pretext of making studies and sketching
landscapes. I knew nothing more enjoyable than that happy-go-lucky
wandering life, in which one is perfectly free, without shackles of any
kind, without care, without preoccupation, without thinking even of the
morrow. One goes in any direction one pleases, without any guide save his
fancy, without any counsellor save his eyes. One stops because a running
brook attracts one, because the smell of potatoes frying tickles one's
olfactories on passing an inn. Sometimes it is the perfume of clematis
which decides one in his choice or the roguish glance of the servant at
an inn. Do not despise me for my affection for these rustics. These girls
have a soul as well as senses, not to mention firm cheeks and fresh lips;
while their hearty and willing kisses have the flavor of wild fruit. Love
is always love, come whence it may. A heart that beats at your approach,
an eye that weeps when you go away are things so rare, so sweet, so
precious that they must never be despised.

"I have had rendezvous in ditches full of primroses, behind the cow
stable and in barns among the straw, still warm from the heat of the day.
I have recollections of coarse gray cloth covering supple peasant skin
and regrets for simple, frank kisses, more delicate in their unaffected
sincerity than the subtle favors of charming and distinguished women.

"But what one loves most amid all these varied adventures is the country,
the woods, the rising of the sun, the twilight, the moonlight. These are,
for the painter, honeymoon trips with Nature. One is alone with her in
that long and quiet association. You go to sleep in the fields, amid
marguerites and poppies, and when you open your eyes in the full glare of
the sunlight you descry in the distance the little village with its
pointed clock tower which sounds the hour of noon.

"You sit down by the side of a spring which gushes out at the foot of an
oak, amid a growth of tall, slender weeds, glistening with life. You go
down on your knees, bend forward and drink that cold, pellucid water
which wets your mustache and nose; you drink it with a physical pleasure,
as though you kissed the spring, lip to lip. Sometimes, when you find a
deep hole along the course of these tiny brooks, you plunge in quite
naked, and you feel on your skin, from head to foot, as it were, an icy
and delicious caress, the light and gentle quivering of the stream.

"You are gay on the hills, melancholy on the edge of ponds, inspired when
the sun is setting in an ocean of blood-red clouds and casts red
reflections or the river. And at night, under the moon, which passes
across the vault of heaven, you think of a thousand strange things which
would never have occurred to your mind under the brilliant light of day.

"So, in wandering through the same country where we, are this year, I
came to the little village of Benouville, on the cliff between Yport and
Etretat. I came from Fecamp, following the coast, a high coast as
straight as a wall, with its projecting chalk cliffs descending
perpendicularly into the sea. I had walked since early morning on the
short grass, smooth and yielding as a carpet, that grows on the edge of
the cliff. And, singing lustily, I walked with long strides, looking
sometimes at the slow circling flight of a gull with its white curved
wings outlined on the blue sky, sometimes at the brown sails of a fishing
bark on the green sea. In short, I had passed a happy day, a day of
liberty and of freedom from care.

"A little farmhouse where travellers were lodged was pointed out to me, a
kind of inn, kept by a peasant woman, which stood in the centre of a
Norman courtyard surrounded by a double row of beeches.

"Leaving the coast, I reached the hamlet, which was hemmed in by great
trees, and I presented myself at the house of Mother Lecacheur.

"She was an old, wrinkled and stern peasant woman, who seemed always to
receive customers under protest, with a kind of defiance.

"It was the month of May. The spreading apple trees covered the court
with a shower of blossoms which rained unceasingly both upon people and
upon the grass.

"I said: 'Well, Madame Lecacheur, have you a room for me?'

"Astonished to find that I knew her name, she answered:

"'That depends; everything is let, but all the same I can find out."

"In five minutes we had come to an agreement, and I deposited my bag upon
the earthen floor of a rustic room, furnished with a bed, two chairs, a
table and a washbowl. The room looked into the large, smoky kitchen,
where the lodgers took their meals with the people of the farm and the
landlady, who was a widow.

"I washed my hands, after which I went out. The old woman was making a
chicken fricassee for dinner in the large fireplace in which hung the
iron pot, black with smoke.

"'You have travellers, then, at the present time?' said I to her.

"She answered in an offended tone of voice:

"'I have a lady, an English lady, who has reached years of maturity. She
occupies the other room.'

"I obtained, by means of an extra five sous a day, the privilege of
dining alone out in the yard when the weather was fine.

"My place was set outside the door, and I was beginning to gnaw the lean
limbs of the Normandy chicken, to drink the clear cider and to munch the
hunk of white bread, which was four days old but excellent.

"Suddenly the wooden gate which gave on the highway was opened, and a
strange lady directed her steps toward the house. She was very thin, very
tall, so tightly enveloped in a red Scotch plaid shawl that one might
have supposed she had no arms, if one had not seen a long hand appear
just above the hips, holding a white tourist umbrella. Her face was like
that of a mummy, surrounded with curls of gray hair, which tossed about
at every step she took and made me think, I know not why, of a pickled
herring in curl papers. Lowering her eyes, she passed quickly in front of
me and entered the house.

"That singular apparition cheered me. She undoubtedly was my neighbor,
the English lady of mature age of whom our hostess had spoken.

"I did not see her again that day. The next day, when I had settled
myself to commence painting at the end of that beautiful valley which you
know and which extends as far as Etretat, I perceived, on lifting my eyes
suddenly, something singular standing on the crest of the cliff, one
might have said a pole decked out with flags. It was she. On seeing me,
she suddenly disappeared. I reentered the house at midday for lunch and
took my seat at the general table, so as to make the acquaintance of this
odd character. But she did not respond to my polite advances, was
insensible even to my little attentions. I poured out water for her
persistently, I passed her the dishes with great eagerness. A slight,
almost imperceptible, movement of the head and an English word, murmured
so low that I did not understand it, were her only acknowledgments.

"I ceased occupying myself with her, although she had disturbed my
thoughts.

"At the end of three days I knew as much about her as did Madame
Lecacheur herself.

"She was called Miss Harriet. Seeking out a secluded village in which to
pass the summer, she had been attracted to Benouville some six months
before and did not seem disposed to leave it. She never spoke at table,
ate rapidly, reading all the while a small book of the Protestant
propaganda. She gave a copy of it to everybody. The cure himself had
received no less than four copies, conveyed by an urchin to whom she had
paid two sous commission. She said sometimes to our hostess abruptly,
without preparing her in the least for the declaration:

"'I love the Saviour more than all. I admire him in all creation; I adore
him in all nature; I carry him always in my heart.'

"And she would immediately present the old woman with one of her tracts
which were destined to convert the universe.

"In, the village she was not liked. In fact, the schoolmaster having
pronounced her an atheist, a kind of stigma attached to her. The cure,
who had been consulted by Madame Lecacheur, responded:

"'She is a heretic, but God does not wish the death of the sinner, and I
believe her to be a person of pure morals.'

"These words, 'atheist,' 'heretic,' words which no one can precisely
define, threw doubts into some minds. It was asserted, however, that this
English woman was rich and that she had passed her life in travelling
through every country in the world because her family had cast her off.
Why had her family cast her off? Because of her impiety, of course!

"She was, in fact, one of those people of exalted principles; one of
those opinionated puritans, of which England produces so many; one of
those good and insupportable old maids who haunt the tables d'hote of
every hotel in Europe, who spoil Italy, poison Switzerland, render the
charming cities of the Mediterranean uninhabitable, carry everywhere
their fantastic manias their manners of petrified vestals, their
indescribable toilets and a certain odor of india-rubber which makes one
believe that at night they are slipped into a rubber casing.

"Whenever I caught sight of one of these individuals in a hotel I fled
like the birds who see a scarecrow in a field.

"This woman, however, appeared so very singular that she did not
displease me.

"Madame Lecacheur, hostile by instinct to everything that was not rustic,
felt in her narrow soul a kind of hatred for the ecstatic declarations of
the old maid. She had found a phrase by which to describe her, a term of
contempt that rose to her lips, called forth by I know not what confused
and mysterious mental ratiocination. She said: 'That woman is a
demoniac.' This epithet, applied to that austere and sentimental
creature, seemed to me irresistibly droll. I myself never called her
anything now but 'the demoniac,' experiencing a singular pleasure in
pronouncing aloud this word on perceiving her.

"One day I asked Mother Lecacheur: 'Well, what is our demoniac about
to-day?'

"To which my rustic friend replied with a shocked air:

"'What do you think, sir? She picked up a toad which had had its paw
crushed and carried it to her room and has put it in her washbasin and
bandaged it as if it were a man. If that is not profanation I should like
to know what is!'

"On another occasion, when walking along the shore she bought a large
fish which had just been caught, simply to throw it back into the sea
again. The sailor from whom she had bought it, although she paid him
handsomely, now began to swear, more exasperated, indeed, than if she had
put her hand into his pocket and taken his money. For more than a month
he could not speak of the circumstance without becoming furious and
denouncing it as an outrage. Oh, yes! She was indeed a demoniac, this
Miss Harriet, and Mother Lecacheur must have had an inspiration in thus
christening her.

"The stable boy, who was called Sapeur, because he had served in Africa
in his youth, entertained other opinions. He said with a roguish air:
'She is an old hag who has seen life.'

"If the poor woman had but known!

"The little kind-hearted Celeste did not wait upon her willingly, but I
was never able to understand why. Probably her only reason was that she
was a stranger, of another race; of a different tongue and of another
religion. She was, in fact, a demoniac!

"She passed her time wandering about the country, adoring and seeking God
in nature. I found her one evening on her knees in a cluster of bushes.
Having discovered something red through the leaves, I brushed aside the
branches, and Miss Harriet at once rose to her feet, confused at having
been found thus, fixing on me terrified eyes like those of an owl
surprised in open day.

"Sometimes, when I was working among the rocks, I would suddenly descry
her on the edge of the cliff like a lighthouse signal. She would be
gazing in rapture at the vast sea glittering in the sunlight and the
boundless sky with its golden tints. Sometimes I would distinguish her at
the end of the valley, walking quickly with her elastic English step, and
I would go toward her, attracted by I know not what, simply to see her
illuminated visage, her dried-up, ineffable features, which seemed to
glow with inward and profound happiness.

"I would often encounter her also in the corner of a field, sitting on
the grass under the shadow of an apple tree, with her little religious
booklet lying open on her knee while she gazed out at the distance.

"I could not tear myself away from that quiet country neighborhood, to
which I was attached by a thousand links of love for its wide and
peaceful landscape. I was happy in this sequestered farm, far removed
from everything, but in touch with the earth, the good, beautiful, green
earth. And--must I avow it?--there was, besides, a little
curiosity which retained me at the residence of Mother Lecacheur. I
wished to become acquainted a little with this strange Miss Harriet and
to know what transpires in the solitary souls of those wandering old
English women.

"We became acquainted in a rather singular manner. I had just finished a
study which appeared to me to be worth something, and so it was, as it
sold for ten thousand francs fifteen years later. It was as simple,
however, as two and two make four and was not according to academic
rules. The whole right side of my canvas represented a rock, an enormous
rock, covered with sea-wrack, brown, yellow and red, across which the sun
poured like a stream of oil. The light fell upon the rock as though it
were aflame without the sun, which was at my back, being visible. That
was all. A first bewildering study of blazing, gorgeous light.

"On the left was the sea, not the blue sea, the slate-colored sea, but a
sea of jade, greenish, milky and solid beneath the deep-colored sky.

"I was so pleased with my work that I danced from sheer delight as I
carried it back to the inn. I would have liked the whole world to see it
at once. I can remember that I showed it to a cow that was browsing by
the wayside, exclaiming as I did so: 'Look at that, my old beauty; you
will not often see its like again.'

"When I had reached the house I immediately called out to Mother
Lecacheur, shouting with all my might:

"'Hullo, there! Mrs. Landlady, come here and look at this.'

"The rustic approached and looked at my work with her stupid eyes which
distinguished nothing and could not even tell whether the picture
represented an ox or a house.

"Miss Harriet just then came home, and she passed behind me just as I was
holding out my canvas at arm's length, exhibiting it to our landlady. The
demoniac could not help but see it, for I took care to exhibit the thing
in such a way that it could not escape her notice. She stopped abruptly
and stood motionless, astonished. It was her rock which was depicted, the
one which she climbed to dream away her time undisturbed.

"She uttered a British 'Aoh,' which was at once so accentuated and so
flattering that I turned round to her, smiling, and said:

"'This is my latest study, mademoiselle.'

"She murmured rapturously, comically and tenderly:

"'Oh! monsieur, you understand nature as a living thing.'

"I colored and was more touched by that compliment than if it had come
from a queen. I was captured, conquered, vanquished. I could have
embraced her, upon my honor.

"I took my seat at table beside her as usual. For the first time she
spoke, thinking aloud:

"'Oh! I do love nature.'

"I passed her some bread, some water, some wine. She now accepted these
with a little smile of a mummy. I then began to talk about the scenery.

"After the meal we rose from the table together and walked leisurely
across the courtyard; then, attracted doubtless by the fiery glow which
the setting sun cast over the surface of the sea, I opened the gate which
led to the cliff, and we walked along side by side, as contented as two
persons might be who have just learned to understand and penetrate each
other's motives and feelings.

"It was one of those warm, soft evenings which impart a sense of ease to
flesh and spirit alike. All is enjoyment, everything charms. The balmy
air, laden with the perfume of grasses and the smell of seaweed, soothes
the olfactory sense with its wild fragrance, soothes the palate with its
sea savor, soothes the mind with its pervading sweetness.

"We were now walking along the edge of the cliff, high above the
boundless sea which rolled its little waves below us at a distance of a
hundred metres. And we drank in with open mouth and expanded chest that
fresh breeze, briny from kissing the waves, that came from the ocean and
passed across our faces.

"Wrapped in her plaid shawl, with a look of inspiration as she faced the
breeze, the English woman gazed fixedly at the great sun ball as it
descended toward the horizon. Far off in the distance a three-master in
full sail was outlined on the blood-red sky and a steamship, somewhat
nearer, passed along, leaving behind it a trail of smoke on the horizon.
The red sun globe sank slowly lower and lower and presently touched the
water just behind the motionless vessel, which, in its dazzling
effulgence, looked as though framed in a flame of fire. We saw it plunge,
grow smaller and disappear, swallowed up by the ocean.

"Miss Harriet gazed in rapture at the last gleams of the dying day. She
seemed longing to embrace the sky, the sea, the whole landscape.

"She murmured: 'Aoh! I love--I love' I saw a tear in her eye. She
continued: 'I wish I were a little bird, so that I could mount up into
the firmament.'

"She remained standing as I had often before seen her, perched on the
cliff, her face as red as her shawl. I should have liked to have sketched
her in my album. It would have been a caricature of ecstasy.

"I turned away so as not to laugh.

"I then spoke to her of painting as I would have done to a fellow artist,
using the technical terms common among the devotees of the profession.
She listened attentively, eagerly seeking to divine the meaning of the
terms, so as to understand my thoughts. From time to time she would
exclaim:

"'Oh! I understand, I understand. It is very interesting.'

"We returned home.

"The next day, on seeing me, she approached me, cordially holding out her
hand; and we at once became firm friends.

"She was a good creature who had a kind of soul on springs, which became
enthusiastic at a bound. She lacked equilibrium like all women who are
spinsters at the age of fifty. She seemed to be preserved in a pickle of
innocence, but her heart still retained something very youthful and
inflammable. She loved both nature and animals with a fervor, a love like
old wine fermented through age, with a sensuous love that she had never
bestowed on men.

"One thing is certain, that the sight of a bitch nursing her puppies, a
mare roaming in a meadow with a foal at its side, a bird's nest full of
young ones, screaming, with their open mouths and their enormous heads,
affected her perceptibly.

"Poor, solitary, sad, wandering beings! I love you ever since I became
acquainted with Miss Harriet.

"I soon discovered that she had something she would like to tell me, but
dare not, and I was amused at her timidity. When I started out in the
morning with my knapsack on my back, she would accompany me in silence as
far as the end of the village, evidently struggling to find words with
which to begin a conversation. Then she would leave me abruptly and walk
away quickly with her springy step.

"One day, however, she plucked up courage:

"I would like to see how you paint pictures. Are you willing? I have been
very curious.'

"And she blushed as if she had said something very audacious.

"I conducted her to the bottom of the Petit-Val, where I had begun a
large picture.

"She remained standing behind me, following all my gestures with
concentrated attention. Then, suddenly, fearing perhaps that she was
disturbing me, she said: 'Thank you,' and walked away.

"But she soon became more friendly, and accompanied me every day, her
countenance exhibiting visible pleasure. She carried her camp stool under
her arm, not permitting me to carry it. She would remain there for hours,
silent and motionless, following with her eyes the point of my brush, in
its every movement. When I obtained unexpectedly just the effect I wanted
by a dash of color put on with the palette knife, she involuntarily
uttered a little 'Ah!' of astonishment, of joy, of admiration. She had
the most tender respect for my canvases, an almost religious respect for
that human reproduction of a part of nature's work divine. My studies
appeared to her a kind of religious pictures, and sometimes she spoke to
me of God, with the idea of converting me.

"Oh, he was a queer, good-natured being, this God of hers! He was a sort
of village philosopher without any great resources and without great
power, for she always figured him to herself as inconsolable over
injustices committed under his eyes, as though he were powerless to
prevent them.

"She was, however, on excellent terms with him, affecting even to be the
confidante of his secrets and of his troubles. She would say:

"'God wills' or 'God does not will,' just like a sergeant announcing to a
recruit: 'The colonel has commanded.'

"At the bottom of her heart she deplored my ignorance of the intentions
of the Eternal, which she endeavored to impart to me.

"Almost every day I found in my pockets, in my hat when I lifted it from
the ground, in my paintbox, in my polished shoes, standing in front of my
door in the morning, those little pious tracts which she no doubt,
received directly from Paradise.

"I treated her as one would an old friend, with unaffected cordiality.
But I soon perceived that she had changed somewhat in her manner, though,
for a while, I paid little attention to it.

"When I was painting, whether in my valley or in some country lane, I
would see her suddenly appear with her rapid, springy walk. She would
then sit down abruptly, out of breath, as though she had been running or
were overcome by some profound emotion. Her face would be red, that
English red which is denied to the people of all other countries; then,
without any reason, she would turn ashy pale and seem about to faint
away. Gradually, however, her natural color would return and she would
begin to speak.

"Then, without warning, she would break off in the middle of a sentence,
spring up from her seat and walk away so rapidly and so strangely that I
was at my wits' ends to discover whether I had done or said anything to
displease or wound her.

"I finally came to the conclusion that those were her normal manners,
somewhat modified no doubt in my honor during the first days of our
acquaintance.

"When she returned to the farm, after walking for hours on the windy
coast, her long curls often hung straight down, as if their springs had
been broken. This had hitherto seldom given her any concern, and she
would come to dinner without embarrassment all dishevelled by her sister,
the breeze.

"But now she would go to her room and arrange the untidy locks, and when
I would say, with familiar gallantry, which, however, always offended
her:

"'You are as beautiful as a star to-day, Miss Harriet,' a blush would
immediately rise to her cheeks, the blush of a young girl, of a girl of
fifteen.

"Then she would suddenly become quite reserved and cease coming to watch
me paint. I thought, 'This is only a fit of temper; it will blow over.'
But it did not always blow over, and when I spoke to her she would answer
me either with affected indifference or with sullen annoyance.

"She became by turns rude, impatient and nervous. I never saw her now
except at meals, and we spoke but little. I concluded at length that I
must have offended her in some way, and, accordingly, I said to her one
evening:

"'Miss Harriet, why is it that you do not act toward me as formerly? What
have I done to displease you? You are causing me much pain!'

"She replied in a most comical tone of anger:

"'I am just the same with you as formerly. It is not true, not true,' and
she ran upstairs and shut herself up in her room.

"Occasionally she would look at me in a peculiar manner. I have often
said to myself since then that those who are condemned to death must look
thus when they are informed that their last day has come. In her eye
there lurked a species of insanity, an insanity at once mystical and
violent; and even more, a fever, an aggravated longing, impatient and
impotent, for the unattained and unattainable.

"Nay, it seemed to me there was also going on within her a struggle in
which her heart wrestled with an unknown force that she sought to master,
and even, perhaps, something else. But what do I know? What do I know?

"It was indeed a singular revelation.

"For some time I had commenced to work, as soon as daylight appeared, on
a picture the subject of which was as follows:

"A deep ravine, enclosed, surmounted by two thickets of trees and vines,
extended into the distance and was lost, submerged in that milky vapor,
in that cloud like cotton down that sometimes floats over valleys at
daybreak. And at the extreme end of that heavy, transparent fog one saw,
or, rather, surmised, that a couple of human beings were approaching, a
human couple, a youth and a maiden, their arms interlaced, embracing each
other, their heads inclined toward each other, their lips meeting.

"A first ray of the sun, glistening through the branches, pierced that
fog of the dawn, illuminated it with a rosy reflection just behind the
rustic lovers, framing their vague shadows in a silvery background. It
was well done; yes, indeed, well done.

"I was working on the declivity which led to the Valley of Etretat. On
this particular morning I had, by chance, the sort of floating vapor
which I needed. Suddenly something rose up in front of me like a phantom;
it was Miss Harriet. On seeing me she was about to flee. But I called
after her, saying: 'Come here, come here, mademoiselle. I have a nice
little picture for you.'

"She came forward, though with seeming reluctance. I handed her my
sketch. She said nothing, but stood for a long time, motionless, looking
at it, and suddenly she burst into tears. She wept spasmodically, like
men who have striven hard to restrain their tears, but who can do so no
longer and abandon themselves to grief, though still resisting. I sprang
to my feet, moved at the sight of a sorrow I did not comprehend, and I
took her by the hand with an impulse of brusque affection, a true French
impulse which acts before it reflects.

"She let her hands rest in mine for a few seconds, and I felt them quiver
as if all her nerves were being wrenched. Then she withdrew her hands
abruptly, or, rather, snatched them away.

"I recognized that tremor, for I had felt it, and I could not be
deceived. Ah! the love tremor of a woman, whether she be fifteen or fifty
years of age, whether she be of the people or of society, goes so
straight to my heart that I never have any hesitation in understanding
it!

"Her whole frail being had trembled, vibrated, been overcome. I knew it.
She walked away before I had time to say a word, leaving me as surprised
as if I had witnessed a miracle and as troubled as if I had committed a
crime.

"I did not go in to breakfast. I went to take a turn on the edge of the
cliff, feeling that I would just as lief weep as laugh, looking on the
adventure as both comic and deplorable and my position as ridiculous,
believing her unhappy enough to go insane.

"I asked myself what I ought to do. It seemed best for me to leave the
place, and I immediately resolved to do so.

"Somewhat sad and perplexed, I wandered about until dinner time and
entered the farmhouse just when the soup had been served up.

"I sat down at the table as usual. Miss Harriet was there, eating away
solemnly, without speaking to any one, without even lifting her eyes. Her
manner and expression were, however, the same as usual.

"I waited patiently till the meal had been finished, when, turning toward
the landlady, I said: 'Well, Madame Lecacheur, it will not be long now
before I shall have to take my leave of you.'

"The good woman, at once surprised and troubled, replied in her drawling
voice: 'My dear sir, what is it you say? You are going to leave us after
I have become so accustomed to you?'

"I glanced at Miss Harriet out of the corner of my eye. Her countenance
did not change in the least. But Celeste, the little servant, looked up
at me. She was a fat girl, of about eighteen years of age, rosy, fresh,
as strong as a horse, and possessing the rare attribute of cleanliness. I
had kissed her at odd times in out-of-the-way corners, after the manner
of travellers--nothing more.

"The dinner being at length over, I went to smoke my pipe under the apple
trees, walking up and down from one end of the enclosure to the other.
All the reflections which I had made during the day, the strange
discovery of the morning, that passionate and grotesque attachment for
me, the recollections which that revelation had suddenly called up,
recollections at once charming and perplexing, perhaps also that look
which the servant had cast on me at the announcement of my
departure--all these things, mixed up and combined, put me now in a
reckless humor, gave me a tickling sensation of kisses on the lips and in
my veins a something which urged me on to commit some folly.

"Night was coming on, casting its dark shadows under the trees, when I
descried Celeste, who had gone to fasten up the poultry yard at the other
end of the enclosure. I darted toward her, running so noiselessly that
she heard nothing, and as she got up from closing the small trapdoor by
which the chickens got in and out, I clasped her in my arms and rained on
her coarse, fat face a shower of kisses. She struggled, laughing all the
time, as she was accustomed to do in such circumstances. Why did I
suddenly loose my grip of her? Why did I at once experience a shock? What
was it that I heard behind me?

"It was Miss Harriet, who had come upon us, who had seen us and who stood
in front of us motionless as a spectre. Then she disappeared in the
darkness.

"I was ashamed, embarrassed, more desperate at having been thus surprised
by her than if she had caught me committing some criminal act.

"I slept badly that night. I was completely unnerved and haunted by sad
thoughts. I seemed to hear loud weeping, but in this I was no doubt
deceived. Moreover, I thought several times that I heard some one walking
up and down in the house and opening the hall door.

"Toward morning I was overcome by fatigue and fell asleep. I got up late
and did not go downstairs until the late breakfast, being still in a
bewildered state, not knowing what kind of expression to put on.

"No one had seen Miss Harriet. We waited for her at table, but she did
not appear. At length Mother Lecacheur went to her room. The English
woman had gone out. She must have set out at break of day, as she was
wont to do, in order to see the sun rise.

"Nobody seemed surprised at this, and we began to eat in silence.

"The weather was hot, very hot, one of those broiling, heavy days when
not a leaf stirs. The table had been placed out of doors, under an apple
tree, and from time to time Sapeur had gone to the cellar to draw a jug
of cider, everybody was so thirsty. Celeste brought the dishes from the
kitchen, a ragout of mutton with potatoes, a cold rabbit and a salad.
Afterward she placed before us a dish of strawberries, the first of the
season.

"As I wished to wash and freshen these, I begged the servant to go and
draw me a pitcher of cold water.

"In about five minutes she returned, declaring that the well was dry. She
had lowered the pitcher to the full extent of the cord and had touched
the bottom, but on drawing the pitcher up again it was empty. Mother
Lecacheur, anxious to examine the thing for herself, went and looked down
the hole. She returned, announcing that one could see clearly something
in the well, something altogether unusual. But this no doubt was bundles
of straw, which a neighbor had thrown in out of spite.

"I wished to look down the well also, hoping I might be able to clear up
the mystery, and I perched myself close to the brink. I perceived
indistinctly a white object. What could it be? I then conceived the idea
of lowering a lantern at the end of a cord. When I did so the yellow
flame danced on the layers of stone and gradually became clearer. All
four of us were leaning over the opening, Sapeur and Celeste having now
joined us. The lantern rested on a black-and-white indistinct mass,
singular, incomprehensible. Sapeur exclaimed:

"'It is a horse. I see the hoofs. It must have got out of the meadow
during the night and fallen in headlong.'

"But suddenly a cold shiver froze me to the marrow. I first recognized a
foot, then a leg sticking up; the whole body and the other leg were
completely under water.

"I stammered out in a loud voice, trembling so violently that the lantern
danced hither and thither over the slipper:

"'It is a woman! Who-who-can it be? It is Miss Harriet!'

"Sapeur alone did not manifest horror. He had witnessed many such scenes
in Africa.

"Mother Lecacheur and Celeste began to utter piercing screams and ran
away.

"But it was necessary to recover the corpse of the dead woman. I attached
the young man securely by the waist to the end of the pulley rope and
lowered him very slowly, watching him disappear in the darkness. In one
hand he held the lantern and a rope in the other. Soon I recognized his
voice, which seemed to come from the centre of the earth, saying:

"'Stop!'

"I then saw him fish something out of the water. It was the other leg. He
then bound the two feet together and shouted anew:

"'Haul up!'

"I began to wind up, but I felt my arms crack, my muscles twitch, and I
was in terror lest I should let the man fall to the bottom. When his head
appeared at the brink I asked:

"'Well?' as if I expected he had a message from the drowned woman.

"We both got on the stone slab at the edge of the well and from opposite
sides we began to haul up the body.

"Mother Lecacheur and Celeste watched us from a distance, concealed from
view behind the wall of the house. When they saw issuing from the hole
the black slippers and white stockings of the drowned person they
disappeared.

"Sapeur seized the ankles, and we drew up the body of the poor woman. The
head was shocking to look at, being bruised and lacerated, and the long
gray hair, out of curl forevermore, hanging down tangled and disordered.

"'In the name of all that is holy! how lean she is,' exclaimed Sapeur in
a contemptuous tone.

"We carried her into the room, and as the women did not put in an
appearance I, with the assistance of the stable lad, dressed the corpse
for burial.

"I washed her disfigured face. Under the touch of my finger an eye was
slightly opened and regarded me with that pale, cold look, that terrible
look of a corpse which seems to come from the beyond. I braided as well
as I could her dishevelled hair and with my clumsy hands arranged on her
head a novel and singular coiffure. Then I took off her dripping wet
garments, baring, not without a feeling of shame, as though I had been
guilty of some profanation, her shoulders and her chest and her long
arms, as slim as the twigs of a tree.

"I next went to fetch some flowers, poppies, bluets, marguerites and
fresh, sweet-smelling grass with which to strew her funeral couch.

"I then had to go through the usual formalities, as I was alone to attend
to everything. A letter found in her pocket, written at the last moment,
requested that her body be buried in the village in which she had passed
the last days of her life. A sad suspicion weighed on my heart. Was it
not on my account that she wished to be laid to rest in this place?

"Toward evening all the female gossips of the locality came to view the
remains of the defunct, but I would not allow a single person to enter. I
wanted to be alone, and I watched beside her all night.

"I looked at the corpse by the flickering light of the candles, at this
unhappy woman, unknown to us all, who had died in such a lamentable
manner and so far away from home. Had she left no friends, no relations
behind her? What had her infancy been? What had been her life? Whence had
she come thither alone, a wanderer, lost like a dog driven from home?
What secrets of sufferings and of despair were sealed up in that
unprepossessing body, in that poor body whose outward appearance had
driven from her all affection, all love?

"How many unhappy beings there are! I felt that there weighed upon that
human creature the eternal injustice of implacable nature! It was all
over with her, without her ever having experienced, perhaps, that which
sustains the greatest outcasts to wit, the hope of being loved once!
Otherwise why should she thus have concealed herself, fled from the face
of others? Why did she love everything so tenderly and so passionately,
everything living that was not a man?

"I recognized the fact that she believed in a God, and that she hoped to
receive compensation from the latter for all the miseries she had
endured. She would now disintegrate and become, in turn, a plant. She
would blossom in the sun, the cattle would browse on her leaves, the
birds would bear away the seeds, and through these changes she would
become again human flesh. But that which is called the soul had been
extinguished at the bottom of the dark well. She suffered no longer. She
had given her life for that of others yet to come.

"Hours passed away in this silent and sinister communion with the dead. A
pale light at length announced the dawn of a new day; then a red ray
streamed in on the bed, making a bar of light across the coverlet and
across her hands. This was the hour she had so much loved. The awakened
birds began to sing in the trees.

"I opened the window to its fullest extent and drew back the curtains
that the whole heavens might look in upon us, and, bending over the icy
corpse, I took in my hands the mutilated head and slowly, without terror
or disgust, I imprinted a kiss, a long kiss, upon those lips which had
never before been kissed."

Leon Chenal remained silent. The women wept. We heard on the box seat the
Count d'Atraille blowing his nose from time to time. The coachman alone
had gone to sleep. The horses, who no longer felt the sting of the whip,
had slackened their pace and moved along slowly. The drag, hardly
advancing at all, seemed suddenly torpid, as if it had been freighted
with sorrow.

   [Miss Harriet appeared in Le Gaulois, July 9, 1883, under the title
   of Miss Hastings. The story was later revised, enlarged; and partly
   reconstructed. This is what De Maupassant wrote to Editor Havard
   March 15, 1884, in an unedited letter, in regard to the title of the
   story that was to give its name to the volume:

   "I do not believe that Hastings is a bad name, inasmuch as it is
   known all over the world, and recalls the greatest facts in English
   history. Besides, Hastings is as much a name as Duval is with us.

   "The name Cherbuliez selected, Miss Revel, is no more like an
   English name than like a Turkish name. But here is another name as
   English as Hastings, and more euphonious; it is Miss Harriet.
   I will ask you therefore to substitute Harriet for Hastings."

   It was in regard to this very tittle that De Maupassant had a
   disagreement with Audran and Boucheron director of the Bouffes
   Parisiens in October, 1890 They had given this title to an operetta
   about to be played at the Bouffes. It ended however, by their
   ceding to De Maupassant, and the title of the operetta was changed
   to Miss Helyett.]




LITTLE LOUISE ROQUE

The former soldier, Mederic Rompel, familiarly called Mederic by the
country folks, left the post office of Roily-le-Tors at the usual hour.
After passing through the village with his long stride, he cut across the
meadows of Villaume and reached the bank of the Brindille, following the
path along the water's edge to the village of Carvelin, where he
commenced to deliver his letters. He walked quickly, following the course
of the narrow river, which frothed, murmured and boiled in its grassy bed
beneath an arch of willows.

Mederic went on without stopping, with only this thought in his mind: "My
first letter is for the Poivron family, then I have one for Monsieur
Renardet; so I must cross the wood."

His blue blouse, fastened round his waist by a black leather belt, moved
in a quick, regular fashion above the green hedge of willow trees, and
his stout stick of holly kept time with his steady tread.

He crossed the Brindille on a bridge consisting of a tree trunk, with a
handrail of rope, fastened at either end to a stake driven into the
ground.

The wood, which belonged to Monsieur Renardet, the mayor of Carvelin and
the largest landowner in the district, consisted of huge old trees,
straight as pillars and extending for about half a league along the left
bank of the stream which served as a boundary to this immense dome of
foliage. Alongside the water large shrubs had grown up in the sunlight,
but under the trees one found nothing but moss, thick, soft and yielding,
from which arose, in the still air, an odor of dampness and of dead wood.

Mederic slackened his pace, took off his black cap adorned with red lace
and wiped his forehead, for it was by this time hot in the meadows,
though it was not yet eight o'clock in the morning.

He had just recovered from the effects of the heat and resumed his quick
pace when he noticed at the foot of a tree a knife, a child's small
knife. When he picked it up he discovered a thimble and also a needlecase
not far away.

Having taken up these objects, he thought: "I'll entrust them to the
mayor," and he resumed his journey, but now he kept his eyes open,
expecting to find something else.

All of a sudden he stopped short, as if he had struck against a wooden
barrier. Ten paces in front of him lay stretched on her back on the moss
a little girl, perfectly nude, her face covered with a handkerchief. She
was about twelve years old.

Meredic advanced on tiptoe, as if he apprehended some danger, and he
glanced toward the spot uneasily.

What was this? No doubt she was asleep. Then he reflected that a person
does not go to sleep naked at half-past seven in the morning under the
cool trees. So, then, she must be dead, and he must be face to face with
a crime. At this thought a cold shiver ran through his frame, although he
was an old soldier. And then a murder was such a rare thing in the
country, and, above all, the murder of a child, that he could not believe
his eyes. But she had no wound-nothing save a spot of blood on her leg.
How, then, had she been killed?

He stopped close to her and gazed at her, while he leaned on his stick.
Certainly he must know her, for he knew all the inhabitants of the
district; but, not being able to get a look at her face, he could not
guess her name. He stooped forward in order to take off the handkerchief
which covered her face, then paused, with outstretched hand, restrained
by an idea that occurred to him.

Had he the right to disarrange anything in the condition of the corpse
before the official investigation? He pictured justice to himself as a
kind of general whom nothing escapes and who attaches as much importance
to a lost button as to the stab of a knife in the stomach. Perhaps under
this handkerchief evidence could be found to sustain a charge of murder;
in fact, if such proof were there it might lose its value if touched by
an awkward hand.

Then he raised himself with the intention of hastening toward the mayor's
residence, but again another thought held him back. If the little girl
were still alive, by any chance, he could not leave her lying there in
this way. He sank on his knees very gently, a little distance from her,
through precaution, and extended his hand toward her foot. It was icy
cold, with the terrible coldness of death which leaves us no longer in
doubt. The letter carrier, as he touched her, felt his heart in his
mouth, as he said himself afterward, and his mouth parched. Rising up
abruptly, he rushed off under the trees toward Monsieur Renardet's house.

He walked on faster than ever, with his stick under his arm, his hands
clenched and his head thrust forward, while his leathern bag, filled with
letters and newspapers, kept flapping at his side.

The mayor's residence was at the end of the wood which served as a park,
and one side of it was washed by the Brindille.

It was a big square house of gray stone, very old, and had stood many a
siege in former days, and at the end of it was a huge tower, twenty
metres high, rising out of the water.

From the top of this fortress one could formerly see all the surrounding
country. It was called the Fox's tower, without any one knowing exactly
why; and from this appellation, no doubt, had come the name Renardet,
borne by the owners of this fief, which had remained in the same family,
it was said, for more than two hundred years. For the Renardets formed
part of the upper middle class, all but noble, to be met with so often in
the province before the Revolution.

The postman dashed into the kitchen, where the servants were taking
breakfast, and exclaimed:

"Is the mayor up? I want to speak to him at once."

Mederic was recognized as a man of standing and authority, and they
understood that something serious had happened.

As soon as word was brought to Monsieur Renardet, he ordered the postman
to be sent up to him. Pale and out of breath, with his cap in his hand,
Mederic found the mayor seated at a long table covered with scattered
papers.

He was a large, tall man, heavy and red-faced, strong as an ox, and was
greatly liked in the district, although of an excessively violent
disposition. Almost forty years old and a widower for the past six
months, he lived on his estate like a country gentleman. His choleric
temperament had often brought him into trouble from which the magistrates
of Roily-le-Tors, like indulgent and prudent friends, had extricated him.
Had he not one day thrown the conductor of the diligence from the top of
his seat because he came near running over his retriever, Micmac? Had he
not broken the ribs of a gamekeeper who abused him for having, gun in
hand, passed through a neighbor's property? Had he not even caught by the
collar the sub-prefect, who stopped over in the village during an
administrative circuit, called by Monsieur Renardet an electioneering
circuit, for he was opposed to the government, in accordance with family
traditions.

The mayor asked:

"What's the matter now, Mederic?"

"I found a little girl dead in your wood."

Renardet rose to his feet, his face the color of brick.

"What do you say--a little girl?"

"Yes, m'sieu, a little girl, quite naked, on her back, with blood on her,
dead--quite dead!"

The mayor gave vent to an oath:

"By God, I'd make a bet it is little Louise Roque! I have just learned
that she did not go home to her mother last night. Where did you find
her?"

The postman described the spot, gave full details and offered to conduct
the mayor to the place.

But Renardet became brusque:

"No, I don't need you. Send the watchman, the mayor's secretary and the
doctor to me at once, and resume your rounds. Quick, quick, go and tell
them to meet me in the wood."

The letter carrier, a man used to discipline, obeyed and withdrew, angry
and grieved at not being able to be present at the investigation.

The mayor, in his turn, prepared to go out, took his big soft hat and
paused for a few seconds on the threshold of his abode. In front of him
stretched a wide sward, in which were three large beds of flowers in full
bloom, one facing the house and the others at either side of it. Farther
on the outlying trees of the wood rose skyward, while at the left, beyond
the Brindille, which at that spot widened into a pond, could be seen long
meadows, an entirely green flat sweep of country, intersected by trenches
and hedges of pollard willows.

To the right, behind the stables, the outhouses and all the buildings
connected with the property, might be seen the village, which was
wealthy, being mainly inhabited by cattle breeders.

Renardet slowly descended the steps in front of his house, and, turning
to the left, gained the water's edge, which he followed at a slow pace,
his hand behind his back. He walked on, with bent head, and from time to
time glanced round in search of the persons he had sent for.

When he stood beneath the trees he stopped, took off his hat and wiped
his forehead as Mederic had done, for the burning sun was darting its
fiery rays on the earth. Then the mayor resumed his journey, stopped once
more and retraced his steps. Suddenly, stooping down, he steeped his
handkerchief in the stream that glided along at his feet and spread it
over his head, under his hat. Drops of water flowed down his temples over
his ears, which were always purple, over his strong red neck, and made
their way, one after the other, under his white shirt collar.

As nobody had appeared, he began tapping with his foot, then he called
out:

"Hello! Hello!"

A voice at his right answered:

"Hello! Hello!"

And the doctor appeared under the trees. He was a thin little man, an
ex-military surgeon, who passed in the neighborhood for a very skillful
practitioner. He limped, having been wounded while in the service, and
had to use a stick to assist him in walking.

Next came the watchman and the mayor's secretary, who, having been sent
for at the same time, arrived together. They looked scared, and hurried
forward, out of breath, walking and running alternately to hasten their
progress, and moving their arms up and down so vigorously that they
seemed to do more work with them than with their legs.

Renardet said to the doctor:

"You know what the trouble is about?"

"Yes, a child found dead in the wood by Mederic."

"That's quite correct. Come on!"

They walked along, side by side, followed by the two men.

Their steps made no sound on the moss. Their eyes were gazing ahead in
front of them.

Suddenly the doctor, extending his arm, said:

"See, there she is!"

Far ahead of them under the trees they saw something white on which the
sun gleamed down through the branches. As they approached they gradually
distinguished a human form lying there, its head toward the river, the
face covered and the arms extended as though on a crucifix.

"I am fearfully warm," said the mayor, and stooping down, he again soaked
his handkerchief in the water and placed it round his forehead.

The doctor hastened his steps, interested by the discovery. As soon as
they were near the corpse, he bent down to examine it without touching
it. He had put on his pince-nez, as one does in examining some curious
object, and turned round very quietly.

He said, without rising:

"Violated and murdered, as we shall prove presently. This little girl,
moreover, is almost a woman--look at her throat."

The doctor lightly drew away the handkerchief which covered her face,
which looked black, frightful, the tongue protruding, the eyes bloodshot.
He went on:

"By heavens! She was strangled the moment the deed was done."

He felt her neck.

"Strangled with the hands without leaving any special trace, neither the
mark of the nails nor the imprint of the fingers. Quite right. It is
little Louise Roque, sure enough!"

He carefully replaced the handkerchief.

"There's nothing for me to do. She's been dead for the last hour at
least. We must give notice of the matter to the authorities."

Renardet, standing up, with his hands behind his back, kept staring with
a stony look at the little body exposed to view on the grass. He
murmured:

"What a wretch! We must find the clothes."

The doctor felt the hands, the arms, the legs. He said:

"She had been bathing no doubt. They ought to be at the water's edge."

The mayor thereupon gave directions:

"Do you, Principe," (this was his secretary), "go and find those clothes
for me along the stream. You, Maxime," (this was the watchman), "hurry on
toward Rouy-le-Tors and bring with you the magistrate with the gendarmes.
They must be here within an hour. You understand?"

The two men started at once, and Renardet said to the doctor:

"What miscreant could have done such a deed in this part of the country?"

The doctor murmured:

"Who knows? Any one is capable of that. Every one in particular and
nobody in general. No matter, it must be some prowler, some workman out
of employment. Since we have become a Republic we meet only this kind of
person along the roads."

Both of them were Bonapartists.

The mayor went on:

"Yes, it can only be a stranger, a passer-by, a vagabond without hearth
or home."

The doctor added, with the shadow of a smile on his face:

"And without a wife. Having neither a good supper nor a good bed, he
became reckless. You can't tell how many men there may be in the world
capable of a crime at a given moment. Did you know that this little girl
had disappeared?"

And with the end of his stick he touched one after the other the
stiffened fingers of the corpse, resting on them as on the keys of a
piano.

"Yes, the mother came last night to look for me about nine o'clock, the
child not having come home at seven to supper. We looked for her along
the roads up to midnight, but we did not think of the wood. However, we
needed daylight to carry out a thorough search."

"Will you have a cigar?" said the doctor.

"Thanks, I don't care to smoke. This thing affects me so."

They remained standing beside the corpse of the young girl, so pale on
the dark moss. A big blue fly was walking over the body with his lively,
jerky movements. The two men kept watching this wandering speck.

The doctor said:

"How pretty it is, a fly on the skin! The ladies of the last century had
good reason to paste them on their faces. Why has this fashion gone out?"

The mayor seemed not to hear, plunged as he was in deep thought.

But, all of a sudden, he turned round, surprised by a shrill noise. A
woman in a cap and blue apron was running toward them under the trees. It
was the mother, La Roque. As soon as she saw Renardet she began to
shriek:

"My little girl! Where's my little girl?" so distractedly that she did
not glance down at the ground. Suddenly she saw the corpse, stopped
short, clasped her hands and raised both her arms while she uttered a
sharp, heartrending cry--the cry of a wounded animal. Then she
rushed toward the body, fell on her knees and snatched away the
handkerchief that covered the face. When she saw that frightful
countenance, black and distorted, she rose to her feet with a shudder,
then sinking to the ground, face downward, she pressed her face against
the ground and uttered frightful, continuous screams on the thick moss.

Her tall, thin frame, with its close-clinging dress, was palpitating,
shaken with spasms. One could see her bony ankles and her dried-up calves
covered with coarse blue stockings shaking horribly. She was digging the
soil with her crooked fingers, as though she were trying to make a hole
in which to hide herself.

The doctor, much affected, said in a low tone:

"Poor old woman!"

Renardet felt a strange sensation. Then he gave vent to a sort of loud
sneeze, and, drawing his handkerchief from his pocket, he began to weep
internally, coughing, sobbing and blowing his nose noisily.

He stammered:

"Damn--damn--damned pig to do this! I would like to seem him
guillotined."

Principe reappeared with his hands empty. He murmured:

"I have found nothing, M'sieu le Maire, nothing at all anywhere."

The mayor, alarmed, replied in a thick voice, drowned in tears:

"What is that you could not find?"

"The little girl's clothes."

"Well--well--look again, and find them--or you''ll have to
answer to me."

The man, knowing that the mayor would not brook opposition, set forth
again with hesitating steps, casting a timid side glance at the corpse.

Distant voices were heard under the trees, a confused sound, the noise of
an approaching crowd, for Mederic had, in the course of his rounds,
carried the news from door to door. The people of the neighborhood, dazed
at first, had gossiped about it in the street, from one threshold to
another. Then they gathered together. They talked over, discussed and
commented on the event for some minutes and had now come to see for
themselves.

They arrived in groups, a little faltering and uneasy through fear of the
first impression of such a scene on their minds. When they saw the body
they stopped, not daring to advance, and speaking low. Then they grew
bolder, went on a few steps, stopped again, advanced once more, and
presently formed around the dead girl, her mother, the doctor and
Renardet a close circle, restless and noisy, which crowded forward at the
sudden impact of newcomers. And now they touched the corpse. Some of them
even bent down to feel it with their fingers. The doctor kept them back.
But the mayor, waking abruptly out of his torpor, flew into a rage, and
seizing Dr. Labarbe's stick, flung himself on his townspeople,
stammering:

"Clear out--clear out--you pack of brutes--clear out!"

And in a second the crowd of sightseers had fallen back two hundred
paces.

Mother La Roque had risen to a sitting posture and now remained weeping,
with her hands clasped over her face.

The crowd was discussing the affair, and young lads' eager eyes curiously
scrutinized this nude young form. Renardet perceived this, and, abruptly
taking off his coat, he flung it over the little girl, who was entirely
hidden from view beneath the large garment.

The secretary drew near quietly. The wood was filled with people, and a
continuous hum of voices rose up under the tangled foliage of the tall
trees.

The mayor, in his shirt sleeves, remained standing, with his stick in his
hands, in a fighting attitude. He seemed exasperated by this curiosity on
the part of the people and kept repeating:

"If one of you come nearer I'll break his head just as I would a dog's."

The peasants were greatly afraid of him. They held back. Dr. Labarbe, who
was smoking, sat down beside La Roque and spoke to her in order to
distract her attention. The old woman at once removed her hands from her
face and replied with a flood of tearful words, emptying her grief in
copious talk. She told the whole story of her life, her marriage, the
death of her man, a cattle drover, who had been gored to death, the
infancy of her daughter, her wretched existence as a widow without
resources and with a child to support. She had only this one, her little
Louise, and the child had been killed--killed in this wood. Then she
felt anxious to see her again, and, dragging herself on her knees toward
the corpse, she raised up one corner of the garment that covered her;
then she let it fall again and began wailing once more. The crowd
remained silent, eagerly watching all the mother's gestures.

But suddenly there was a great commotion at the cry of "The gendarmes!
the gendarmes!"

Two gendarmes appeared in the distance, advancing at a rapid trot,
escorting their captain and a little gentleman with red whiskers, who was
bobbing up and down like a monkey on a big white mare.

The watchman had just found Monsieur Putoin, the magistrate, at the
moment when he was mounting his horse to take his daily ride, for he
posed as a good horseman, to the great amusement of the officers.

He dismounted, along with the captain, and pressed the hands of the mayor
and the doctor, casting a ferret-like glance on the linen coat beneath
which lay the corpse.

When he was made acquainted with all the facts, he first gave orders to
disperse the crowd, whom the gendarmes drove out of the wood, but who
soon reappeared in the meadow and formed a hedge, a big hedge of excited
and moving heads, on the other side of the stream.

The doctor, in his turn, gave explanations, which Renardet noted down in
his memorandum book. All the evidence was given, taken down and commented
on without leading to any discovery. Maxime, too, came back without
having found any trace of the clothes.

This disappearance surprised everybody; no one could explain it except on
the theory of theft, and as her rags were not worth twenty sous, even
this theory was inadmissible.

The magistrate, the mayor, the captain and the doctor set to work
searching in pairs, putting aside the smallest branch along the water.

Renardet said to the judge:

"How does it happen that this wretch has concealed or carried away the
clothes, and has thus left the body exposed, in sight of every one?"

The other, crafty and sagacious, answered:

"Ha! ha! Perhaps a dodge? This crime has been committed either by a brute
or by a sly scoundrel. In any case, we'll easily succeed in finding him."

The noise of wheels made them turn their heads round. It was the deputy
magistrate, the doctor and the registrar of the court who had arrived in
their turn. They resumed their search, all chatting in an animated
fashion.

Renardet said suddenly:

"Do you know that you are to take luncheon with me?"

Every one smilingly accepted the invitation, and the magistrate, thinking
that the case of little Louise Roque had occupied enough attention for
one day, turned toward the mayor.

"I can have the body brought to your house, can I not? You have a room in
which you can keep it for me till this evening?"

The other became confused and stammered:

"Yes--no--no. To tell the truth, I prefer that it should not
come into my house on account of--on account of my servants, who are
already talking about ghosts in--in my tower, in the Fox's tower.
You know--I could no longer keep a single one. No--I prefer not
to have it in my house."

The magistrate began to smile.

"Good! I will have it taken at once to Roily for the legal examination."
And, turning to his deputy, he said:

"I can make use of your trap, can I not?"

"Yes, certainly."

They all came back to the place where the corpse lay. Mother La Roque,
now seated beside her daughter, was holding her hand and was staring
right before her with a wandering, listless eye.

The two doctors endeavored to lead her away, so that she might not
witness the dead girl's removal, but she understood at once what they
wanted to do, and, flinging herself on the body, she threw both arms
round it. Lying on top of the corpse, she exclaimed:

"You shall not have it--it's mine--it's mine now. They have
killed her for me, and I want to keep her--you shall not have
her----"

All the men, affected and not knowing how to act, remained standing
around her. Renardet fell on his knees and said to her:

"Listen, La Roque, it is necessary, in order to find out who killed her.
Without this, we could not find out. We must make a search for the man in
order to punish him. When we have found him we'll give her up to you. I
promise you this."

This explanation bewildered the woman, and a feeling of hatred manifested
itself in her distracted glance.

"So then they'll arrest him?"

"Yes, I promise you that."

She rose up, deciding to let them do as they liked, but when the captain
remarked:

"It is surprising that her clothes were not found," a new idea, which she
had not previously thought of, abruptly entered her mind, and she asked:

"Where are her clothes? They're mine. I want them. Where have they been
put?"

They explained to her that they had not been found. Then she demanded
them persistently, crying and moaning.

"They're mine--I want them. Where are they? I want them!"

The more they tried to calm her the more she sobbed and persisted in her
demands. She no longer wanted the body, she insisted on having the
clothes, as much perhaps through the unconscious cupidity of a wretched
being to whom a piece of silver represents a fortune as through maternal
tenderness.

And when the little body, rolled up in blankets which had been brought
out from Renardet's house, had disappeared in the vehicle, the old woman
standing under the trees, sustained by the mayor and the captain,
exclaimed:

"I have nothing, nothing, nothing in the world, not even her little cap
--her little cap."

The cure, a young priest, had just arrived. He took it on himself to
accompany the mother, and they went away together toward the village. The
mother's grief was modified by the sugary words of the clergyman, who
promised her a thousand compensations. But she kept repeating: "If I had
only her little cap." This idea now dominated every other.

Renardet called from the distance:

"You will lunch with us, Monsieur l'Abbe--in an hour's time."

The priest turned his head round and replied:

"With pleasure, Monsieur le Maire. I'll be with you at twelve."

And they all directed their steps toward the house, whose gray front,
with the large tower built on the edge of the Brindille, could be seen
through the branches.

The meal lasted a long time. They talked about the crime. Everybody was
of the same opinion. It had been committed by some tramp passing there by
mere chance while the little girl was bathing.

Then the magistrates returned to Rouy, announcing that they would return
next day at an early hour. The doctor and the cure went to their
respective homes, while Renardet, after a long walk through the meadows,
returned to the wood, where he remained walking till nightfall with slow
steps, his hands behind his back.

He went to bed early and was still asleep next morning when the
magistrate entered his room. He was rubbing his hands together with a
self-satisfied air.

"Ha! ha! You are still sleeping! Well, my dear fellow, we have news this
morning."

The mayor sat up in his bed.

"What, pray?"

"Oh! Something strange. You remember well how the mother clamored
yesterday for some memento of her daughter, especially her little cap?
Well, on opening her door this morning she found on the threshold her
child's two little wooden shoes. This proves that the crime was
perpetrated by some one from the district, some one who felt pity for
her. Besides, the postman, Mederic, brought me the thimble, the knife and
the needle case of the dead girl. So, then, the man in carrying off the
clothes to hide them must have let fall the articles which were in the
pocket. As for me, I attach special importance to the wooden shoes, as
they indicate a certain moral culture and a faculty for tenderness on the
part of the assassin. We will, therefore, if you have no objection, go
over together the principal inhabitants of your district."

The mayor got up. He rang for his shaving water and said:

"With pleasure, but it will take some time, and we may begin at once."

M. Putoin sat astride a chair.

Renardet covered his chin with a white lather while he looked at himself
in the glass. Then he sharpened his razor on the strop and continued:

"The principal inhabitant of Carvelin bears the name of Joseph Renardet,
mayor, a rich landowner, a rough man who beats guards and
coachmen--"

The examining magistrate burst out laughing.

"That's enough. Let us pass on to the next."

"The second in importance is Pelledent, his deputy, a cattle breeder, an
equally rich landowner, a crafty peasant, very sly, very close-fisted on
every question of money, but incapable in my opinion of having
perpetrated such a crime."

"Continue," said M. Putoin.

Renardet, while proceeding with his toilet, reviewed the characters of
all the inhabitants of Carvelin. After two hours' discussion their
suspicions were fixed on three individuals who had hitherto borne a shady
reputation--a poacher named Cavalle, a fisherman named Paquet, who
caught trout and crabs, and a cattle drover named Clovis.
II

The search for the perpetrator of the crime lasted all summer, but he was
not discovered. Those who were suspected and arrested easily proved their
innocence, and the authorities were compelled to abandon the attempt to
capture the criminal.

But this murder seemed to have moved the entire country in a singular
manner. There remained in every one's mind a disquietude, a vague fear, a
sensation of mysterious terror, springing not merely from the
impossibility of discovering any trace of the assassin, but also and
above all from that strange finding of the wooden shoes in front of La
Roque's door the day after the crime. The certainty that the murderer had
assisted at the investigation, that he was still, doubtless, living in
the village, possessed all minds and seemed to brood over the
neighborhood like a constant menace.

The wood had also become a dreaded spot, a place to be avoided and
supposed to be haunted.

Formerly the inhabitants went there to spend every Sunday afternoon. They
used to sit down on the moss at the feet of the huge tall trees or walk
along the water's edge watching the trout gliding among the weeds. The
boy's used to play bowls, hide-and-seek and other games where the ground
had been cleared and levelled, and the girls, in rows of four or five,
would trip along, holding one another by the arms and screaming songs
with their shrill voices. Now nobody ventured there for fear of finding
some corpse lying on the ground.

Autumn arrived, the leaves began to fall from the tall trees, whirling
round and round to the ground, and the sky could be seen through the bare
branches. Sometimes, when a gust of wind swept over the tree tops, the
slow, continuous rain suddenly grew heavier and became a rough storm that
covered the moss with a thick yellow carpet that made a kind of creaking
sound beneath one's feet.

And the sound of the falling leaves seemed like a wail and the leaves
themselves like tears shed by these great, sorrowful trees, that wept in
the silence of the bare and empty wood, this dreaded and deserted wood
where wandered lonely the soul, the little soul of little Louise Roque.

The Brindille, swollen by the storms, rushed on more quickly, yellow and
angry, between its dry banks, bordered by two thin, bare, willow hedges.

And here was Renardet suddenly resuming his walks under the trees. Every
day, at sunset, he came out of his house, descended the front steps
slowly and entered the wood in a dreamy fashion, with his hands in his
pockets, and paced over the damp soft moss, while a legion of rooks from
all the neighboring haunts came thither to rest in the tall trees and
then flew off like a black cloud uttering loud, discordant cries.

Night came on, and Renardet was still strolling slowly under the trees;
then, when the darkness prevented him from walking any longer, he would
go back to the house and sink into his armchair in front of the glowing
hearth, stretching his damp feet toward the fire.

One morning an important bit of news was circulated through the district;
the mayor was having his wood cut down.

Twenty woodcutters were already at work. They had commenced at the corner
nearest to the house and worked rapidly in the master's presence.

And each day the wood grew thinner, losing its trees, which fell down one
by one, as an army loses its soldiers.

Renardet no longer walked up, and down. He remained from morning till
night, contemplating, motionless, with his hands behind his back, the
slow destruction of his wood. When a tree fell he placed his foot on it
as if it were a corpse. Then he raised his eyes to the next with a kind
of secret, calm impatience, as if he expected, hoped for something at the
end of this slaughter.

Meanwhile they were approaching the place where little Louise Roque had
been found. They came to it one evening in the twilight.

As it was dark, the sky being overcast, the woodcutters wanted to stop
their work, putting off till next day the fall of an enormous beech tree,
but the mayor objected to this and insisted that they should at once lop
and cut down this giant, which had sheltered the crime.

When the lopper had laid it bare and the woodcutters had sapped its base,
five men commenced hauling at the rope attached to the top.

The tree resisted; its powerful trunk, although notched to the centre,
was as rigid as iron. The workmen, all together, with a sort of
simultaneous motion,' strained at the rope, bending backward and uttering
a cry which timed and regulated their efforts.

Two woodcutters standing close to the giant remained with axes in their
grip, like two executioners ready to strike once more, and Renardet,
motionless, with his hand on the trunk, awaited the fall with an uneasy,
nervous feeling.

One of the men said to him:

"You are too near, Monsieur le Maire. When it falls it may hurt you."

He did not reply and did not move away. He seemed ready to catch the
beech tree in his open arms and to cast it on the ground like a wrestler.

All at once, at the base of the tall column of wood there was a rent
which seemed to run to the top, like a painful shock; it bent slightly,
ready to fall, but still resisting. The men, in a state of excitement,
stiffened their arms, renewed their efforts with greater vigor, and, just
as the tree came crashing down, Renardet suddenly made a forward step,
then stopped, his shoulders raised to receive the irresistible shock, the
mortal shock which would crush him to the earth.

But the beech tree, having deviated a little, only rubbed against his
loins, throwing him on his face, five metres away.

The workmen dashed forward to lift him up. He had already arisen to his
knees, stupefied, with bewildered eyes and passing his hand across his
forehead, as if he were awaking from an attack of madness.

When he had got to his feet once more the men, astonished, questioned
him, not being able to understand what he had done. He replied in
faltering tones that he had been dazed for a moment, or, rather, he had
been thinking of his childhood days; that he thought he would have time
to run under the tree, just as street boys rush in front of vehicles
driving rapidly past; that he had played at danger; that for the past
eight days he felt this desire growing stronger within him, asking
himself each time a tree began to fall whether he could pass beneath it
without being touched. It was a piece of stupidity, he confessed, but
every one has these moments of insanity and these temptations to boyish
folly.

He made this explanation in a slow tone, searching for his words, and
speaking in a colorless tone.

Then he went off, saying:

"Till to-morrow, my friends-till to-morrow."

As soon as he got back to his room he sat down at his table which his
lamp lighted up brightly, and, burying his head in his hands, he began to
cry.

He remained thus for a long time, then wiped his eyes, raised his head
and looked at the clock. It was not yet six o'clock.

He thought:

"I have time before dinner."

And he went to the door and locked it. He then came back, and, sitting
down at his table, pulled out the middle drawer. Taking from it a
revolver, he laid it down on his papers in full view. The barrel of the
firearm glittered, giving out gleams of light.

Renardet gazed at it for some time with the uneasy glance of a drunken
man. Then he rose and began to pace up and down the room.

He walked from one end of the apartment to the other, stopping from time
to time, only to pace up and down again a moment afterward. Suddenly he
opened the door of his dressing-room, steeped a towel in the water
pitcher and moistened his forehead, as he had done on the morning of the
crime.

Then he, began walking up and down again. Each time he passed the table
the gleaming revolver attracted his glance, tempted his hand, but he kept
watching the clock and reflected:

"I have still time."

It struck half-past six. Then he took up the revolver, opened his mouth
wide with a frightful grimace and stuck the barrel into it as if he
wanted to swallow it. He remained in this position for some seconds
without moving, his finger on the trigger. Then, suddenly seized with a
shudder of horror, he dropped the pistol on the carpet.

He fell back on his armchair, sobbing:

"I cannot. I dare not! My God! my God! How can I have the courage to kill
myself?'"

There was a knock at the door. He rose up, bewildered. A servant said:

"Monsieur's dinner is ready."

He replied:

"All right. I'm coming down."

Then he picked up the revolver, locked it up again in the drawer and
looked at himself in the mirror over the mantelpiece to see whether his
face did not look too much troubled. It was as red as usual, a little
redder perhaps. That was all. He went down and seated himself at table.

He ate slowly, like a man who wants to prolong the meal, who does not
want to be alone.

Then he smoked several pipes in the hall while the table was being
cleared. After that he went back to his room.

As soon as he had locked himself in he looked, under the bed, opened all
the closets, explored every corner, rummaged through all the furniture.
Then he lighted the candles on the mantelpiece, and, turning round
several times, ran his eye all over the apartment with an anguish of
terror that distorted his face, for he knew well that he would see her,
as he did every night--little Louise Roque, the little girl he had
attacked and afterward strangled.

Every night the odious vision came back again. First he seemed to hear a
kind of roaring sound, such as is made by a threshing machine or the
distant passage of a train over a bridge. Then he commenced to gasp, to
suffocate, and he had to unbutton his collar and his belt. He moved about
to make his blood circulate, he tried to read, he attempted to sing. It
was in vain. His thoughts, in spite of himself, went back to the day of
the murder and made him begin it all over again in all its most secret
details, with all the violent emotions he had experienced from the first
minute to the last.

He had felt on rising that morning, the morning of the horrible day, a
little dizziness and headache, which he attributed to the heat, so that
he remained in his room until breakfast time.

After the meal he had taken a siesta, then, toward the close of the
afternoon, he had gone out to breathe the fresh, soothing breeze under
the trees in the wood.

But, as soon as he was outside, the heavy, scorching air of the plain
oppressed him still more. The sun, still high in the heavens, poured down
on the parched soil waves of burning light. Not a breath of wind stirred
the leaves. Every beast and bird, even the grasshoppers, were silent.
Renardet reached the tall trees and began to walk over the moss where the
Brindille produced a slight freshness of the air beneath the immense roof
of branches. But he felt ill at ease. It seemed to him that an unknown,
invisible hand was strangling him, and he scarcely thought of anything,
having usually few ideas in his head. For the last three months only one
thought haunted him, the thought of marrying again. He suffered from
living alone, suffered from it morally and physically. Accustomed for ten
years past to feeling a woman near him, habituated to her presence every
moment, he had need, an imperious and perplexing need of such
association. Since Madame Renardet's death he had suffered continually
without knowing why, he had suffered at not feeling her dress brushing
past him, and, above all, from no longer being able to calm and rest
himself in her arms. He had been scarcely six months a widower and he was
already looking about in the district for some young girl or some widow
he might marry when his period of mourning was at an end.

He had a chaste soul, but it was lodged in a powerful, herculean body,
and carnal imaginings began to disturb his sleep and his vigils. He drove
them away; they came back again; and he murmured from time to time,
smiling at himself:

"Here I am, like St. Anthony."

Having this special morning had several of these visions, the desire
suddenly came into his breast to bathe in the Brindille in order to
refresh himself and cool his blood.

He knew of a large deep pool, a little farther down, where the people of
the neighborhood came sometimes to take a dip in summer. He went there.

Thick willow trees hid this clear body of water where the current rested
and went to sleep for a while before starting on its way again. Renardet,
as he appeared, thought he heard a light sound, a faint plashing which
was not that of the stream on the banks. He softly put aside the leaves
and looked. A little girl, quite naked in the transparent water, was
beating the water with both hands, dancing about in it and dipping
herself with pretty movements. She was not a child nor was she yet a
woman. She was plump and developed, while preserving an air of youthful
precocity, as of one who had grown rapidly. He no longer moved, overcome
with surprise, with desire, holding his breath with a strange, poignant
emotion. He remained there, his heart beating as if one of his sensuous
dreams had just been realized, as if an impure fairy had conjured up
before him this young creature, this little rustic Venus, rising from the
eddies of the stream as the real Venus rose from the waves of the sea.

Suddenly the little girl came out of the water, and, without seeing him,
came over to where he stood, looking for her clothes in order to dress
herself. As she approached gingerly, on account of the sharp-pointed
stones, he felt himself pushed toward her by an irresistible force, by a
bestial transport of passion, which stirred his flesh, bewildered his
mind and made him tremble from head to foot.

She remained standing some seconds behind the willow tree which concealed
him from view. Then, losing his reason entirely, he pushed aside the
branches, rushed on her and seized her in his arms. She fell, too
terrified to offer any resistance, too terror-stricken to cry out. He
seemed possessed, not understanding what he was doing.

He woke from his crime as one wakes from a nightmare. The child burst out
weeping.

"Hold your tongue! Hold your tongue!" he said. "I'll give you money."

But she did not hear him and went on sobbing.

"Come now, hold your tongue! Do hold your tongue! Keep quiet!" he
continued.

She kept shrieking as she tried to free herself. He suddenly realized
that he was ruined, and he caught her by the neck to stop her mouth from
uttering these heartrending, dreadful screams. As she continued to
struggle with the desperate strength of a being who is seeking to fly
from death, he pressed his enormous hands on the little throat swollen
with screaming, and in a few seconds he had strangled her, so furiously
did he grip her. He had not intended to kill her, but only to make her
keep quiet.

Then he stood up, overwhelmed with horror.

She lay before him, her face bleeding and blackned. He was about to rush
away when there sprang up in his agitated soul the mysterious and
undefined instinct that guides all beings in the hour of danger.

He was going to throw the body into the water, but another impulse drove
him toward the clothes, which he made into a small package. Then, as he
had a piece of twine in his pocket, he tied it up and hid it in a deep
portion of the stream, beneath the trunk of a tree that overhung the
Brindille.

Then he went off at a rapid pace, reached the meadows, took a wide turn
in order to show himself to some peasants who dwelt some distance away at
the opposite side of the district, and came back to dine at the usual
hour, telling his servants all that was supposed to have happened during
his walk.

He slept, however, that night; he slept with a heavy, brutish sleep like
the sleep of certain persons condemned to death. He did not open his eyes
until the first glimmer of dawn, and he waited till his usual hour for
riding, so as to excite no suspicion.

Then he had to be present at the inquiry as to the cause of death. He did
so like a somnambulist, in a kind of vision which showed him men and
things as in a dream, in a cloud of intoxication, with that sense of
unreality which perplexes the mind at the time of the greatest
catastrophes.

But the agonized cry of Mother Roque pierced his heart. At that moment he
had felt inclined to cast himself at the old woman's feet and to exclaim:

"I am the guilty one!"

But he had restrained himself. He went back, however, during the night to
fish up the dead girl's wooden shoes, in order to place them on her
mother's threshold.

As long as the inquiry lasted, as long as it was necessary to lead
justice astray he was calm, master of himself, crafty and smiling. He
discussed quietly with the magistrates all the suppositions that passed
through their minds, combated their opinions and demolished their
arguments. He even took a keen and mournful pleasure in disturbing their
investigations, in embroiling their ideas, in showing the innocence of
those whom they suspected.

But as soon as the inquiry was abandoned he became gradually nervous,
more excitable than he had been before, although he mastered his
irritability. Sudden noises made him start with fear; he shuddered at the
slightest thing and trembled sometimes from head to foot when a fly
alighted on his forehead. Then he was seized with an imperious desire for
motion, which impelled him to take long walks and to remain up whole
nights pacing up and down his room.

It was not that he was goaded by remorse. His brutal nature did not lend
itself to any shade of sentiment or of moral terror. A man of energy and
even of violence, born to make war, to ravage conquered countries and to
massacre the vanquished, full of the savage instincts of the hunter and
the fighter, he scarcely took count of human life. Though he respected
the Church outwardly, from policy, he believed neither in God nor the
devil, expecting neither chastisement nor recompense for his acts in
another life. His sole belief was a vague philosophy drawn from all the
ideas of the encyclopedists of the last century, and he regarded religion
as a moral sanction of the law, the one and the other having been
invented by men to regulate social relations. To kill any one in a duel,
or in war, or in a quarrel, or by accident, or for the sake of revenge,
or even through bravado would have seemed to him an amusing and clever
thing and would not have left more impression on his mind than a shot
fired at a hare; but he had experienced a profound emotion at the murder
of this child. He had, in the first place, perpetrated it in the heat of
an irresistible gust of passion, in a sort of tempest of the senses that
had overpowered his reason. And he had cherished in his heart, in his
flesh, on his lips, even to the very tips of his murderous fingers a kind
of bestial love, as well as a feeling of terrified horror, toward this
little girl surprised by him and basely killed. Every moment his thoughts
returned to that horrible scene, and, though he endeavored to drive this
picture from his mind, though he put it aside with terror, with disgust,
he felt it surging through his soul, moving about in him, waiting
incessantly for the moment to reappear.

Then, as evening approached, he was afraid of the shadow falling around
him. He did not yet know why the darkness seemed frightful to him, but he
instinctively feared it, he felt that it was peopled with terrors. The
bright daylight did not lend itself to fears. Things and beings were
visible then, and only natural things and beings could exhibit themselves
in the light of day. But the night, the impenetrable night, thicker than
walls and empty; the infinite night, so black, so vast, in which one
might brush against frightful things; the night, when one feels that a
mysterious terror is wandering, prowling about, appeared to him to
conceal an unknown threatening danger, close beside him.

What was it?

He knew ere long. As he sat in his armchair, rather late one evening when
he could not sleep, he thought he saw the curtain of his window move. He
waited, uneasily, with beating heart. The drapery did not stir; then, all
of a sudden, it moved once more. He did not venture to rise; he no longer
ventured to breathe, and yet he was brave. He had often fought, and he
would have liked to catch thieves in his house.

Was it true that this curtain did move? he asked himself, fearing that
his eyes had deceived him. It was, moreover, such a slight thing, a
gentle flutter of drapery, a kind of trembling in its folds, less than an
undulation caused by the wind.

Renardet sat still, with staring eyes and outstretched neck. He sprang to
his feet abruptly, ashamed of his fear, took four steps, seized the
drapery with both hands and pulled it wide apart. At first he saw nothing
but darkened glass, resembling plates of glittering ink. The night, the
vast, impenetrable night, stretched beyond as far as the invisible
horizon. He remained standing in front of this illimitable shadow, and
suddenly he perceived a light, a moving light, which seemed some distance
away.

Then he put his face close to the window pane, thinking that a person
looking for crabs might be poaching in the Brindille, for it was past
midnight, and this light rose up at the edge of the stream, under the
trees. As he was not yet able to see clearly, Renardet placed his hands
over his eyes, and suddenly this light became an illumination, and he
beheld little Louise Roque naked and bleeding on the moss. He recoiled,
frozen with horror, knocked over his chair and fell over on his back. He
remained there some minutes in anguish of mind; then he sat up and began
to reflect. He had had a hallucination--that was all, a
hallucination due to the fact that a night marauder was walking with a
lantern in his hand near the water's edge. What was there astonishing,
besides, in the circumstance that the recollection of his crime should
sometimes bring before him the vision of the dead girl?

He rose from the ground, swallowed a glass of wine and sat down again. He
was thinking:

"What am I to do if this occurs again?"

And it would occur; he felt it; he was sure of it. Already his glance was
drawn toward the window; it called him; it attracted him. In order to
avoid looking at it, he turned his chair round. Then he took a book and
tried to read, but it seemed to him that he presently heard something
stirring behind him, and he swung round his armchair on one foot.

The curtain was moving again; unquestionably, it moved this time. He
could no longer have any doubt about it.

He rushed forward and grasped it so violently that he pulled it down with
its pole. Then he eagerly glued his face to the glass. He saw nothing.
All was black outside, and he breathed with the joy of a man whose life
has just been saved.

Then he went back to his chair and sat down again, but almost immediately
he felt a longing to look out once more through the window. Since the
curtain had fallen down, the window made a sort of gap, fascinating and
terrible, on the dark landscape. In order not to yield to this dangerous
temptation, he undressed, blew out the light and closed his eyes.

Lying on his back motionless, his skin warm and moist, he awaited sleep.
Suddenly a great gleam of light flashed across his eyelids. He opened
them, believing that his dwelling was on fire. All was black as before,
and he leaned on his elbow to try to distinguish the window which had
still for him an unconquerable attraction. By dint of, straining his eyes
he could perceive some stars, and he rose, groped his way across the
room, discovered the panes with his outstretched hands, and placed his
forehead close to them. There below, under the trees, lay the body of the
little girl gleaming like phosphorus, lighting up the surrounding
darkness.

Renardet uttered a cry and rushed toward his bed, where he lay till
morning, his head hidden under the pillow.

From that moment his life became intolerable. He passed his days in
apprehension of each succeeding night, and each night the vision came
back again. As soon as he had locked himself up in his room he strove to
resist it, but in vain. An irresistible force lifted him up and pushed
him against the window, as if to call the phantom, and he saw it at once,
lying first in the spot where the crime was committed in the position in
which it had been found.

Then the dead girl rose up and came toward him with little steps just as
the child had done when she came out of the river. She advanced quietly,
passing straight across the grass and over the bed of withered flowers.
Then she rose up in the air toward Renardet's window. She came toward him
as she had come on the day of the crime. And the man recoiled before the
apparition--he retreated to his bed and sank down upon it, knowing
well that the little one had entered the room and that she now was
standing behind the curtain, which presently moved. And until daybreak he
kept staring at this curtain with a fixed glance, ever waiting to see his
victim depart.

But she did not show herself any more; she remained there behind the
curtain, which quivered tremulously now and then.

And Renardet, his fingers clutching the clothes, squeezed them as he had
squeezed the throat of little Louise Roque.

He heard the clock striking the hours, and in the stillness the pendulum
kept ticking in time with the loud beating of his heart. And he suffered,
the wretched man, more than any man had ever suffered before.

Then, as soon as a white streak of light on the ceiling announced the
approaching day, he felt himself free, alone at last, alone in his room;
and he went to sleep. He slept several hours--a restless, feverish
sleep in which he retraced in dreams the horrible vision of the past
night.

When he went down to the late breakfast he felt exhausted as after
unusual exertion, and he scarcely ate anything, still haunted as he was
by the fear of what he had seen the night before.

He knew well, however, that it was not an apparition, that the dead do
not come back, and that his sick soul, his soul possessed by one thought
alone, by an indelible remembrance, was the only cause of his torture,
was what brought the dead girl back to life and raised her form before
his eyes, on which it was ineffaceably imprinted. But he knew, too, that
there was no cure, that he would never escape from the savage persecution
of his memory, and he resolved to die rather than to endure these
tortures any longer.

Then he thought of how he would kill himself, It must be something simple
and natural, which would preclude the idea of suicide. For he clung to
his reputation, to the name bequeathed to him by his ancestors; and if
his death awakened any suspicion people's thoughts might be, perhaps,
directed toward the mysterious crime, toward the murderer who could not
be found, and they would not hesitate to accuse him of the crime.

A strange idea came into his head, that of allowing himself to be crushed
by the tree at the foot of which he had assassinated little Louise Roque.
So he determined to have the wood cut down and to simulate an accident.
But the beech tree refused to crush his ribs.

Returning to his house, a prey to utter despair, he had snatched up his
revolver, and then did not dare to fire it.

The dinner bell summoned him. He could eat nothing, and he went upstairs
again. And he did not know what to do. Now that he had escaped the first
time, he felt himself a coward. Presently he would be ready, brave,
decided, master of his courage and of his resolution; now he was weak and
feared death as much as he did the dead girl.

He faltered:

"I dare not venture it again--I dare not venture it."

Then he glanced with terror, first at the revolver on the table and next
at the curtain which hid his window. It seemed to him, moreover, that
something horrible would occur as soon as his life was ended. Something?
What? A meeting with her, perhaps. She was watching for him; she was
waiting for him; she was calling him; and it was in order to seize him in
her turn, to draw him toward the doom that would avenge her, and to lead
him to die, that she appeared thus every night.

He began to cry like a child, repeating:

"I will not venture it again--I will not venture it."

Then he fell on his knees and murmured:

"My God! my God!" without believing, nevertheless, in God. And he no
longer dared, in fact, to look at his window, where he knew the
apparition was hiding, nor at his table, where his revolver gleamed. When
he had risen up he said:

"This cannot last; there must be an end of it."

The sound of his voice in the silent room made a chill of fear pass
through his limbs, but as he could not bring himself to come to a
determination, as he felt certain that his finger would always refuse to
pull the trigger of his revolver, he turned round to hide his head under
the bedclothes and began to reflect.

He would have to find some way in which he could force himself to die, to
play some trick on himself which would not permit of any hesitation on
his part, any delay, any possible regrets. He envied condemned criminals
who are led to the scaffold surrounded by soldiers. Oh! if he could only
beg of some one to shoot him; if after confessing his crime to a true
friend who would never divulge it he could procure death at his hand. But
from whom could he ask this terrible service? From whom? He thought of
all the people he knew. The doctor? No, he would talk about it afterward,
most probably. And suddenly a fantastic idea entered his mind. He would
write to the magistrate, who was on terms of close friendship with him,
and would denounce himself as the perpetrator of the crime. He would in
this letter confess everything, revealing how his soul had been tortured,
how he had resolved to die, how he had hesitated about carrying out his
resolution and what means he had employed to strengthen his failing
courage. And in the name of their old friendship he would implore of the
other to destroy the letter as soon as he had ascertained that the
culprit had inflicted justice on himself. Renardet could rely on this
magistrate; he knew him to be true, discreet, incapable of even an idle
word. He was one of those men who have an inflexible conscience,
governed, directed, regulated by their reason alone.

Scarcely had he formed this project when a strange feeling of joy took
possession of his heart. He was calm now. He would write his letter
slowly, then at daybreak he would deposit it in the box nailed to the
outside wall of his office; then he would ascend his tower to watch for
the postman's arrival; and when the man in the blue blouse had gone away,
he would cast himself head foremost on the rocks on which the foundations
rested, He would take care to be seen first by the workmen who had cut
down his wood. He could climb to the projecting stone which bore the
flagstaff displayed on festivals, He would smash this pole with a shake
and carry it along with him as he fell.

Who would suspect that it was not an accident? And he would be killed
outright, owing to his weight and the height of the tower.

Presently he got out of bed, went over to the table and began to write.
He omitted nothing, not a single detail of the crime, not a single detail
of the torments of his heart, and he ended by announcing that he had
passed sentence on himself, that he was going to execute the criminal,
and begged his friend, his old friend, to be careful that there should
never be any stain on his memory.

When he had finished this letter he saw that the day had dawned.

He closed, sealed it and wrote the address. Then he descended with light
steps, hurried toward the little white box fastened to the outside wall
in the corner of the farmhouse, and when he had thrown into it this
letter, which made his hand tremble, he came back quickly, drew the bolts
of the great door and climbed up to his tower to wait for the passing of
the postman, who was to bear away his death sentence.

He felt self-possessed now. Liberated! Saved!

A cold dry wind, an icy wind passed across his face. He inhaled it
eagerly with open mouth, drinking in its chilling kiss. The sky was red,
a wintry red, and all the plain, whitened with frost, glistened under the
first rays of the sun, as if it were covered with powdered glass.

Renardet, standing up, his head bare, gazed at the vast tract of country
before him, the meadows to the left and to the right the village whose
chimneys were beginning to smoke in preparation for the morning meal. At
his feet he saw the Brindille flowing amid the rocks, where he would soon
be crushed to death. He felt new life on that beautiful frosty morning.
The light bathed him, entered his being like a new-born hope. A thousand
recollections assailed him, recollections of similar mornings, of rapid
walks on the hard earth which rang beneath his footsteps, of happy days
of shooting on the edges of pools where wild ducks sleep. All the good
things that he loved, the good things of existence, rushed to his memory,
penetrated him with fresh desires, awakened all the vigorous appetites of
his active, powerful body.

And he was about to die! Why? He was going to kill himself stupidly
because he was afraid of a shadow-afraid of nothing! He was still rich
and in the prime of life. What folly! All he needed was distraction,
absence, a voyage in order to forget.

This night even he had not seen the little girl because his mind was
preoccupied and had wandered toward some other subject. Perhaps he would
not see her any more? And even if she still haunted him in this house,
certainly she would not follow him elsewhere! The earth was wide, the
future was long.

Why should he die?

His glance travelled across the meadows, and he perceived a blue spot in
the path which wound alongside the Brindille. It was Mederic coming to
bring letters from the town and to carry away those of the village.

Renardet gave a start, a sensation of pain shot through his breast, and
he rushed down the winding staircase to get back his letter, to demand it
back from the postman. Little did it matter to him now whether he was
seen, He hurried across the grass damp from the light frost of the
previous night and arrived in front of the box in the corner of the
farmhouse exactly at the same time as the letter carrier.

The latter had opened the little wooden door and drew forth the four
papers deposited there by the inhabitants of the locality.

Renardet said to him:

"Good-morrow, Mederic."

"Good-morrow, Monsieur le Maire."

"I say, Mederic, I threw a letter into the box that I want back again. I
came to ask you to give it back to me."

"That's all right, Monsieur le Maire--you'll get it."

And the postman raised his eyes. He stood petrified at the sight of
Renardet's face. The mayor's cheeks were purple, his eyes were anxious
and sunken, with black circles round them, his hair was unbrushed, his
beard untrimmed, his necktie unfastened. It was evident that he had not
been in bed.

The postman asked:

"Are you ill, Monsieur le Maire?"

The other, suddenly comprehending that his appearance must be unusual,
lost countenance and faltered:

"Oh! no-oh! no. Only I jumped out of bed to ask you for this letter. I
was asleep. You understand?"

He said in reply:

"What letter?"

"The one you are going to give back to me."

Mederic now began to hesitate. The mayor's attitude did not strike him as
natural. There was perhaps a secret in that letter, a political secret.
He knew Renardet was not a Republican, and he knew all the tricks and
chicanery employed at elections.

He asked:

"To whom is it addressed, this letter of yours?"

"To Monsieur Putoin, the magistrate--you know, my friend, Monsieur
Putoin!"

The postman searched through the papers and found the one asked for. Then
he began looking at it, turning it round and round between his fingers,
much perplexed, much troubled by the fear of either committing a grave
offence or of making an enemy of the mayor.

Seeing his hesitation, Renardet made a movement for the purpose of
seizing the letter and snatching it away from him. This abrupt action
convinced Mederic that some important secret was at stake and made him
resolve to do his duty, cost what it may.

So he flung the letter into his bag and fastened it up, with the reply:

"No, I can't, Monsieur le Maire. As long as it is for the magistrate, I
can't."

A dreadful pang wrung Renardet's heart and he murmured:

"Why, you know me well. You are even able to recognize my handwriting. I
tell you I want that paper."

"I can't."

"Look here, Mederic, you know that I'm incapable of deceiving you--I
tell you I want it."

"No, I can't."

A tremor of rage passed through Renardet's soul.

"Damn it all, take care! You know that I never trifle and that I could
get you out of your job, my good fellow, and without much delay, either,
And then, I am the mayor of the district, after all; and I now order you
to give me back that paper."

The postman answered firmly:

"No, I can't, Monsieur le Maire."

Thereupon Renardet, losing his head, caught hold of the postman's arms in
order to take away his bag; but, freeing himself by a strong effort, and
springing backward, the letter carrier raised his big holly stick.
Without losing his temper, he said emphatically:

"Don't touch me, Monsieur le Maire, or I'll strike. Take care, I'm only
doing my duty!"

Feeling that he was lost, Renardet suddenly became humble, gentle,
appealing to him like a whimpering child:

"Look here, look here, my friend, give me back that letter and I'll
recompense you--I'll give you money. Stop! stop! I'll give you a
hundred francs, you understand--a hundred francs!"

The postman turned on his heel and started on his journey.

Renardet followed him, out of breath, stammering:

"Mederic, Mederic, listen! I'll give you a thousand francs, you
understand--a thousand francs."

The postman still went on without giving any answer.

Renardet went on:

"I'll make your fortune, you understand--whatever you
wish--fifty thousand francs--fifty thousand francs for that
letter! What does it matter to you? You won't? Well, a hundred
thousand--I say--a hundred thousand francs. Do you understand?
A hundred thousand francs--a hundred thousand francs."

The postman turned back, his face hard, his eye severe:

"Enough of this, or else I'll repeat to the magistrate everything you
have just said to me."

Renardet stopped abruptly. It was all over. He turned back and rushed
toward his house, running like a hunted animal.

Then, in his turn, Mederic stopped and watched his flight with
stupefaction. He saw the mayor reenter his house, and he waited still, as
if something astonishing were about to happen.

In fact, presently the tall form of Renardet appeared on the summit of
the Fox's tower. He ran round the platform like a madman. Then he seized
the flagstaff and shook it furiously without succeeding in breaking it;
then, all of a sudden, like a diver, with his two hands before him, he
plunged into space.

Mederic rushed forward to his assistance. He saw the woodcutters going to
work and called out to them, telling them an accident had occurred. At
the foot of the walls they found a bleeding body, its head crushed on a
rock. The Brindille surrounded this rock, and over its clear, calm waters
could be seen a long red thread of mingled brains and blood.




THE DONKEY

There was not a breath of air stirring; a heavy mist was lying over the
river. It was like a layer of cotton placed on the water. The banks
themselves were indistinct, hidden behind strange fogs. But day was
breaking and the hill was becoming visible. In the dawning light of day
the plaster houses began to appear like white spots. Cocks were crowing
in the barnyard.

On the other side of the river, hidden behind the fogs, just opposite
Frette, a slight noise from time to time broke the dead silence of the
quiet morning. At times it was an indistinct plashing, like the cautious
advance of a boat, then again a sharp noise like the rattle of an oar and
then the sound of something dropping in the water. Then silence.

Sometimes whispered words, coming perhaps from a distance, perhaps from
quite near, pierced through these opaque mists. They passed by like wild
birds which have slept in the rushes and which fly away at the first
light of day, crossing the mist and uttering a low and timid sound which
wakes their brothers along the shores.

Suddenly along the bank, near the village, a barely perceptible shadow
appeared on the water. Then it grew, became more distinct and, coming out
of the foggy curtain which hung over the river, a flatboat, manned by two
men, pushed up on the grass.

The one who was rowing rose and took a pailful of fish from the bottom of
the boat, then he threw the dripping net over his shoulder. His
companion, who had not made a motion, exclaimed: "Say, Mailloche, get
your gun and see if we can't land some rabbit along the shore."

The other one answered: "All right. I'll be with you in a minute." Then
he disappeared, in order to hide their catch.

The man who had stayed in the boat slowly filled his pipe and lighted it.
His name was Labouise, but he was called Chicot, and was in partnership
with Maillochon, commonly called Mailloche, to practice the doubtful and
undefined profession of junk-gatherers along the shore.

They were a low order of sailors and they navigated regularly only in the
months of famine. The rest of the time they acted as junk-gatherers.
Rowing about on the river day and night, watching for any prey, dead or
alive, poachers on the water and nocturnal hunters, sometimes ambushing
venison in the Saint-Germain forests, sometimes looking for drowned
people and searching their clothes, picking up floating rags and empty
bottles; thus did Labouise and Maillochon live easily.

At times they would set out on foot about noon and stroll along straight
ahead. They would dine in some inn on the shore and leave again side by
side. They would remain away for a couple of days; then one morning they
would be seen rowing about in the tub which they called their boat.

At Joinville or at Nogent some boatman would be looking for his boat,
which had disappeared one night, probably stolen, while twenty or thirty
miles from there, on the Oise, some shopkeeper would be rubbing his
hands, congratulating himself on the bargain he had made when he bought a
boat the day before for fifty francs, which two men offered him as they
were passing.

Maillochon reappeared with his gun wrapped up in rags. He was a man of
forty or fifty, tall and thin, with the restless eye of people who are
worried by legitimate troubles and of hunted animals. His open shirt
showed his hairy chest, but he seemed never to have had any more hair on
his face than a short brush of a mustache and a few stiff hairs under his
lower lip. He was bald around the temples. When he took off the dirty cap
that he wore his scalp seemed to be covered with a fluffy down, like the
body of a plucked chicken.

Chicot, on the contrary, was red, fat, short and hairy. He looked like a
raw beefsteak. He continually kept his left eye closed, as if he were
aiming at something or at somebody, and when people jokingly cried to
him, "Open your eye, Labouise!" he would answer quietly: "Never fear,
sister, I open it when there's cause to."

He had a habit of calling every one "sister," even his scavenger
companion.

He took up the oars again, and once more the boat disappeared in the
heavy mist, which was now turned snowy white in the pink-tinted sky.

"What kind of lead did you take, Maillochon?" Labouise asked.

"Very small, number nine; that's the best for rabbits."

They were approaching the other shore so slowly, so quietly that no noise
betrayed them. This bank belongs to the Saint-Germain forest and is the
boundary line for rabbit hunting. It is covered with burrows hidden under
the roots of trees, and the creatures at daybreak frisk about, running in
and out of the holes.

Maillochon was kneeling in the bow, watching, his gun hidden on the
floor. Suddenly he seized it, aimed, and the report echoed for some time
throughout the quiet country.

Labouise, in a few strokes, touched the beach, and his companion, jumping
to the ground, picked up a little gray rabbit, not yet dead.

Then the boat once more disappeared into the fog in order to get to the
other side, where it could keep away from the game wardens.

The two men seemed to be riding easily on the water. The weapon had
disappeared under the board which served as a hiding place and the rabbit
was stuffed into Chicot's loose shirt.

After about a quarter of an hour Labouise asked: "Well, sister, shall we
get one more?"

"It will suit me," Maillochon answered.

The boat started swiftly down the current. The mist, which was hiding
both shores, was beginning to rise. The trees could be barely perceived,
as through a veil, and the little clouds of fog were floating up from the
water. When they drew near the island, the end of which is opposite
Herblay, the two men slackened their pace and began to watch. Soon a
second rabbit was killed.

Then they went down until they were half way to Conflans. Here they
stopped their boat, tied it to a tree and went to sleep in the bottom of
it.

From time to time Labouise would sit up and look over the horizon with
his open eye. The last of the morning mist had disappeared and the large
summer sun was climbing in the blue sky.

On the other side of the river the vineyard-covered hill stretched out in
a semicircle. One house stood out alone at the summit. Everything was
silent.

Something was moving slowly along the tow-path, advancing with
difficulty. It was a woman dragging a donkey. The stubborn, stiff-jointed
beast occasionally stretched out a leg in answer to its companion's
efforts, and it proceeded thus, with outstretched neck and ears lying
flat, so slowly that one could not tell when it would ever be out of
sight.

The woman, bent double, was pulling, turning round occasionally to strike
the donkey with a stick.

As soon as he saw her, Labouise exclaimed: "Say, Mailloche!"

Mailloche answered: "What's the matter?"

"Want to have some fun?"

"Of course!"

"Then hurry, sister; we're going to have a laugh."

Chicot took the oars. When he had crossed the river he stopped opposite
the woman and called:

"Hey, sister!"

The woman stopped dragging her donkey and looked.

Labouise continued: "What are you doing--going to the locomotive
show?"

The woman made no reply. Chicot continued:

"Say, your trotter's prime for a race. Where are you taking him at that
speed?"

At last the woman answered: "I'm going to Macquart, at Champioux, to have
him killed. He's worthless."

Labouise answered: "You're right. How much do you think Macquart will
give you for him?"

The woman wiped her forehead on the back of her hand and hesitated,
saying: "How do I know? Perhaps three francs, perhaps four."

Chicot exclaimed: "I'll give you five francs and your errand's done!
How's that?"

The woman considered the matter for a second and then exclaimed: "Done!"

The two men landed. Labouise grasped the animal by the bridle. Maillochon
asked in surprise:

"What do you expect to do with that carcass?"

Chicot this time opened his other eye in order to express his gaiety. His
whole red face was grinning with joy. He chuckled: "Don't worry, sister.
I've got my idea."

He gave five francs to the woman, who then sat down by the road to see
what was going to happen. Then Labouise, in great humor, got the gun and
held it out to Maillochon, saying: "Each one in turn; we're going after
big game, sister. Don't get so near or you'll kill it right away! You
must make the pleasure last a little."

He placed his companion about forty paces from the victim. The ass,
feeling itself free, was trying to get a little of the tall grass, but it
was so exhausted that it swayed on its legs as if it were about to fall.

Maillochon aimed slowly and said: "A little pepper for the ears; watch,
Ghicot!" And he fired.

The tiny shot struck the donkey's long ears and he began to shake them in
order to get rid of the stinging sensation. The two men were doubled up
with laughter and stamped their feet with joy. The woman, indignant,
rushed forward; she did not want her donkey to be tortured, and she
offered to return the five francs. Labouise threatened her with a
thrashing and pretended to roll up his sleeves. He had paid, hadn't he?
Well, then, he would take a shot at her skirts, just to show that it
didn't hurt. She went away, threatening to call the police. They could
hear her protesting indignantly and cursing as she went her way.

Maillochon held out the gun to his comrade, saying: "It's your turn,
Chicot."

Labouise aimed and fired. The donkey received the charge in his thighs,
but the shot was so small and came from such a distance that he thought
he was being stung by flies, for he began to thrash himself with his
tail.

Labouise sat down to laugh more comfortably, while Maillochon reloaded
the weapon, so happy that he seemed to sneeze into the barrel. He stepped
forward a few paces, and, aiming at the same place that his friend had
shot at, he fired again. This time the beast started, tried to kick and
turned its head. At last a little blood was running. It had been wounded
and felt a sharp pain, for it tried to run away with a slow, limping,
jerky gallop.

Both men darted after the beast, Maillochon with a long stride, Labouise
with the short, breathless trot of a little man. But the donkey, tired
out, had stopped, and, with a bewildered look, was watching his two
murderers approach. Suddenly he stretched his neck and began to bray.

Labouise, out of breath, had taken the gun. This time he walked right up
close, as he did not wish to begin the chase over again.

When the poor beast had finished its mournful cry, like a last call for
help, the man called: "Hey, Mailloche! Come here, sister; I'm going to
give him some medicine." And while the other man was forcing the animal's
mouth open, Chicot stuck the barrel of his gun down its throat, as if he
were trying to make it drink a potion. Then he said: "Look out, sister,
here she goes!"

He pressed the trigger. The donkey stumbled back a few steps, fell down,
tried to get up again and finally lay on its side and closed its eyes:
The whole body was trembling, its legs were kicking as if it were, trying
to run. A stream of blood was oozing through its teeth. Soon it stopped
moving. It was dead.

The two men went along, laughing. It was over too quickly; they had not
had their money's worth. Maillochon asked: "Well, what are we going to do
now?"

Labouise answered: "Don't worry, sister. Get the thing on the boat; we're
going to have some fun when night comes."

They went and got the boat. The animal's body was placed on the bottom,
covered with fresh grass, and the two men stretched out on it and went to
sleep.

Toward noon Labouise drew a bottle of wine, some bread and butter and raw
onions from a hiding place in their muddy, worm-eaten boat, and they
began to eat.

When the meal was over they once more stretched out on the dead donkey
and slept. At nightfall Labouise awoke and shook his comrade, who was
snoring like a buzzsaw. "Come on, sister," he ordered.

Maillochon began to row. As they had plenty of time they went up the
Seine slowly. They coasted along the reaches covered with water-lilies,
and the heavy, mud-covered boat slipped over the lily pads and bent the
flowers, which stood up again as soon as they had passed.

When they reached the wall of the Eperon, which separates the
Saint-Germain forest from the Maisons-Laffitte Park, Labouise stopped his
companion and explained his idea to him. Maillochon was moved by a
prolonged, silent laugh.

They threw into the water the grass which had covered the body, took the
animal by the feet and hid it behind some bushes. Then they got into
their boat again and went to Maisons-Laffitte.

The night was perfectly black when they reached the wine shop of old man
Jules. As soon as the dealer saw them he came up, shook hands with them
and sat down at their table. They began to talk of one thing and another.
By eleven o'clock the last customer had left and old man Jules winked at
Labouise and asked: "Well, have you got any?"

Labouise made a motion with his head and answered: "Perhaps so, perhaps
not!"

The dealer insisted: "Perhaps you've not nothing but gray ones?"

Chicot dug his hands into his flannel shirt, drew out the ears of a
rabbit and declared: "Three francs a pair!"

Then began a long discussion about the price. Two francs sixty-five and
the two rabbits were delivered. As the two men were getting up to go, old
man Jules, who had been watching them, exclaimed:

"You have something else, but you won't say what."

Labouise answered: "Possibly, but it is not for you; you're too stingy."

The man, growing eager, kept asking: "What is it? Something big? Perhaps
we might make a deal."

Labouise, who seemed perplexed, pretended to consult Maillochon with a
glance. Then he answered in a slow voice: "This is how it is. We were in
the bushes at Eperon when something passed right near us, to the left, at
the end of the wall. Mailloche takes a shot and it drops. We skipped on
account of the game people. I can't tell you what it is, because I don't
know. But it's big enough. But what is it? If I told you I'd be lying,
and you know, sister, between us everything's above-board."

Anxiously the man asked: "Think it's venison?"

Labouise answered: "Might be and then again it might not!
Venison?--uh! uh!--might be a little big for that! Mind you, I
don't say it's a doe, because I don't know, but it might be."

Still the dealer insisted: "Perhaps it's a buck?"

Labouise stretched out his hand, exclaiming: "No, it's not that! It's not
a buck. I should have seen the horns. No, it's not a buck!"

"Why didn't you bring it with you?" asked the man.

"Because, sister, from now on I sell from where I stand. Plenty of people
will buy. All you have to do is to take a walk over there, find the thing
and take it. No risk for me."

The innkeeper, growing suspicious, exclaimed "Supposing he wasn't there!"

Labouise once more raised his hand and said:

"He's there, I swear!--first bush to the left. What it is, I don't
know. But it's not a buck, I'm positive. It's for you to find out what it
is. Twenty-five francs, cash down!"

Still the man hesitated: "Couldn't you bring it?"

Maillochon exclaimed: "No, indeed! You know our price! Take it or leave
it!"

The dealer decided: "It's a bargain for twenty francs!"

And they shook hands over the deal.

Then he took out four big five-franc pieces from the cash drawer, and the
two friends pocketed the money. Labouise arose, emptied his glass and
left. As he was disappearing in the shadows he turned round to exclaim:
"It isn't a buck. I don't know what it is!--but it's there. I'll
give you back your money if you find nothing!"

And he disappeared in the darkness. Maillochon, who was following him,
kept punching him in the back to express his joy.




MOIRON

As we were still talking about Pranzini, M. Maloureau, who had been
attorney general under the Empire, said: "Oh! I formerly knew a very
curious affair, curious for several reasons, as you will see.

"I was at that time imperial attorney in one of the provinces. I had to
take up the case which has remained famous under the name of the Moiron
case.

"Monsieur Moiron, who was a teacher in the north of France, enjoyed an
excellent reputation throughout the whole country. He was a person of
intelligence, quiet, very religious, a little taciturn; he had married in
the district of Boislinot, where he exercised his profession. He had had
three children, who had died of consumption, one after the other. From
this time he seemed to bestow upon the youngsters confided to his care
all the tenderness of his heart. With his own money he bought toys for
his best scholars and for the good boys; he gave them little dinners and
stuffed them with delicacies, candy and cakes: Everybody loved