The new terror
“‘Have I the honor of speaking to Madame Beauvisage, the wife of
Captain Gérard Beauvisage?’ I asked with a bow.
“She colored and tried to pass on without answering me.
“‘Madame, I am your neighbor, Captain Michel Alban,’ I persisted.
“‘Oh, please forgive me, monsieur,’ she returned, ‘my husband has often
spoken of you ... Captain Michel Alban....’
“She seemed terribly ill at ease, and yet in her confusion she was more
beautiful than ever, if that were possible. In spite of her obvious
desire to elude me I went on:
“‘How comes it that Captain Beauvisage has returned to France without
letting his old friend know? I shall be particularly obliged if you
will tell Gérard that I’m coming to shake hands with him this very
evening.’
“And observing that she was hastening her steps, I bowed, but as I was
speaking she turned round, betraying an agitation which was more and
more difficult to comprehend.
“‘Impossible to-night.... I promise to tell Gérard of our meeting.
That’s the most I can do. Gérard doesn’t wish to see any one—any one.
He lives alone.... We live alone.... And we took the house because we
were told that the next house was occupied only for a few days once or
twice a year by some one who is never seen!...’
“And she added in a voice tinged with sadness:
“‘You must forgive Gérard, monsieur. We do not receive any one—any one.
Good day, monsieur.’
“‘Madame, the Captain and you receive friends occasionally,’ I returned
with some impatience. ‘For instance, to-night you are expecting friends
with whom you made an appointment a year ago.’
“She flushed scarlet.
“‘Oh, but that’s an exceptional case ... that’s an absolutely
exceptional case.... They are our very particular friends.’
“Having said which she made her escape, but at once stopped her
retreat and turned back.
“‘Whatever you do, don’t call to-night,’ she entreated, and disappeared
into the garden.
“I returned to my house and began to keep watch on my neighbors. They
did not show themselves, and long before it was dark I saw the shutters
being closed and lights gleaming through the openings, such as I had
seen on that amazing night a year ago. But I did not hear the same
extraordinary din like the thunderous beating of a wooden drum.
“At seven o’clock I began to dress for I called to mind the low-necked
robe worn by the lady of the lamp. Madame Beauvisage’s last words had
but strengthened my determination. The captain was seeing some of his
friends that evening; he dared not refuse me admission. After dressing
it crossed my mind, before I went downstairs, to put my revolver in my
pocket, but in the end I left it in its place, considering that to take
it would be an act of stupidity.
“The stupidity lay in not taking it with me.
“On reaching the entrance to the Villa Makoko I turned the handle of
the gate on the off chance—the handle which last year I had seen turn
by itself. And to my intense surprise the door opened. Therefore my
neighbors were expecting visitors. I walked up to the house and knocked
at the door.
“‘Come in!’ a voice cried.
“I recognized Gérard’s voice. I walked gaily into the house. I passed
first through the hall, and then as the door of a small drawing-room
stood open, and the room was lit up, I entered it.
“‘Gérard it’s me,’ I exclaimed, ‘your old pal Michel Alban.’
“‘Oh, really, so you made up your mind to come, my dear old Michel! I
told my wife only just now that you would come and I should be glad
to see you.... But you are the only one, apart from our particular
friends.... Do you know, my dear Michel, you haven’t altered much....’
“It would be impossible for me to describe my stupefaction. I heard
Gérard, but I could not see him. His voice rang in my ears, but no one
was near me, no one was in the drawing-room. The Voice went on:
“‘Sit down, won’t you? My wife will soon be here, for she will remember
that she left me on the mantelpiece!’
“I looked up, and then discovered above me ... above me resting on a
high mantelpiece—a bust.
“It was this bust which had been speaking. It resembled Gérard. It was
Gérard’s body. It had been placed there as people are wont to place
busts on mantelpieces. It was a bust like those carved by sculptors,
that is to say, it was without arms.
“‘I can’t shake hands with you, my dear Michel,’ the voice went on,
‘for as you see I have no hands, but if you raise yourself on tiptoe
you will be able to take me in your arms and place me on the table. My
wife put me up here in a moment of temper, because she said I was in
the way when she swept the room. She’s a funny thing is my wife.’
“And the bust burst out laughing.
“It seemed to me that I was the victim of an optical illusion as
happens in those entertainments where you behold living heads and
shoulders suspended in mid-air, the result of tricks with mirrors; but
after setting down my friend on the table, as he requested, I had to
admit that this head and body without arms or legs was indeed all that
remained of the excellent officer whom I had known in days gone by.
His body was resting on a small wheeled platform, such as are used by
cripples without legs, but Gérard did not possess even the stumps of
legs which can be seen in the case of most cripples. To think that my
old friend was nothing but a bust!
“Small hooks took the place of arms, and language fails me to describe
how, leaning for support on a hook here, or on another there, he set to
work to hop, skip and jump and perform a hundred swift movements which
shot him from the table to a chair, from a chair to the floor, and then
suddenly made him appear on the table once more, where he indulged in
the gayest chatter.
“Myself, I was in a state of consternation. I was rendered speechless.
I watched this freak perform his antics and say with a chuckle which
alarmed me:
“‘I have greatly changed I daresay. You must admit, my dear Michel,
that you hardly recognize me. You did quite right to call this evening.
We shall see some sport. We have a few very special friends, and, you
know, apart from them I don’t care to meet any one—merely as a matter
of pride. We don’t even keep a servant. Wait for me here. I must get
into my smoking jacket.’
“He went off, and almost at once the lady of the lamp appeared. She
wore the same low-necked dress of the year before. As soon as her eyes
fell upon me, she seemed strangely perturbed, and said in a strained
voice:
“‘Oh, so you are here! You’ve made a mistake, Captain Michel. I gave
your message to my husband, but I forbade you to call this evening.
I may tell you that when he learnt that you were in this place, he
asked me to invite you this evening, but I did no such thing because,’
she went on, ill at ease, ‘I had good reasons. We have certain very
particular friends who are rather a worry—they are very fond of
noise—uproar. You must have heard them last year,’ she added, giving me
a look out of the corner of her eye. ‘Well, promise me to leave early.’
“‘I promise to leave early, madame,’ I returned, and yet a vague
misgiving took possession of me at this conversation, the meaning of
which I was far from understanding. ‘I promise you faithfully, but can
you tell me how it is that I find my old friend in such a state? What
terrible accident happened to him?’
“‘None at all, monsieur, none.’
“‘What do you mean, “none at all”? Don’t you know anything about the
accident which deprived him of arms and legs? Yet he must have met with
it since your marriage.’
“‘No, monsieur, no. I married the captain as he is now.... But excuse
me, our guests will be here presently, and I must help my husband to
put on his smoking jacket.’
“She left me to myself, dazed by the one stupefying thought: ‘She
married the captain as he is now!’ and almost at once I heard sounds in
the hall, the curious sounds which had accompanied the lady of the lamp
to the garden gate and baffled me last year. This noise was followed
by the appearance, on their wheeled platforms, of four cripples without
arms or legs who stared at me in wonder. They were all attired in
perfectly-fitting evening dress with snow-white shirt fronts.
“One wore gold-rimmed pince-nez, another, an old man, spectacles, the
third a single eyeglass, and the fourth was content to gaze at me out
of his own proud, shrewd eyes with an expression of boredom. All four,
however, saluted me with their little hooks, and asked after Captain
Beauvisage. I told them that he was dressing, and Madame Beauvisage was
quite well. When I took the liberty of speaking of Madame Beauvisage,
I caught an exchange of glances between them which seemed to embody a
certain raillery.
“‘Haw, haw, I presume you are a great friend of our good old captain,’
drawled the cripple with the monocle.
“The others smiled with a look which was by no means pleasant, and then
they all started to talk in the same breath:
“‘Sorry, sorry, monsieur.... We are quite naturally surprised to meet
you at the house of the good old captain, who swore on his wedding day
to shut himself up in the country with his wife, and not to receive any
one—any one but his very special friends, you understand. When one is
so thoroughly a cripple as the captain consented to be, and is married
to such a beautiful woman, it is quite natural—quite natural. But,
after all, if in the course of his life he met a man of honor who does
not happen to be a cripple, we’re glad of it.... We congratulate you.’
“And they repeated: ‘We’re glad of it.... We congratulate you.’
“Lord how odd they were, these dwarfs! I watched them and held my
peace. Others arrived in twos and threes and so on. And they all
contemplated me with a look of surprise or uneasiness or irony. For my
part I was rendered speechless by the spectacle of so many cripples
without arms or legs; for after all I was beginning to see through most
of the extraordinary happenings which had so greatly stirred my mind;
and though the cripples, by their presence, explained many things,
the presence of the cripples still required explanation, as also did
the monstrous union of that splendid woman with that awful shred of
humanity.
“True, I realized now that these little ambulating trunks were bound to
pass unperceived by me in the narrow garden path lined with verbena,
and the road running between two low hedges; and, truth to tell, when
at the time I said to myself that it was impossible to avoid seeing
any person going down those paths, I had in mind persons who would be
standing upright on their two legs.
“The handle of the garden gate itself no longer puzzled me, and in my
mind’s eye I saw the invisible hook which had turned it.
“The peculiar noise which I heard was but the creaking made by the
small badly oiled wheels of these cars for freaks. Finally, the
extraordinary sound like the thunderous beating of a wooden drum, was
obviously caused by the many cars and hooks striking the floor when,
after an excellent dinner, our friends the cripples indulged in a dance.
“Yes, all this was capable of explanation, but I was conscious as I
caught a curious eager gleam in their eyes, and heard the peculiar
sound of their nippers, that something terrible still remained to be
cleared up, and that all else which had surprised me was of no account.
“Meanwhile Madame Beauvisage promptly appeared, accompanied by her
husband. They were greeted with shouts of delight. The little hooks
‘applauded’ them with an infernal din. I was deafened by it. Then I was
introduced. Cripples were all over the place: on the tables, chairs,
stools, on stands usually occupied by vases, on the sideboard. One of
them sat on the shelf of a dresser like a Buddha in his recess. And
each one politely held out his hook to me. They seemed for the most