The new terror
It was as though nothing out of the way had happened. When she came
downstairs clad in a gossamer robe, and clung to my arm with a
grace and trustfulness which enchanted me, old Surdon and Mathilde
complimented her on her appearance, and conveyed to me by certain signs
that all was as well as well could be.
Surdon wanted to saddle Thunder and Monarch, or to get out the gig so
that we might go for a long drive before lunch, but Cordélia would
not hear of it. She expressed a wish to stroll through the fields, to
wander on my arm along the country lanes.
“We don’t want to ride or drive to-day,” she said, leading me away and
gently pressing my hand. “We don’t need anything or anybody. Let us
think only of ourselves. I have so many things to say to you now that I
am your wife.”
These last words were spoken in a serious and intense voice which I
failed to recognize; and I could not help giving a start when I looked
at her.
As she uttered them, she lifted her eyes to me and they seemed to
contain an expression which, like her voice, was new to me. I read
in them, beyond the shadow of a doubt, an emotional tenderness and
gratitude which startled me without my knowing exactly why. At all
events, I could not at the moment analyze what was passing within me.
But one thing was certain: I felt distinctly uneasy. I fully expected,
indeed, to see a look in my dear Cordélia’s eyes like that one day; to
see this impulse, this quivering emotion of thankfulness towards the
man who had become everything to her, but I did not expect to see that
look after the dreadful time through which we had just passed.
In a word, I was unspeakably surprised. Our walk, our conversation at
lunch, the sweet surrender with which, leaning upon my shoulder, she
confided to me her plans for the future—all this did nothing to remove
from my mind the curious impression that I was confronted with a new
Cordélia who was no longer the young girl of the day before. I turned
pale at the thought of it.
She noticed it and in her turn betrayed a certain anxiety at my
agitation.
“But dearest what is the matter? Are you not feeling well? You don’t
say anything.”
I kissed her hair and whispered tritely:
“I love you.”
My heart was pounding as though it would burst. She could hear it.
“I really believe that you do love me,” she said, “and, besides, your
heart tells me so. Listen to my heart which will tell you, too, how it
loves you.”
She took my head between her two little hands, and placed it on her
young, heaving bosom with the quiet gesture of a woman who is giving
herself up to the husband to whom she belongs.
I was speechless.
She went on as she stroked my hair:
“What a night! What a beautiful night! Oh how well you understand me!
You are wonderful, my Hector.”
I am unable to say whether I really seemed wonderful to her, but I drew
myself up roughly. My face underwent a fierce contortion. She looked at
me with disquiet.
“What is it? What’s the matter?”
“Nothing.... Nothing. It’s over—a slight attack of neuralgia.”
“Ah my love, you are tired. You had no sleep.”
“Yes, you’re right. I had no sleep.”
“You ought to have gone to bed. I told you so when we came back from
our walk in the park.”
“Ah yes.... Our walk in the park.... Of course, of course.”
“But what is the matter with you?”
“Nothing I tell you.... A slight headache.”
“Well, be sensible. You must go to bed, dearest.”
I had to give way. She came with me to the door of my room. I let
myself be led by her little hands. Strange to say I made no effort to
keep her. She left the room, and I threw myself on the bed as an animal
lies down. And soon, in order to cease thinking about things which
seemed either appalling or ridiculous, I fell asleep.
The light was waning when I woke up feeling greatly refreshed. I have
always been able to sleep soundly. A shower bath helped to restore my
self-possession. My uncle had returned during my nap. He had come from
Caen, and was leaving that same evening for Paris. I discovered from
his first words that he knew nothing of the incidents of the previous
night. Surdon and Mathilde, perceiving that “all was well as well could
be,” had not considered it necessary to enlighten him. I could not but
approve of their discretion.
My uncle had been for a short walk with Cordélia, and when she
returned her face was beaming with happiness.
“Have you had a good sleep, dearest?” she asked as she threw herself
into my arms. “Has that awful headache gone?”
I kissed her ardently in return.
My uncle wore a smile as he contemplated the pleasant spectacle. He
endeavored to take me aside to express his gratification.
“Well, what did I say? There you are, the happiest of men and she is
the happiest of women. She told me so. I congratulate you—you rascal!”
I could have struck him. I could have struck him. He gave me no
opportunity. He embraced us and went off muttering repeatedly:
“What a handsome couple they make!”
CHAPTER X
THE SECOND NIGHT
I have taken particular care to trace in detail the various stages
of this extraordinary story in order that the reader who would fain
judge us, notwithstanding the jury’s verdict, may know as much about
the facts as I do, and be in a position to fix the responsibility
definitely as between me and the man who was the greatest thief
that ever lived. If the reader will follow me step by step he will
understand me, and it will be open to any candid person of average
intelligence to measure the extent of the calamity which befell me.
I now come to the second night, which will throw a light upon the
events which occurred at Vascoeuil and those which were to follow;
a light which others may regard as supernatural, but which I am
compelled, unfortunately, to proclaim as entirely natural after what I
know and saw with my own eyes.
At least that is what I maintain to-day, but considering that I was
sailing on an unknown sea, it will be realized how far I had to go
before I recognized the truth.
Cordélia wished to wind up the day, as on the previous evening, by a
little homely supper in her boudoir, and, to be sure, I should have
been the last person to think of raising any objection. Anything that
could bring me closer to her gave me the constantly renewed hope that I
might succeed in driving away, once for all, the delusions which kept
us apart. I use the word delusions advisedly, because that is how I
regarded the matter on that second evening when I sat down beside her
at dinner.
And how could it have been otherwise? How could I fail to cling to
this word when I take into consideration the abyss over which my
poor distracted mind hung suspended for a moment in the course of
this startling day. Just think. Remember the altogether unforeseen
attitude of a Cordélia filled with gratitude and affection. Delusions!
Delusions! I appealed to you, O delusions, in defense of her, and, as
the lesser of my enemies, to her unhealthy imagination, at once ardent
and poetic—for the whole thing was but the aberration of a highly
sensitive mind. I tried to convince myself of it.
And thus I no longer wished to remember anything but Dr. Thurel’s
reassuring words: “I have rid her mind of any thought of the other
person. She is cured.”
Upon my word, when I think of her as I beheld her on that second
evening seated at our little domestic fête, helping me as though I were
a spoiled child, anticipating my every wish, stirring the fire lest I
should catch cold, assuming the superior and tyrannical graces of a
nurse which caused us to burst out laughing, I cannot but cry: “There
she was as God made her, and as He gave her to me—my dear, dear, dear
Cordélia!”
Before she met the thief, she was sweet and fresh and girlish and
perfectly natural, slightly inclined to be mischievous and self-willed,
but born to make a husband happy who would have made her happy. And,
take it from me, it is not necessary to be clever or brilliant to make
a woman happy. It is a question of being an ordinarily decent man; at
least I still think so, and I have yet to meet the person who can prove
the contrary. I know what I mean. One must also be in love with her.
Who ever loved her more than I did? And did she love any one more than
she loved me? Did she love the thief? Lord above, let those persons who
know everything tell me if the dove which is transfixed in its flight
loves the hawk whom it encounters on its way from the nest....
But let us return to our little supper.
I forget on what subject Cordélia was good-humoredly making fun of me.
I have always possessed an equable temper. I can allow myself to be
teased without taking offense, just as a pet dog will permit his ears
to be pulled by those to whom he is attached. Thus Cordélia could throw
herself into the game to her heart’s content.
But suddenly I sprang to my feet with a look of ferocity on my face,
a very excellent look of ferocity, and walked up to her, grinding
my teeth, as if I had sworn to gobble her up alive. She started to
run round the table, laughing boisterously. I for my part, while I
continued to give chase, strove to keep my countenance and to assume a
more ferocious air than ever. At length she pretended to be frightened
as I was pretending to be in a rage; and when I mention that in our
race round the room the light wrap which she wore rose higher, caught
on to a piece of furniture and even became torn, revealing a glimpse of
some new loveliness, it will be gathered that the game had become an
extremely attractive one; so much so that I thought the best thing I
could do was to finish it by capturing the fugitive and holding her in
my arms.
She had taken refuge in a recess of the window, and it was there that I
dived after her. I caught her, but straightway I was impressed by the
fact that she had stopped laughing. I lowered my eyes to her face, but
it was no longer the face of a young girl. She gazed at me with a look
of grave distress yet, I must say, full of love. I felt her young heart
beat against mine. I held her closer, calling her the most endearing
names.
“Oh dearest,” she breathed. “Have you seen the park? Look at the park.
How beautiful it is!”
She was not now looking at me. Her eyes were turned to the park
which gleamed ghost-like in the moonlight. The night was a dream of
brightness and opalescent light. The tall trees whose leaves had
already fallen, stood erect like huge silver chandeliers, their
wondrous shadows lengthened, as though by the brush of an artist, on
the luminous grassy slopes and gravel paths. In the distance the unseen
mystery of the park into which I had never set foot, stirred under the
motionless, effulgent, impassive moon.
I tried to turn Cordélia’s eyes away from the ill-omened sight, and
bring her back to our own interests. She thrust me aside with her
little hands and returned to the window, pressing her forehead against
the pane. I may be asked: “Why did you not compel her to leave the
window and the perilous spectacle of the park in the moonlight?” Let
those who are unable to understand that more power sometimes lies in a
young girl’s little finger than in an elephant’s foot, cease to read
me!
This is the answer that I have to make:
Men of science, or those who call themselves men of science, have
not yet, perhaps, given a name to this “psychic” force, but if they
were to take the trouble to study and weigh its power mathematically,
and dignify it with a Latin or Greek name, there would be less
astonishment, perhaps, that the aura of a marriageable girl yielded
to the suggestion of a sham-necromancer than to realize that a
mass of flesh and blood weighing about thirteen stone, for that is