The Wandering Jew — Complete
covered with yellow velvet; the floor was carefully polished, and
a globe lamp, which gave at most a third of its proper light, was
suspended (at a much greater height than usual) from the ceiling.
Finding the appearance of this habitation singularly plain for the
dwelling of a minister, Adrienne, though she had no suspicion, could not
suppress a movement of surprise and paused a moment on the threshold of
the door. M. Baleinier, by whose arm she held, guessed the cause of her
astonishment, and said to her with a smile:
"This place appears to you very paltry for 'his excellency,' does it
not? If you knew what a thing constitutional economy is!--Moreover,
you will see a 'my lord,' who has almost as little pretension as his
furniture. But please to wait for me an instant. I will go and inform
the minister you are here, and return immediately."
Gently disengaging himself from the grasp of Adrienne, who had
involuntarily pressed close to him, the physician opened a small side
door, by which he instantly disappeared. Adrienne de Cardoville was left
alone.
Though she could not have explained the cause of her impression, there
was something awe-inspiring to the young lady in this large, cold,
naked, curtainless room; and as, by degrees, she noticed certain
peculiarities in the furniture, which she had not at first perceived,
she was seized with an indefinable feeling of uneasiness.
Approaching the cheerless hearth, she perceived with surprise that an
iron grating completely enclosed the opening of the chimney, and that
the tongs and shovel were fastened with iron chains. Already astonished
by this singularity, she was about mechanically to draw towards her
an armchair placed against the wall, when she found that it remained
motionless. She then discovered that the back of this piece of
furniture, as well as that of all the other chairs, was fastened to the
wainscoting by iron clamps. Unable to repress a smile, she exclaimed:
"Have they so little confidence in the statesman in whose house I am,
that they are obliged to fasten the furniture to the walls?"
Adrienne had recourse to this somewhat forced pleasantry as a kind of
effort to resist the painful feeling of apprehension that was gradually
creeping over her; for the most profound and mournful silence reigned in
this habitation, where nothing indicated the life, the movement and the
activity, which usually surround a great centre of business. Only,
from time to time, the young lady heard the violent gusts of wind from
without.
More than a quarter of an hour had elapsed, and M. Baleinier did not
return. In her impatient anxiety, Adrienne wished to call some one to
inquire about the doctor and the minister. She raised her eyes to look
for a bell-rope by the side of the chimney-glass; she found none, but
she perceived, that what she had hitherto taken for a glass, thanks to
the half obscurity of the room, was in reality a large sheet of
shining tin. Drawing nearer to it, she accidentally touched a bronzed
candlestick; and this, as well as a clock, was fixed to the marble of
the chimney-piece.
In certain dispositions of mind, the most insignificant circumstances
often assume terrific proportions. This immovable candlestick, this
furniture fastened to the wainscot, this glass replaced by a tin sheet,
this profound silence, and the prolonged absence of M. Baleinier, had
such an effect upon Adrienne, that she was struck with a vague terror.
Yet such was her implicit confidence in the doctor, that she reproached
herself with her own fears, persuading herself that the causes of them
were after all of no real importance, and that it was unreasonable to
feel uneasy at such trifles.
Still, though she thus strove to regain courage, her anxiety induced her
to do what otherwise she would never have attempted. She approached the
little door by which the doctor had disappeared, and applied her ear to
it. She held her breath, and listened, but heard nothing.
Suddenly, a dull, heavy sound, like that of a falling body, was audible
just above her head; she thought she could even distinguish a stifled
moaning. Raising her eyes, hastily, she saw some particles of the
plaster fall from the ceiling, loosened, no doubt, by the shaking of the
floor above.
No longer able to resist the feeling of terror, Adrienne ran to the door
by which she had entered with the doctor, in order to call some one. To
her great surprise, she found it was fastened on the outside. Yet, since
her arrival, she had heard no sound of a key turning in the lock.
More and more alarmed, the young girl flew to the little door by which
the physician had disappeared, and at which she had just been listening.
This door also was fastened on the outside.
Still, wishing to struggle with the terror which was gaining invincibly
upon her, Adrienne called to her aid all the firmness of her character,
and tried to argue away her fears.
"I must have been deceived." she said; "it was only a fall that I heard.
The moaning had no existence, except in my imagination. There are a
thousand reasons for believing that it was not a person who fell down.
But, then, these locked doors? They, perhaps, do not know that I am
here; they may have thought that there was nobody in this room."
As she uttered these words, Adrienne looked round with anxiety; then
she added, in a firm voice: "No weakness! it is useless to try to blind
myself to my real situation. On the contrary, I must look it well in the
face. It is evident that I am not here at a minister's house; no end of
reasons prove it beyond a doubt; M. Baleinier has therefore deceived me.
But for what end? Why has he brought me hither? Where am I?"
The last two questions appeared to Adrienne both equally insoluble. It
only remained clear, that she was the victim of M. Baleinier's perfidy.
But this certainly seemed so horrible to the young girl's truthful
and generous soul, that she still tried to combat the idea by the
recollection of the confiding friendship which she had always shown this
man. She said to herself with bitterness: "See how weakness and fear
may lead one to unjust and odious suspicions! Yes; for until the
last extremity, it is not justifiable to believe in so infernal a
deception--and then only upon the clearest evidence. I will call some
one: it is the only way of completely satisfying these doubts." Then,
remembering that there was no bell, she added: "No matter; I will knock,
and some one will doubtless answer." With her little, delicate hand,
Adrienne struck the door several times.
The dull, heavy sound which came from the door showed that it was very
thick. No answer was returned to the young girl. She ran to the other
door. There was the same appeal on her part, the same profound silence
without--only interrupted from time to time by the howling of the wind.
"I am not more timid than other people," said Adrienne, shuddering;
"I do not know if it is the excessive cold, but I tremble in spite of
myself. I endeavor to guard against all weakness; yet I think that any
one in my position would find all this very strange and frightful."
At this instant, loud cries, or rather savage and dreadful howls, burst
furiously from the room just above, and soon after a sort of stamping
of feet, like the noise of a violent struggle, shook the ceiling of the
apartment. Struck with consternation, Adrienne uttered a loud cry of
terror became deadly pale, stood for a moment motionless with affright,
and then rushed to one of the windows, and abruptly threw it open.
A violent gust of wind, mixed with melted snow, beat against Adrienne's
face, swept roughly into the room, and soon extinguished the flickering
and smoky light of the lamp. Thus, plunged in profound darkness, with
her hands clinging to the bars that were placed across the window,
Mdlle. de Cardoville yielded at length to the full influence of her
fears, so long restrained, and was about to call aloud for help, when an
unexpected apparition rendered her for some minutes absolutely mute with
terror.
Another wing of the building, opposite to that in which she was, stood
at no great distance. Through the midst of the black darkness, which
filled the space between, one large, lighted window was distinctly
visible. Through the curtainless panes, Adrienne perceived a white
figure, gaunt and ghastly, dragging after it a sort of shroud, and
passing and repassing continually before the window, with an abrupt and
restless motion. Her eyes fixed upon this window, shining through the
darkness, Adrienne remained as if fascinated by that fatal vision: and,
as the spectacle filled up the measure of her fears, she called for help
with all her might, without quitting the bars of the window to which
she clung. After a few seconds, whilst she was thus crying out, two tall
women entered the room in silence, unperceived by Mdlle. de Cardoville,
who was still clinging to the window.
These women, of about forty to fifty years of age, robust and masculine,
were negligently and shabbily dressed, like chambermaids of the lower
sort; over their clothes they wore large aprons of blue cotton, cut
sloping from their necks, and reaching down to their feet. One of them,
who held a lamp in her hand, had a broad, red, shining face, a large
pimpled nose, small green eyes, and tow hair, which straggled rough and
shaggy from beneath her dirty white cap. The other, sallow, withered,
and bony, wore a mourning-cap over a parchment visage, pitted with
the small-pox, and rendered still more repulsive by the thick black
eyebrows, and some long gray hairs that overshadowed the upper lip. This
woman carried, half unfolded in her hand, a garment of strange form,
made of thick gray stuff.
They both entered silently by the little door, at the moment when
Adrienne, in the excess of her terror, was grasping the bars of the
window, and crying out: "Help! help!"
Pointing out the young lady to each other, one of them went to place the
lamp on the chimney-piece, whilst the other (she who wore the mourning
cap) approached the window, and laid her great bony hand upon Mdlle. de
Cardoville's shoulder.
Turning round, Adrienne uttered a new cry of terror at the sight of this
grim figure. Then, the first moment of stupor over, she began to feel
less afraid; hideous as was this woman, it was at least some one to
speak to; she exclaimed, therefore, in an agitated voice: "Where is M.
Baleinier?"
The two women looked at each other, exchanged a leer of mutual
intelligence, but did not answer.
"I ask you, madame," resumed Adrienne, "where is M. Baleinier, who
brought me hither? I wish to see him instantly."
"He is gone," said the big woman.
"Gone!" cried Adrienne; "gone without me!--Gracious heaven! what can
be the meaning of all this?" Then, after a moment's reflection, she
resumed, "Please to fetch me a coach."
The two women looked at each other, and shrugged their shoulders. "I
entreat you, madame," continued Adrienne, with forced calmness in her
voice, "to fetch me a coach since M. Baleinier is gone without me. I
wish to leave this place."
"Come, come, madame," said the tall woman, who was called "Tomboy,"
without appearing to listen to what Adrienne asked, "it is time for you
to go to bed."
"To go to bed!" cried Mdlle. Cardoville, in alarm. "This is really
enough to drive one mad." Then, addressing the two women, she added:
"What is this house? where am I? answer!"
"You are in a house," said Tomboy, in a rough voice, "where you must not
make a row from the window, as you did just now."
"And where you must not put out the lamp as you have done," added the
other woman, who was called Gervaise, "or else we shall have a crow to
pick with you."
Adrienne, unable to utter a word, and trembling with fear, looked in a