It was on a Saturday, at six in the morning, that I died after a
three days' illness. My wife was searching a trunk for some linen,
and when she rose and turned she saw me rigid, with open eyes and
silent pulses. She ran to me, fancying that I had fainted, touched
my hands and bent over me. Then she suddenly grew alarmed, burst
into tears and stammered:
"My God, my God! He is dead!"
I heard everything, but the sounds seemed to come from a great
distance. My left eye still detected a faint glimmer, a whitish
light in which all objects melted, but my right eye was quite bereft
of sight. It was the coma of my whole being, as if a thunderbolt
had struck me. My will was annihilated; not a fiber of flesh obeyed
my bidding. And yet amid the impotency of my inert limbs my
thoughts subsisted, sluggish and lazy, still perfectly clear.
My poor Marguerite was crying; she had dropped on her knees beside
the bed, repeating in heart-rending tones:
"He is dead! My God, he is dead!"
Was this strange state of torpor, this immobility of the flesh,
really death, although the functions of the intellect were not
arrested? Was my soul only lingering for a brief space before it
soared away forever? From my childhood upward I had been subject to
hysterical attacks, and twice in early youth I had nearly succumbed
to nervous fevers. By degrees all those who surrounded me had got
accustomed to consider me an invalid and to see me sickly. So much
so that I myself had forbidden my wife to call in a doctor when I
had taken to my bed on the day of our arrival at the cheap
lodginghouse of the Rue Dauphine in Paris. A little rest would soon
set me right again; it was only the fatigue of the journey which had
caused my intolerable weariness. And yet I was conscious of having
felt singularly uneasy. We had left our province somewhat abruptly;
we were very poor and had barely enough money to support ourselves
till I drew my first month's salary in the office where I had
obtained a situation. And now a sudden seizure was carrying me off!
Was it really death? I had pictured to myself a darker night, a
deeper silence. As a little child I had already felt afraid to die.
Being weak and compassionately petted by everyone, I had concluded
that I had not long to live, that I should soon be buried, and the
thought of the cold earth filled me with a dread I could not master--
a dread which haunted me day and night. As I grew older the same
terror pursued me. Sometimes, after long hours spent in reasoning
with myself, I thought that I had conquered my fear. I reflected,
"After all, what does it matter? One dies and all is over. It is
the common fate; nothing could be better or easier."
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I then prided myself on being able to look death boldly in the face,
but suddenly a shiver froze my blood, and my dizzy anguish returned,
as if a giant hand had swung me over a dark abyss. It was some
vision of the earth returning and setting reason at naught. How
often at night did I start up in bed, not knowing what cold breath
had swept over my slumbers but clasping my despairing hands and
moaning, "Must I die?" In those moments an icy horror would stop my
pulses while an appalling vision of dissolution rose before me. It
was with difficulty that I could get to sleep again. Indeed, sleep
alarmed me; it so closely resembled death. If I closed my eyes they
might never open again--I might slumber on forever.
I cannot tell if others have endured the same torture; I only know
that my own life was made a torment by i asleep. You see, I am alive, and I love you."
CHAPTER II
FUNERAL PREPARATIONS
Marguerite's cries had attracted attention, for all at once the door
was opened and a voice exclaimed: "What is the matter, neighbor? Is
he worse?"
I recognized the voice; it was that of an elderly woman, Mme Gabin,
who occupied a room on the same floor. She had been most obliging
since our arrival and had evidently become interested in our
concerns. On her own side she had lost no time in telling us her
history. A stern landlord had sold her furniture during the
previous winter to pay himself his rent, and since then she had
resided at the lodginghouse in the Rue Dauphine with her daughter
Dede, a child of ten. They both cut and pinked lamp shades, and
between them they earned at the utmost only two francs a day.
"Heavens! Is it all over?" cried Mme Gabin, looking at me.
I realt. Death ever rose between
me and all I loved; I can remember how the thought of it poisoned
the happiest moments I spent with Marguerite. During the first
months of our married life, when she lay sleeping by my side and I
dreamed of a fair future for her and with her, the foreboding of
some fatal separation dashed my hopes aside and embittered my
delights. Perhaps we should be parted on the morrow--nay, perhaps
in an hour's time. Then utter discouragement assailed me; I
wondered what the bliss of being united availed me if it were to end
in so cruel a disruption.
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My morbid imagination reveled in scenes of mourning. I speculated
as to who would be the first to depart, Marguerite or I. Either
alternative caused me harrowing grief, and tears rose to my eyes at
the thought of our shattered lives. At the happiest periods of my
existence I often became a prey to grim dejection such as nobody
could understand but which was caused by the thought of impending
nihility. When I was most successful I was to general wonder most
depressed. The fatal question, "What avails it?" rang like a knell
in my ears. But the sharpest sting of this torment was that it came
with a secret sense of shame, which rendered me unable to confide my
thoughts to another. Husband and wife lying side by side in the
darkened room may quiver with the same shudder and yet remain mute,
for people do not mention death any more than they pronounce certain
obscene words. Fear makes it nameless.
I was musing thus while my dear Marguerite knelt sobbing at my feet.
It grieved me sorely to be unable to comfort her by telling her that
I suffered no pain. If death were merely the annihilation of the
flesh it had been foolish of me to harbor so much dread. I
experienced a selfish kind of restfulness in which all my cares were
forgotten. My memory had become extraordinarily vivid. My whole
life passed before me rapidly like a play in which I no longer acted
a part; it was a curious and enjoyable sensation--I seemed to hear a
far-off voice relating my own history.
I saw in particular a certain spot in the country near Guerande, on
the way to Piriac. The road turns sharply, and some scattered pine
trees carelessly dot a rocky slope. When I was seven years old I
used to pass through those pines with my father as far as a
crumbling old house, where Marguerite's parents gave me pancakes.
They were salt gatherers and earned a scanty livelihood by working
the adjacent salt marshes. Then I remembered the school at Nantes,
where I had grown up, leading a monotonous life within its ancient
wallis and yearning for the broad horizon of Guerande and the salt
marshes stretching to the limitless sea widening under the sky.
Next came a blank--my father was dead. I entered the hospital as
clerk to the managing board and led a dreary life with one solitary
diversion: my Sunday visits to the old house on Piriac road. The
saltworks were doing badly; poverty reigned in the land, and
Marguerite's parents were nearly penniless. Marguerite, when merely
a child, had been fond of me because I trundled her about in a
wheelbarrow, but on the morning when I asked her in marriage she
shrank from me with a frightened gesture, and I realized that she
thought me hideous. Her parents, however, consented at once; they
looked upon my offer as a godsend, and the daughter submissively
acquiesced. When she became accustomed to the idea of marrying me
she did not seem to dislike it so much. On our wedding day at
Guerande the rain fell in torrents, and when we got home my bride
had to take off her dress, which was soaked through, and sit in her
petticoats.
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That was all the youth I ever had. We did not remain long in our
province. One day I found my wife in tears. She was miserable;
life was so dull; she wanted to get away. Six months later I had
saved a little money by taking in extra work after office hours, and
through the influence of a friend of my father's I obtained a petty
appointment in Paris. I started off to settle there with the dear
little woman so that she might cry no more. During the night, which
we spent in the third-class railway carriage, the seats being very
hard, I took her in my arms in order that she might sleep.
That was the past, and now I had just died on the narrow couch of a
Paris lodginghouse, and my wife was crouching on the floor, crying
bitterly. The white light before my left eye was growing dim, but I
remembered the room perfectly. On the left there was a chest of
drawers, on the right a mantelpiece surmounted by a damaged clock
without a pendulum, the hands of which marked ten minutes past ten.
The window overlooked the Rue Dauphine, a long, dark street. All
Paris seemed to pass below, and the noise was so great that the
window shook.
We knew nobody in the city; we had hurried our departure, but I was
not expected at the office till the following Monday. Since I had
taken to my bed I had wondered at my imprisonment in this narrow
room into which we had tumbled after a railway journey of fifteen
hours, followed by a hurried, confusing transit through the noisy
streets. My wife had nursed me with smiling tenderness, but I knew
that she was anxious. She would walk to the window, glance out and
return to the bedside, looking very pale and startled by the sight
of the busy thoroughfare, the aspect of the vast city of which she
did not know a single stone and which deafened her with its
continuous roar. What would happen to her if I never woke up again--
alone, friendless and unknowing as she was?
Marguerite had caught hold of one of my hands which lay passive on
the coverlet, and, covering it with kisses, she repeated wildly:
"Olivier, answer me. Oh, my God, he is dead, dead!"
So death was not complete annihilation. I could hear and think. I
had been uselessly alarmed all those years. I had not dropped into
utter vacancy as I had anticipated. I could not picture the
disappearance of my being, the suppression of all that I had been,
without the possibility of renewed existence. I had been wont to
shudder whenever in any book or newspaper I came across a date of a
hundred years hence. A date at which I should no longer be alive, a
future which I should never see, filled me with unspeakable
uneasiness. Was I not the whole world, and would not the universe
crumble away when I was no more?
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To dream of life had been a cherished vision, but this could not
possibly be death. I should assuredly awake presently. Yes, in a
few moments I would lean over, take Marguerite in my arms and dry
her tears. I would rest a little while longer before going to my
office, and then a new life would begin, brighter than the last.
However, I did not feel impatient; the commotion had been too
strong. It was wrong of Marguerite to give way like that when I had
not even the strength to turn my head on the pillow and smile at
her. The next time that she moaned out, "He is dead! Dead!" I
would embrace her and murmer softly so as not to startle her: "No,
my darling, I was onlyzed that she was drawing nearer. She examined me, touched me
and, turning to Marguerite, murmured compassionately: "Poor girl!
Poor girl!"
My wife, wearied out, was sobbing like a child. Mme Gabin lifted
her, placed her in a dilapidated armchair near the fireplace and
proceeded to comfort her.
"Indeed, you'll do yourself harm if you go on like this, my dear.
It's no reason because your husband is gone that you should kill
yourself with weeping. Sure enough, when I lost Gabin I was just
like you. I remained three days without swallowing a morsel of
food. But that didn't help me--on the contrary, it pulled me down.
Come, for the Lord's sake, be sensible!"
By degrees Marguerite grew calmer; she was exhausted, and it was
only at intervals that she gave way to a fresh flow of tears.
Meanwhile the old woman had taken possession of the room with a sort
of rough authority.
"Don't worry yourself," she said as she bustled about. "Neighbors
must help each other. Luckily Dede has just gone to take the work
home. Ah, I see your trunks are not yet all unpacked, but I suppose
there is some linen in the chest of drawers, isn't there?"
I heard her pull a drawer open; she must have taken out a napkin
which she spread on the little table at the bedside. She then
struck a match, which made me think that she was lighting one of the
candles on the mantelpiece and placing it near me as a religious
rite. I could follow her movements in the room and divine all her
actions.
"Poor gentleman," she muttered. "Luckily I heard you sobbing, poor
dear!" Suddenly the vague light which my left eye had detected
vanished. Mme Gabin had just closed my eyelids, but I had not felt
her finger on my face. When I understood this I felt chilled.
The door had opened again, and Dede, the child of ten, now rushed
in, calling out in her shrill voice: "Mother, Mother! Ah, I knew
you would be here! Look here, there's the money--three francs and
four sous. I took back three dozen lamp shades."
"Hush, hush! Hold your tongue," vainly repeated the mother, who, as
the little girl chattered on, must have pointed to the bed, for I
guessed that the child felt perplexed and was backing toward the
door.
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"Is the gentleman asleep?" she whispered.
"Yes, yes--go and play," said Mme Gabin.
But the child did not go. She was, no doubt, staring at me with
widely opened eyes, startled and vaguely comprehending. Suddenly
she seemed convulsed with terror and ran out, upsetting a chair.
"He is dead, Mother; he is dead!" she gasped.
Profound silence followed. Marguerite, lying back in the armchair,
had left off crying. Mme Gabin was still rummaging about the room
and talking under her breath.
"Children know everything nowadays. Look at that girl. Heaven
knows how carefully she's brought up! When I send her on an errand
or take the shades back I calculate the time to a minute so that she
can't loiter about, but for all that she learns everything. She saw
at a glance what had happened here--and yet I never showed her but
one corpse, that of her uncle Francois, and she was then only four
years old. Ah well, there are no children left--it can't be
helped."
She paused and without any transition passed to another subject.
"I say, dearie, we must think of the formalities--there's the
declaration at the municipal offices to be made and the seeing about
the funeral. You are not in a fit state to attend to business.
What do you say if I look in at Monsieur Simoneau's to find out if
he's at home?"
Marguerite did not reply. It seemed to me that I watched her from
afar and at times changed into a subtle flame hovering above the
room, while a stranger lay heavy and unconscious on my bed. I
wished that Marguerite had declined the assistance of Simoneau. I
had seen him three or four times during my brief illness, for he
occupied a room close to ours and had been civil and neighborly.
Mme Gabin had told us that he was merely making a short stay in
Paris, having come to collect some old debts due to his father, who
had settled in the country and recently died. He was a tall,
strong, handsome young man, and I hated him, perhaps on account of
his healthy appearance. On the previous evening he had come in to
make inquiries, and I had much disliked seeing him at Marguerite's
side; she had looked so fair and pretty, and he had gazed so
intently into her face when she smilingly thanked him for his
kindness.
"Ah, here is Monsieur Simoneau," said Mme Gabin, introducing him.
He gently pushed the door ajar, and as soon as Marguerite saw him
enter she burst into a flood of tears. The presence of a friend, of
the only person she knew in Paris besides the old woman, recalled
her bereavement. I could not see the young man, but in the darkness
that encompassed me I conjured up his appearance. I pictured him
distinctly, grave and sad at finding poor Marguerite in such
distress. How lovely she must have looked with her golden hair
unbound, her pale face and her dear little baby hands burning with
fever!
"I am at your disposal, madame," he said softly. "Pray allow me to
manage everything."
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She only answered him with broken words, but as the young man was
leaving, accompanied by Mme Gabin, I heard the latter mention money.
These things were always expensive, she said, and she feared that
the poor little body hadn't a farthing--anyhow, he might ask her.
But Simoneau silenced the old woman; he did not want to have the
widow worried; he was going to the municipal office and to the
undertaker's.
When silence reigned once more I wondered if my nightmare would last
much longer. I was certainly alive, for I was conscious of passing
incidents, and I began to realize my condition. I must have fallen
into one of those cataleptic states that I had read of. As a child
I had suffered from syncopes which had lasted several hours, but
surely my heart would beat anew, my blood circulate and my muscles
relax. Yes, I should wake up and comfort Marguerite, and, reasoning
thus, I tried to be patient.
Time passed. Mme Gabin had brought in some breakfast, but
Marguerite refused to taste any food. Later on the afternoon waned.
Through the open window I heard the rising clamor of the Rue
Dauphine. By and by a slight ringing of the brass candlestick on
the marble-topped table made me think that a fresh candle had been
lighted. At last Simoneau returned.
"Well?" whispered the old woman.
"It is all settled," he answered; "the funeral is ordered for
tomorrow at eleven. There is nothing for you to do, and you needn't
talk of these things before the poor lady."
Nevertheless, Mme Gabin remarked: "The doctor of the dead hasn't
come yet."
Simoneau took a seat beside Marguerite and after a few words of
encouragement remained silent. The funeral was to take place at
eleven! Those words rang in my brain like a passing bell. And the
doctor coming--the doctor of the dead, as Mme Gabin had called him.
HE could not possibly fail to find out that I was only in a state of
lethargy; he would do whatever might be necessary to rouse me, so I
longed for his arrival with feverish anxiety.
The day was drawing to a close. Mme Gabin, anxious to waste no
time, had brought in her lamp shades and summoned Dede without
asking Marguerite's permission. "To tell the truth," she observed,
"I do not like to leave children too long alone."
"Come in, I say," she whispered to the little girl; "come in, and
don't be frightened. Only don't look toward the bed or you'll catch
it."
She thought it decorous to forbid Dede to look at me, but I was
convinced that the child was furtively glancing at the corner where
I lay, for every now and then I heard her mother rap her knuckles
and repeat angrily: "Get on with your work or you shall leave the
room, and the gentleman will come during the night and pull you by
the feet."
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The mother and daughter had sat down at our table. I could plainly
hear the click of their scissors as they clipped the lamp shades,
which no doubt required very delicate manipulation, for they did not
work rapidly. I counted the shades one by one as they were laid
aside, while my anxiety grew more and more intense.
The clicking of the scissors was the only noise in the room, so I
concluded that Marguerite had been overcome by fatigue and was
dozing. Twice Simoneau rose, and the torturing thought flashed
through me that he might be taking advantage of her slumbers to
touch her hair with his lips. I hardly knew the man and yet felt
sure that he loved my wife. At last little Dede began to giggle,
and her laugh exasperated me.
"Why are you sniggering, you idiot?" asked her mother. "Do you want
to be turned out on the landing? Come, out with it; what makes you
laugh so?"
The child stammered: she had not laughed; she had only coughed, but
I felt certain she had seen Simoneau bending over Marguerite and had
felt amused.
The lamp had been lit when a knock was heard at the door.
"It must be the doctor at last," said the old woman.
It was the doctor; he did not apologize for coming so late, for he
had no doubt ascended many flights of stairs during the day. The
room being but imperfectly lighted by the lamp, he inquired: "Is the
body here?"
"Yes, it is," answered Simoneau.
Marguerite had risen, trembling violently. Mme Gabin dismissed
Dede, saying it was useless that a child should be present, and then
she tried to lead my wife to the window, to spare her the sight of
what was about to take place.
The doctor quickly approached the bed. I guessed that he was bored,
tired and impatient. Had he touched my wrist? Had he placed his
hand on my heart? I could not tell, but I fancied that he had only
carelessly bent over me.
"Shall I bring the lamp so that you may see better?" asked Simoneau
obligingly.
"No it is not necessary," quietly answered the doctor.
Not necessary! That man held my life in his hands, and he did not
think it worth while to proceed to a careful examination! I was not
dead! I wanted to cry out that I was not dead!
"At what o'clock did he die?" asked the doctor.
"At six this morning," volunteered Simoneau.
A feeling of frenzy and rebellion rose within me, bound as I was in
seemingly iron chains. Oh, for the power of uttering one word, of
moving a single limb!
"This close weather is unhealthy," resumed the doctor; "nothing is
more trying than these early spring days."
And then he moved away. It was like my life departing. Screams,
sobs and insults were choking me, struggling in my convulsed throat,
in which even my breath was arrested. The wretch! Turned into a
mere machine by professional habits, he only came to a deathbed to
accomplish a perfunctory formality; he knew nothing; his science was
a lie, since he could not at a glance distinguish life from death--
and now he was going--going!
"Good nighought helped to calm me. It had just occurred to me that I
had witnessed a case similar to my own when I was employed at the
hospital of Guerande. A man had been sleeping twenty-eight hours,
the doctors hesitating in presence of his apparent lifelessness,
when suddenly he had sat up in bed and was almost at once able to
rise. I myself had already been asleep for some twenty-five hours;
if I awoke at ten I should still be in time.
I endeavored to ascertain who was in the room and what was going on
there. Dede must have been playing on the landing, for once when
the door opened I heard her shrill childish laughter outside.
Simoneau must have retired, for nothing indicated his presence. Mme
Gabin's slipshod tread was still audible over the floor. At last
she spoke.
"Come, my dear," she said. "It is wrong of you not to take it while
it is hot. It, sir," said Simoneau.
There came a moment's silence; the doctor was probably bowing to
Marguerite, who had turned while Mme Gabin was fastening the window.
He left the room, and I heard his footsteps descending the stairs.
It was all over; I was condemned. My last hope had vanished with
that man. If I did not wake before eleven on the morrow I should be
buried alive. The horror of that thought was so great that I lost
all consciousness of my surroundings--'twas something like a
fainting fit in death. The last sound I heard was the clicking of
the scissors handled by Mme Gabin and Dede. The funeral vigil had
begun; nobody spoke.
Marguerite had refused to retire to rest in the neighbor's room.
She remained reclining in her armchair, with her beautiful face
pale, her eyes closed and her long lashes wet with tears, while
before her in the gloom Simoneau sat silently watching her.
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