The Second Life of Doctor Albin

by Raoul Gineste

  He wondered now whether he might be the victim of a dream. His fascinated eyes could not tear themselves away from doors forever closed, seemingly open wide to oblivion. A strange impression of emptiness had suddenly invaded him, and in the confused spider-web that blurred his vision, the past seemed to retreat and fade away into a prodigious distance.

  He had wanted, before going away, to leave a souvenir to his venerated father, to his adored Jeanne, but now he thought he saw them loom up before him, irritated, to reproach him for the impure promiscuity of the unknown cadaver that he had just placed beside them.

  A vague and dolorous far had taken possession of his entire being; he was in haste to escape that remorse of sorts, when, timidly and slowly, emaciated and poorly dressed, a young woman approached the grille and placed, in the midst of all the sumptuous wreaths, a humble bouquet of violets, and then knelt down to say a brief prayer.

  Jacques Liban went to the pauperess, who stood up, her eyes devoid of tears but full of a soft sadness.

  “Did you know Dr. Albin?” he asked, in a low voice.

  “He cared for me last year in the hospital, Monsieur. He was good to the poor invalids.”

  “And you prayed for him?”

  “I knelt down as a sign of gratitude.”

  “That’s good, Mademoiselle. How are you now?”

  “I live as I can. I’m so often weary!”

  “I was a close friend of Dr. Albin. You action touched me. Take this in memory of him.”

  And Jacques Liban fled at a rapid pace, leaving his last louis in the hands of the bewildered and delighted young woman.

  Chapter IV

  Dead and buried! The man in the blue spectacles sniggered, gripped again by his pride, as he headed for the exit. Free of the old man! But not of the public man, for Dr. Albin’s glory survives, and as it’s at his expense that I have to edify mine, it will be necessary to annihilate him.

  He stopped, and emitted a burst of strident laughter.

  I would never have thought that social sanction had such great force. Have I not already arrived, like everyone else, at believing that Professor Albin is well and truly dead, and that I’m a completely different man, a being really and absolutely different from the other. It is, however, the same brain that is thinking and the same organs that are functioning. Is what has happened to me, from the biological point of view, a change of state analogous to a chemical transformation? Is the metal about to pass to the state of a salt, an acid, a base, or vice versa?

  So much the better, after all, since Destiny is calling me to destroy my first work. Destiny? Vain word; it’s Will that I ought to say.

  He took a diagonal path to shorten his route and suddenly found himself confronted by thirty grave individuals groups around a stele. A man with an inspired expression had detached himself from the group and advanced toward the coffin.

  “Vita in Morte sepulta est,” he proclaimed, in a loud voice. Life is buried in Death!15

  The passer-by was already far away, but the enigmatic text was still buzzing in his ears like a menacing knell.

  He emerged from the necropolis and found himself on the exterior boulevards. Facing him, the terraces of wine merchants and restaurateurs were invaded by a noisy and joyful crowd. Young women were mingled with bands of students, the tables were filled with food and wine. Calls to the waiters, bursts of laughter, emphatic speeches, toasts and the clink of glasses overlapped with the choruses of traditional songs. The Pomponnette succeeded the Chanson de Bicêtre and C’est la reine d’Angleterre-terre-terre-terre and the Esprit-Saint descendez en nous. Gascons, Auvergnats and Bretons confused their accents and rolled their rs in energetic interpellations, hoarse bellows or bacchic challenges. Girls grabbed by the waist fled the brutality of kisses with shrill cries. An “extra,” alarmed by demands or liters intoned to the tune of Lampions and the reproaches of the proprietor, dropped a pile of plates, to the great hilarity of the customers, whose frenetic cheers saluted his clumsiness. An exuberant manifestation of life seemed to want to redeem the few hours consecrated to the cult of death.

  The passers-by paused to smile at that juvenile gaiety, which an April sun caressed with its medial rays. Workers solicited as they went by hastened to come and clink glasses fraternally.

  He felt comforted, then, cheered up, attained by a prodigious desire for movement and noise. He would have liked to mingle with the groups, to rediscover some of the distant impressions of youth, but time was pressing; the banks closed at three o’clock and he was at risk of being found wanting. Carried away by generosity, he had just given his last louis to the grateful pauperess and could not have much left. He opened his purse, searched all his pockets, and found two francs fifty.

  “Just enough to take a cab,” he murmured. I’ll go withdraw my money, and then I’ll eat at the first place I come to—I’m dying of hunger. Then I’ll take a room at the Grand and send the bellboy to fetch my trunk from the Gare de Lyon. Let’s take care of the most urgent matter first.

  He hailed a coachman and had himself taken to the Crédit International in the Rue Saint-Lazare. It was the day of a share-issue; the hall of the vast financial establishment was overflowing with people and long queues had formed at the windows. In any other circumstances he would have postponed the operation until the following day, but hunger was clawing at him, and he no longer had a sou, or very nearly. He joined the line of people withdrawing their deposits in order to buy the new shares, and his turn finally arrived.

  The employee who received his entitlement, seeing that he was faced with a special case, made a characteristic grimace and asked him to come back tomorrow. The depositor had to protest energetically. The sum was payable on demand; he had only deposited it after a preliminary agreement and on that condition. The bank was open and he needed his money immediately; he demanded that it be given to him.

  The subaltern referred the matter to his superior, who deemed the demand well-founded, obtained a few signatures, carefully verified the entitlement and sent an order to the safe.

  Jacques Liban, momentarily anxious, uttered a sigh of satisfaction. He sat down in a corner and rapidly counted his bills. The fifty wads of ten thousand francs formed a voluminous package, which he could not think of putting in the summary pockets of his coat. He asked a passing office-boy whether he could obtain an old newspaper.

  “Permit me to offer you a copy of the Times,” said a stranger with a strong English accent.

  “Many thanks,” replied Jacques Liban, bowing. “That’s a great help.”

  The ranger had unfolded the immense sheet on a corner of the table. “There’s enough there to wrap two million,” he exclaimed, on seeing the awkwardness of its recipient—and with a rapid movement he made a perfect roll, which he hastened to hand to its possessor.

  “That’s how we do it in London,” he said, bowing.

  After thanking him again, Jacques Liban was heading for the stairway to the exit when the obliging person ran after him.

  “A thousand pardons, Monsieur,” he said, “Would you be kind enough to return half of the paper that I gave you. Here’s my friend Sir William Reynolds, who has just withdraw six hundred and fifty thousand francs, and is in the same situation as you.”

  A respectable gentleman displayed his pockets, stuffed with blue wads.

  It would have been difficult to refuse the reciprocity of the service that had just been rendered to him. The three of them retraced their steps and sat down at an empty table at the back of the hall, where Jacques Liban opened his roll, detached a double page of the great English newspaper and held it out to its former owner. The latter rapidly wrapped up the wads that his friend passed to him, and had quickly made up his parcel.

  “No, not like that,” he said, laughing jovially at the slowness with which Jacques Liban was reconstituting his own. “You haven’t profited from my lesson.”

  He took the package from his hands again, finished it with a marvelous dexterity, returned i
t to him, then uttered a cordial “Good morning,” and disappeared.

  Jacques Liban, who had not eaten since the day before, was in haste to appease his hunger. Fortunately, he was in the vicinity of the Gare Saint-Lazare, where restaurants abound. He went out without losing a moment, but stopped at a kiosk to buy newspapers with the last sous remaining to him, and went into the Café Mansard, on whose windows he saw written: Lunches, dinners and suppers, all day service.

  “Waiter,” he said, on going in, “serve me something to eat quickly; I’m in a hurry.”

  The waiter looked at the clock. “It’s after four,” he said. “We don’t have anything left at this hour but cold meat. Would you like a slice of roast beef while we prepare your order?”

  “Anything you like, but be quick, and order a Chateaubriand with apples.”

  The manager, a thin man with harsh angular features and a narrow forehead surmounted by thick hair, with hooded and avid eyes, who was leaping from table to table with a napkin over his arm, had come to ask what the customer wanted.

  He repeated the order and was assured that it would be immediately satisfied.

  “We don’t have any roast beef left,” the waiter returned to announce. “Would you like ham instead?”

  “Whatever you like,” he relied, discontentedly. “How many times do I have to tell you?”

  He took off his blue-tinted spectacles, which were annoying him, and devoured the ham, for which he did not have to wait very long.

  The service was despairingly slow. He had finished his hors-d’oeuvres a long time ago, and did not see anything coming. He had questioned with his head and gaze, but the indolent waiter made him hand signals bidding him not to be impatient. He looked around. The vast room was full of noise and movement. At every moment, travelers were coming in, their meager luggage in their hand, obtaining a hasty snack, asking for the bill or scanning a newspaper, and leaving immediately.

  The lady cashier, with a vague smile tamped on her lips, on the lookout for the slightest incident of service, awoke the attention of the waiters with the aid of a shrill hand-bell. The latter, accustomed to the haste of customers who were afraid of missing their train, seemed to take a malign pleasure in proceeding with the perfect tranquility of people prepared to carry out their tasks but having to intention of putting overmuch zeal into them.

  It was nearly five o’clock and the famished diner as beginning to get seriously impatient. Perhaps the manager had forgotten the order or the waiter, with his mocking expression, was venting a little ill-will. He made the observation several times, and the cashier’s irritated ringing and the manager’s reminders ended up causing an altercation.

  “I can’t bring a dish that isn’t cooked,” cried the reprimanded waiter. “Complain to the boss.”

  The manager made his excuses. The morning dishes had run out, the evening ones were only just starting to cook. It was necessary to give the chef time to carry out an order transmitted to him—and then, to be truthful, it was rarely necessary to serve a dinner at such an hour.

  “Why put all day service in your window then?” muttered the demanding diner.

  “I don’t refuse service, but it’s necessary to give us the necessary time.”

  The fillet so much desired cut short the explanations. The diner, profiting from experience, had ordered two more dishes, and set about satisfying his hunger. The manager and the waiter observed him from a distance, whispering.

  “It’s always the bad customers who make the most fuss,” muttered the waiter. “And this is another one who doesn’t look like much to me: a bookmaker or a pickpocket. He looks like the old man a week ago who had your dinner and ours and took you for a mug. You didn’t want to send for the police, and now he’s sending you his friends, damn it!”

  “Let’s not make assumptions,” replied the manager, aggravated by the unpleasant memory.

  “Look at him, then,” said the waiter, “with his English suit, his red kerchief and his dirty overcoat, not to mention the blue glasses that he had on when he came in.”

  “Oh! He had blue spectacles?”

  “Of course, that’s part of the get-up, the blue glasses. But you can see how he’s guzzling—one would think he hadn’t eaten for a week. I’ll bet you a pernod he’s a crook.”

  “Agreed,” said the manager. “If I lose, of course, I promise you that I won’t let this one off.”

  Jacques Liban had vaguely perceived, several times, that the manager and the waiter were looking at him in a singular fashion, but he had put that affectation down to his anterior protests, and had not attached any importance to it in any case. Having finished his meal he ordered a coffee, a small glass of Chartreuse and an excellent cigar, and then started reading the newspapers, which were singing the praises of Dr. Albin endlessly. Then, perceiving that it was almost six o’clock, he decided to go and book a room, deposit his cash in the safe at the Grand, and go to the theater.

  He asked for the bill and, knowing that he had to more money, opened his parcel in order to take out a banknote.

  A cold sweat immediately formed on his brow. The first note he detached was play-money. Seized by a feverish agitation, he examined the others rapidly; they were all the same. A cloud passed before his eyes and he nearly fell over. There was no doubt about it; the obliging stranger who had offered him the Times was an audacious pickpocket who had substituted this derisory parcel for his own.

  How had he allowed himself to fall into that crude trap? Where was his intelligence? His first impulse as to run after the thieves; he stood up abruptly, but fell back on to the bench immediately. It was more than two hours since the thieves had pulled their trick.

  The waiter had arrived with the bill on a plate, and presented it to him. He contemplated it, dazedly, and mumbled a few incoherent words. The manager, on the lookout, hastened to appear.

  “Robbed—I’ve been robbed,” murmured the customer, pale and distressed.

  “I know that one,” the employee replied, in a mocking tone. “Would you please settle your bill: it’s seventeen francs.”

  “I’ve just been robbed,” repeated the unfortunate, lamentably.

  “That’s nothing to do with me,” replied the manager, harshly. “Don’t play games: pay me.”

  The customers watched the scene incredulously. The exotic appearance of the insolvent did not inspire confidence. The man had stood up and was rummaging through his pockets with a tragic despair that made them laugh.

  He fell back, as if stunned. “Nothing,” he murmured. “Nothing.” He revived. “Would you like my coat and hat?” he said, in a strangled voice.

  “You’re joking! Your dirty dust-coat and your hat! They’re not worth three francs, and this isn’t the Temple square.”

  He made a gesture of deliverance and took out his luggage-ticket. “This will redeem a trunk full of linen, and you’ll be fully compensated.”

  “This is simpler. I’ll have you accompanied by two waiters—you can pay for the cab, of course—you can get the trunk and settle the bill.”

  The man made a gesture of negation. “I can’t pay for the cab and there’s nothing in my trunk but linen.”

  “Once again, I’m not a second-hand clothes merchant, and you’re going to explain yourself at the police station.”

  “The police station!” exclaimed the unfortunate, recovering a little energy. “You can’t think so! The police, for such a trivial sum. I swear to you that you won’t lose anything. I’ll go and get my trunk, sell the contents myself, and come back to pay you.”

  “Tell it to someone else, old man. One last time, are you going to pay me or not? I don’t have time to argue.”

  The fake American, devastated, stood there open-mouthed.

  “Émile,” said the manager. “Fetch the police, and go with the monsieur.”

  Chapter V

  The police, always numerous in the neighborhood of the Gare Saint-Lazare, did not keep them waiting long. Jacques Liban, whom the
terrible misadventure seemed to have plunged him into a stupor, followed them mechanically and found himself facing the Commissaire without having had time to make the slightest reflection.

  The latter had just put on his overcoat and was preparing to leave. He sat down again, cursing, and listened to the explanations of the waiter from the café like a man weary of that kind of misdemeanor.

  “You refuse to pay?” he demanded. “What do you have to say?”

  The customer emerged from his torpor.

  “The man is twisting the facts. I’m not refusing to pay, but I can’t do it at present. I was robbed in a financial establishment about three hours ago, and I only perceived just now that I couldn’t pay.”

  “What proof is there that you were robbed?” the waiter advanced. “I think you’re using that excuse to avoid settling the bill.”

  “Wretch!” replied the accused, incapable of controlling himself.

  “No insults, please,” said the Commissaire. “You haven’t been robbed of everything at a stroke, I assume?”

  “I beg your pardon, Monsieur, but they took everything I possessed.”

  “And you possessed?”

  “Five hundred thousand—or, more exactly, 499,500—francs in banknotes, rolled up in newspaper.

  “Damn!” exclaimed the honorable magistrate, who could not help laughing. “You had a sum like that wrapped up in newspaper and you don’t have a louis in your pocket!”

  “Alas, no.”

  “Well, at least it’s extraordinary. What proof do you have that you’re telling the truth?”

  “The Crédit International just paid out that sum to me. Send an agent.”

  “The banks aren’t open at this hour. But you must have money at home, or objects that can present a sufficient guarantee.”

  “I only have a trunk at the Gare de Lyon. It contains linen and toiletries.”

  “The boss doesn’t accept linen in payment,” declared the waiter.