by Eugène Sue
These words, uttered with animation, as if the creole was addressing an unseen lover, were rendered by her the theme of a delicious melody; her charming fingers produced from the guitar, an instrument of no great power, vibrations full of harmony. The impassioned look of Cecily, her half closed, humid eyes fastened on Jacques Ferrand, were full of the expression of expectation. Words of love, delicious music, together conspired at the moment to bereave Jacques Ferrand of his reason; and, half frenzied, he exclaimed:
“Mercy, Cecily, mercy! You will drive me distracted! Oh, be silent, or I die! Oh, that I were mad!”
“Listen to the second couplet, master,” said the creole, again touching the chords; and she thus continued her impassioned recitative:
“If my lover were here, and his hand touched my bare shoulder, I should tremble and die. If he were here, and his curly hair touched my cheek, my pale cheek would become purple — my pale cheek would be on fire. Soul of my Soul, if thou wert here, my parched lips would not utter a word. Life of my Life, if thou wert here, I should expiring ask thy pardon. ’Tis sweet to die for and with those we love. Angel, come — come to my heart — come — come — come!”
If the creole had rendered the first strophe with languid pleasure, she put in her last words all the enthusiasm of antique love; and as if the music had been powerless to express her intense passion, she threw her guitar from her, and, half rising and extending her arms towards the door, where Jacques Ferrand stood, she repeated, in a faltering, dying tone, “Oh, come — come — come!” It would be impossible to depict the electric look with which she accompanied these words. Jacques Ferrand uttered a terrible cry.
“Oh, death! Death to him whom you could thus love!” he cried, shaking the door in a burst of jealousy and furious rage.
Agile as a panther, Cecily was at the door with one bound; and, as if she with difficulty repressed her feigned transports, she said to Jacques Ferrand, in a low, concentrated, palpitating voice:
“Well, then, I will confess I am excited by my song. I did not mean to approach the door again, yet here I am, in spite of myself; for I hear still the words you said just now, ‘If you bade me strike, I would strike.’ You love me, then?”
“Will you have gold, — all my gold?”
“No, I have enough.”
“Have you an enemy? I will kill him.”
“I have no enemy.”
“Will you be my wife? I’ll marry you.”
“I am married.”
“What would you, then? Oh, what would you?”
“Prove to me that your passion for me is blind, — furious! And that you would sacrifice all to it.”
“Ah! — yes — all. But how?”
“I do not know, — but a moment since your eyes fascinated me. If again you give me one of those marks of intense love, which excite the imagination of a woman to madness, I know not of what I should not be capable. Make haste, then, for I am capricious, and to-morrow, perhaps, all the impression will be effaced.”
“But what proof can I give you at this moment?” cried the notary.
“You are but a fool, after all!” replied Cecily, retreating from the aperture with an air of disdain. “I was deceived, — I believed you capable of energetic devotion. Goodnight! It’s a pity!”
“Cecily, do not leave me! Return! What can I do?”
“I was but too much disposed to listen to you; you will never have such another opportunity.”
“But oh, tell me what you would have!” cried the notary, half mad.
“Eh! If you were as passionately in love as you say, you would find means to persuade me. Good night!”
“Cecily.”
“I will shut the door, instead of opening it.”
“Cecily, — listen! I will give you yet another proof of my devotion.”
“What is this proof of your love?” said the creole, who, having approached the mantelpiece to resume her dagger, returned slowly towards the door, lighted by the flame of the hearth. Then, unobserved by the notary, she made sure of the action of an iron chain, which terminated in two small knobs, one of which was screwed into the door, and the other into the door-post.
“Listen!” said Jacques Ferrand, in a hoarse and broken voice, “listen! If I place my honour, my fortune, my life, at your mercy, — now, this very instant, — will you then believe I love you?”
“Your honour, your fortune, your life! I do not comprehend you.”
“If I confide to you a secret which may bring me to the scaffold, will you then believe me?”
“You a criminal? You do but jest. What, then, of your austere life, — your piety, — your honesty?”
“All — all a lie!”
“You pass for a saint, and yet you boast of these iniquities! No, there is no man so craftily skilful, so fortunately bold, as thus to captivate the confidence and respect of men; that were, indeed, a fearful defiance cast in the teeth of society!”
“I am that man, — I have cast that sarcasm, that defiance, in the face of society!” exclaimed the monster, in a tone of ecstatic pride.
“Jacques! Jacques! Do not speak thus!” said Cecily, with a tone of emotion. “You make me mad!”
“My head for your love, — will you have it so?”
“Ah, this, indeed, is love! Here, take my poniard, — you disarm me!”
Jacques Ferrand took, through the wicket, the dangerous weapon, with due precaution, and flung it from him to a distance in the corridor.
“Cecily, you believe me, then!” he exclaimed with transport.
“Do I believe you?” said the creole, energetically pressing her beautiful fingers on the clasped hands of Jacques Ferrand. “Oh, yes, I do! For now, again, you look as you did a short time since, when my very soul seemed fascinated by your gaze.”
“Cecily, you will speak the words of, truth — and truth only — to me?”
“And can you doubt it for a moment? Ah, you will soon have ample proof of my sincerity. But what you are about to tell me is quite true, — is it not?”
“I repeat that you may believe each word I utter.”
“So much the better, since you are enabled to prove your passion by the avowal of them.”
“And if I tell you all?”
“Then will I, in return, withhold nothing from you; for if, indeed, you have this blind, this courageous confidence in me, Jacques, I will call no more for the ideal lover of my song, but you, — my hero, my tiger! to whom I will sing, ‘Come — come — oh, come!’”
As Cecily uttered these words, with an air and voice of seductive tenderness, she drew so close to the wicket that Jacques Ferrand could feel the hot breath of the creole pass over his cheek, while her fresh, full lip lightly touched his coarse, vulgar hand. “Call me your tiger, — your slave, — what you will, — and if after that you but divulge what I entrust to you, my life will be the consequence. Yes, enchantress, a word from you, and I perish on a scaffold. My honour, reputation, nay, my very existence, are henceforward in your hands.”
“Your honour?”
“Yes, even so. But listen. About ten years ago I was entrusted with the care of a child, and a sum of money for her use, amounting to two hundred thousand francs; well, I wronged the little creature by spreading a false report of her death, and then appropriated the money to my own purposes.”
“It was boldly and cleverly done! Who would ever have believed you capable of such conduct?”
“Again. I had a cashier whom I detested, and I determined upon ruining him one way or other. Well, one evening, under some great emergency, he took from my cash-box a trifling amount of gold, which he paid back the next day; but to wreak my malice on the object of my dislike, I accused him of having stolen a large sum. Of course my testimony was believed, and the wretched man was thrown into prison. Now is not my honour — my very safety — at your will and pleasure? At your word both would be in peril.”
“Then you love me, Jacques, — oh, truly, blindly love me! Since you thus surrender to m
e the most precious secrets of your heart, how plainly does it prove the empire I must have over you! Ah, believe me, I will not be niggardly in repaying you. Stoop that brow, from which have emanated so many infernal schemes, that I may press it with my lips.”
“Were the scaffold erected for me,” cried the excited notary, “did death stare me in the face, I would not now recall my words. But hearken to what I have still to confess. The child I formerly wronged and forsook has again crossed my path, her reappearance disquieted me, and I have had her murdered.”
“Murdered! and by your orders? But how — in what manner?”
“A few days since; it occurred thus: Near the bridge of Asnières, at the Isle du Ravageur, a man named Martial, for a bribe, contrived to sink her in a boat made purposely with a false bottom. Are these particulars sufficient? Will you believe me now?”
“Oh, fiend! demon! You terrify while you fascinate me! In what consists your marvellous power and influence?”
“But listen further, for I have not yet finished my catalogue of crimes. Previously to that a man had entrusted me with one hundred thousand crowns. I contrived to waylay and blow out his brains, making it appear he had fallen by his own hand. Afterwards, when his sister claimed the money entrusted to my charge, I denied all knowledge of it. Now, then, I have proclaimed myself a malefactor, guilty of every crime. Will you not open your door, and admit a lover so ardent, so impatient as myself?”
“Jacques,” exclaimed the creole, with much excitement, “I admire, — love, — nay, adore you!”
“Let a thousand deaths come!” cried the notary, in a state of enthusiastic delight impossible to describe, “I will brave them all! Oh, you are right! Were I ever so young, so handsome, or so seducing, I could not hope for joy such as now swells my heart. But delay not, charmer of my soul, — give me the key, or yourself undo the bolts which separate us. I can endure this torturing suspense no longer!”
The creole took from the lock, which she had carefully secured beforehand, the key so ardently prayed for, and, handing it to the notary through the aperture, said, in a languishing tone of utter abandonnement:
“Jacques, my senses seem forsaking me, — my brain is on fire, — I know not what I do or say.”
“You are mine, then, at length, my adorable beauty!” cried he, with a wild shout of savage exultation, and hastily turning the key in the lock. But the firmly bolted door yielded not yet.
“Come, beloved of my heart!” murmured Cecily, in a languid voice; “bless me with your presence, — come!”
“The bolt! The bolt!” gasped out Jacques Ferrand, breathless with his exertions to force open the door.
“But what if you have been deceiving me?” cried the creole, as though a sudden thought had seized her; “if you have only invented the secrets with which you affect to entrust me, to mock at my credulity, to ensnare my confidence?”
The notary appeared thunderstruck with surprise at this fresh expression of doubt, at the very moment when he believed himself upon the point of attaining his wishes; to find a new obstacle arise when he considered success certain drove him almost furious. He rapidly thrust his hand into his breast, opened his waistcoat, impatiently snapped a steel chain, to which was suspended a small red morocco pocketbook, took it, and showing it to Cecily, through the aperture, cried, in a thick, palpitating voice:
“This book contains papers that would bring me to a scaffold; only undo the bolts which deny me entrance to your presence, and this book, with all its precious documents, is yours.”
“Oh, then, let us seal the compact!” exclaimed Cecily, as, drawing back the bolt with as much noise as possible with one hand, with the other she seized the pocketbook.
But Jacques Ferrand permitted it not to leave his possession till he felt the door yield to his pressure. But though it partially gave way, it was but to leave an opening about half a foot wide, the solid chain which passed across it above the lock preventing any person’s entering as completely as before. At this unexpected obstacle Jacques Ferrand precipitated himself against the door and shook it with desperate fury, while Cecily, with the rapidity of thought, took the pocket-book between her teeth, opened the window, threw a large cloak out into the yard below, and, light and agile as bold and daring, seized a knotted cord previously secured to the balcony, and glided from her chamber on the first floor to the court beneath, descending with the swiftness of an arrow shot from a bow. Then wrapping herself hastily in the mantle, she flew to the porter’s lodge, opened the door, drew up the string, ran into the street, and sprang into a hackney-coach, which, ever since Cecily had been with Jacques Ferrand, came regularly every evening, in case of need, by Baron Graün’s orders, and took up its station a short distance from the notary’s house. Directly she had entered the vehicle it drove off at the topmost speed of the two strong, powerful horses that drew it, and had reached the Boulevards ere Jacques Ferrand had even discovered Cecily’s flight.
We will now return to the disappointed wretch. From the situation of the door he was unable to perceive the window by which the creole had contrived to prepare and make good her flight; but concentrating all his powers, by a vigorous application of his brawny shoulders Jacques Ferrand succeeded in forcing out the chain which kept the door from opening.
With furious impatience he rushed into the chamber, — it was empty. The knotted cord was still suspended to the balcony of the window from which he leaned; and then, at the other extremity of the courtyard, he saw by means of the moon, which just then shone out from behind the stormy clouds which had hitherto obscured it, the dim outline of the outer gate swinging to and fro as though left open by some person having hastily passed through. Then did Jacques Ferrand divine the whole of the scheme so successfully laid to entrap him; but a glimmer of hope still remained. Determined and vigorous, he threw his leg over the balcony, let himself down in his turn by the cord, and hastily quitted the house.
The street was quite deserted, — not a creature was to be seen; and the only sound his ear could detect was the distant rumbling of the wheels of the vehicle that bore away the object of his search. The notary, who supposed it to be the carriage of some person whose business or pleasure took them late from home, paid no attention to this circumstance.
There was then no chance of finding Cecily, whose absence was the more disastrous, as she carried with her the positive proof of his crimes. As this fearful certainty came over him, he fell, struck with consternation, on a bench placed against his door, where he long remained, mute, motionless, and as though petrified with horror. His eyes fixed and haggard, his teeth clenched, and his lips covered with foam, tearing his breast, as though unconsciously, till the blood streamed from it, he felt his very brain dizzy with thought, till his ideas were lost in a fathomless abyss.
When he recovered from his stupor he arose and staggered onwards with an unsteady and faltering step, like a person just aroused from a state of complete intoxication. He violently shut the entrance door and returned to the courtyard. The rain had by this time ceased, but the wind still continued strong and gusty, and drove rapidly along the heavy gray clouds which veiled without entirely excluding the brightness of the moon, whose pale and sickly light shone on the house.
Somewhat calmed by the clear freshness of the night air, Jacques Ferrand, as though hoping to find relief from his internal agitation by the rapidity of his movements, plunged into the muddy paths of his garden, walking with quick, hurried steps, and from time to time pressing his clenched hands against his forehead. Heedless of the direction he proceeded in, he at length reached the termination of a walk, adjoining to which was a dilapidated greenhouse.
Suddenly he stumbled heavily against a mass of newly disturbed earth. Mechanically he stooped down to examine the nature of the impediment which presented itself; the deep hole which had been dug, and morsels of torn garments lying by, told him with awful certainty that he stood by the grave dug by poor Louise Morel to receive the remains of her dead infant
, — her infant, which was also the child of the heartless, hardened wretch who now stood trembling and conscience-stricken beside this fearful memento of his sensuality and brutal persecution of a poor and helpless girl. And spite of his hardihood, his long course of sin and seared conscience, a deadly tremor shook his frame, he felt an instinctive persuasion that the hour of deep retribution was at hand.
Under other circumstances Jacques Ferrand would have trampled the humble grave beneath his feet without remorse or concern, but now, exhausted by the preceding scene, he felt his usual boldness forsake him, while fear and trembling came upon him. A cold sweat bedewed his brow, his tottering knees refused to support him, and he fell motionless beside the open grave.
CHAPTER V.
LA FORCE.
WE MAY, PERHAPS, be accused, from the space accorded to the following scenes, of injuring the unity of our story by some episodical pictures; but it seems to us that, at this moment particularly, when important questions of punishment are engaging the attention of the legislature, that the interior of a prison — that frightful pandemonium, that gloomy thermometer of civilisation — will be an opportune study. In a word, the various physiognomies of prisoners of all classes, the relations of kin or affection, which still bind them to the world from which their gaol walls separate them, appear to us worthy of interest and attention. We hope, therefore, to be excused for having grouped about many prisoners known to the readers of this history other secondary characters, intended to put in relief certain ideas of criticism, and to complete the initiation of a prison life.
Let us enter La Force. There is nothing sombre or repulsive in the aspect of this house of incarceration in the Rue du Roi de Sicile, in the Marais. In the centre of one of the first courts there are some clumps of trees, thickened with shrubs, at the roots of which there are already, here and there, the green, precocious shoots of primroses and snowdrops. A raised ascent, surmounted by a porch covered with trellis-work, in which knotty stalks of the vine entwine, leads to one of the seven or eight walks assigned to the prisoners. The vast buildings which surround these courts very much resemble those of barrack or manufactory kept with exceeding care. There are lofty façades of white stone, pierced with high and large windows, which admit of the free circulation of pure air.