Thinking like that has made death adorable to me. So don’t weep and wail, my darling. Say to yourself now and then : there were two good-natured harlots, both of them beautiful, who both died for me, without bearing me any grudge, who worshipped me; raise up in your heart a monument to Coralie, to Esther, and go on your way! Do you remember the day when you pointed out to me the mistress of a poet before the Revolution, old, shrivelled, in a cabbage-green bonnet, in a puce quilted wrap with black stains of grease, hardly warmed by the sun, although she was sitting out in it in the Tuileries, fussing over a horrible pug-dog, the mangiest ever? You know, she’d had lackeys, equipages, a town house! I said to you then : ‘It is better to die at thirty!’ Well, that day, you found me thoughtful, you did all kinds of silly things to distract me; and, between two kisses, I said to you again : ‘Every day pretty women leave the theatre before the play is over! ‘… So you can say, I didn’t want to see the last act, that’s all…
You’ll be finding me garrulous, but this is my last tittle-tattle. I’m writing to you as though I were talking to you, and I want my conversation to be gay. Complaining seamstresses have always irritated me; you know I tried to die properly once before, when I got back from that awful Opera ball, where they told you I’d been a whore!
Oh! no, my sweet, don’t give this portrait away. If you knew under what waves of love I drowned in your eyes as I gazed at them intoxicated just now at a pause in my writing,… if you were able to take back the love I’ve tried to overlay this ivory with, you’d think the soul of your once-cherished was there.
A dead woman who begs alms, isn’t that funny?… No, I must learn to stay quiet in my grave.
You don’t know how heroic my death would seem to fools if they were told that last night Nucingen offered me two millions if I’d love him as I loved you. He’ll feel nicely robbed when he knows I’ve kept my word and died of him. I did all I could to go on breathing the same air as you. I told this fat thief: ‘If you want to be loved as you say, I’ll even undertake never to see Lucien again…’ ‘What must I do?’ he asked. ‘Will you give me two million for him?’… No! if you’d seen his face? Ah! I should have laughed, if it hadn’t meant tragedy for me. ‘Don’t answer, then!’ I said. ‘I can see, you’d rather have two millions than me. Well, it’s always nice for a woman to know what she’s worth,’ I added, turning my back on him.
The old scoundrel will know in an hour or two that I wasn’t joking.
Who’ll be able to part your hair as I did? Bah! I don’t want to think about anything to do with life any longer, I’ve only got five minutes left, I give them to God; don’t be jealous of Him, my angel, I only want to talk to Him about you, ask Him to make you happy in return for my death, and my punishment in another world. I wish I weren’t going to Hell, I should have liked to see the angels and find out whether they are at all like you…
Good-bye, my pretty, good-bye! out of all my unhappiness I bless you. Even in the grave I shall be
Your ESTHER…
It is striking eleven. I have said my last prayer, I am going to bed now to die. Once more, good-bye! I wish that the warmth of my hand might keep my soul there as I place a last kiss on it, and I must just once more call you nice pussy, although you have caused the death of your
ESTHER.
In which we see that the Law is and must be heartless
A FEELING of jealousy contracted the magistrate’s heart as he finished reading the only suicide’s letter he had seen written with such gaiety, although it was a feverish gaiety, and the last effort of a blind tenderness.
What is there so unusual about him that he should be loved like that!…’ he thought repeating what is always said by men who lack the gift of appealing to women.
‘If you can prove not only that you are not Jacques Collin, escaped convict, but also that you really are Don Carlos Herrera, canon of Toledo, secret envoy of His Majesty Ferdinand VII,’ said the magistrate to Jacques Collin, ‘you will be set at liberty, for the impartiality which my office requires of me obliges me to tell you that I have just received a letter from the girl Esther Gobseck in which she avows her intention of killing herself, and in which she gives expression to suspicions about her servants which may well designate them as authors of the theft of the seven hundred and fifty thousand francs.’
As he spoke, Monsieur Camusot was comparing the handwriting of the letter with that of the will, and it seemed to him evident that the letter had indeed been written by the same person who had drawn up the will.
‘Sir, you were too quick to believe that a crime had been committed, do not be in a hurry to suppose theft.’
‘Ah!…’ said Camusot casting a judge’s glance at the prisoner.
‘Don’t imagine that I am compromising myself if I tell you that this sum may yet be found,’ went on Jacques Collin giving the judge to understand that his suspicion had been noted. ‘That poor creature was well loved by her servants; and, if I were free, I should undertake to look for money which now belongs to the being I most love in the world, to Lucien!… Would you be so kind as to let me read the letter, it won’t take long… it is the proof of my dear child’s innocence… you can’t suppose I should destroy it… or speak about it, since I’m being kept in solitary confinement.’
‘Solitary confinement!…’ exclaimed the magistrate, ‘you won’t be presently… I’m begging you to establish your identity as quickly as you can, have recourse to your ambassador if you want…’
And he handed the letter to Jacques Collin. Camusot was happy to be rid of his difficulties, to be able to satisfy the Attorney General, Mesdames de Maufrigneuse and Sérisy. Nevertheless he coldly and curiously watched the man’s face while his prisoner read the letter from the harlot; and, despite the sincerity of the feelings there depicted, he said to himself: ‘That really is a convict physiognomy, all the same.’
‘That’s how they love him!…’ said Jacques Collin giving the letter back… And he showed Camusot a face bathed in tears. ‘If you knew him!’ he went on, ‘his soul is so young, so fresh, he is so magnificently handsome, a child, a poet… You can’t help feeling a need to sacrifice yourself for him, to gratify his least whim. Dear Lucien, he would bewitch you with his winning ways.’
‘So, then,’ said the magistrate still making an effort to discover the truth, ‘you can’t possibly be Jacques Collin…’
‘No sir…’ replied the convict.
And Jacques Collin made himself more of a Don Carlos Herrera than ever. To put the finishing touches to his creation, he went up to the magistrate, led him into the window embrasure and adopted the manner of a prince of the Church, speaking in a confidential tone.
‘I love that child so much, sir, that were it necessary to be the criminal you take me for in order to avoid some inconvenience befalling my heart’s idol, I should accuse myself,’ he said in a low voice. ‘I should imitate the poor wench who killed herself to his gain. Therefore, sir, I implore you to grant me a favour, that is, to set Lucien at liberty forthwith…’
‘My duty does not properly allow it,’ said Camusot good-humouredly; ‘but, whenever compromise is possible, the Law knows how to show consideration, and, if you can give me good reasons… Say what you have to say, this won’t be written down…’
‘Why, then, ’Jacques Collin continued, deceived by the good humour of Camusot, ‘I know all that the poor child is suffering at this moment, he might even attempt to take his own life on finding himself in prison…’
‘Oh! as to that,’ said Camusot with a shrug.
‘You don’t know whom you’ll oblige by obliging me,’ added Jacques Collin playing on other strings. ‘You’ll be rendering a service to an Order more powerful than any Comtesse de Sérisy or Duchesse de Maufrigneuse who won’t forgive you for having had their letters in your office…,’ said he indicating two scented bundles… ‘My Order does not forget.’
‘Sir!’ said Camusot, ‘that will do. Think of other reasons you can give me. My
duty is as much to the prisoner as to the prosecution.’
‘Well, then, believe me, I know Lucien, he has the soul of a woman, a poet, a man of the South, inconstant, lacking in will-power,’ Jacques Collin continued, who thought he perceived that the judge had been won over to their side. ‘You are certain of the young man’s innocence, don’t torment him, don’t ask him questions; give him this letter, tell him that he inherits from Esther, and set him at liberty… If you act otherwise, you’ll find that it leads you nowhere; while if you just let him go without a thought, I’ll explain to you (keep me locked up meanwhile), tomorrow, this evening, everything that seems mysterious to you in this affair, including the reasons why there are people in such hot pursuit of me; but I shall be risking my life, they’ve been after my head these five years… With Lucien free, rich and married to Clotilde de Grand-lieu, my earthly task will be over, I shan’t care about my own skin any more… My pursuer is a spy of your last king…’
‘Ah! Corentin!’
‘Ah! he’s called Corentin… thank you… Well, then, sir, are you going to promise to do what I ask?…’
‘A judge cannot and must not make promises. Coquart! tell the usher and the constables to take the prisoner back to the Conciergerie… I shall give orders for you to be moved to more comfortable quarters this evening,’ he added gently with a slight inclination of the head to the prisoner.
The magistrate regains the upper hand
STRUCK by Jacques Collin’s request and remembering how strongly he had insisted on being questioned first, giving his illness as a reason, Camusot was again filled with distrust. Lending ear to his unformed suspicions, he saw the supposed invalid go out, walking like a Hercules, no longer putting on those little touches so expertly adopted at the time of his entrance.
‘Sir?…’
Jacques Collin turned.
‘In spite of your refusal to sign, my clerk will read over to you his report of your interrogation.’
The prisoner was in excellent health, the movement with which he came and sat down beside the clerk was a revelation to the judge.
‘You’ve recovered very promptly?’ said Camusot.
‘I’ve been caught,’ thought Jacques Collin. Then he replied in a clear voice: ‘Joy alone, sir, is nature’s panacea… this letter, the proof of an innocence I never questioned… that’s the great remedy.’
The magistrate followed his prisoner with an attentive gaze as the usher and constables gathered round him; then he moved like a man waking from sleep, and threw Esther’s letter down on his clerk’s desk.
‘Coquart, copy that letter!…’
A melancholy peculiar to examining magistrates
IF it is in man’s nature to distrust what he is begged to do when this is against his interests or against his duty, even though he may feel personally indifferent about it, such a feeling is obligatory with examining magistrates. The more the prisoner, whose identity was not yet fully established, saw clouds on the horizon if Lucien were interrogated, the more such a questioning seemed necessary to Camusot. According to the Code and its usages, the formality would not have been strictly indispensable, had not the question of Father Carlos’s identity arisen. In all walks of life, there exists some form of professional conscience. Without feeling any particular curiosity, Camusot would have questioned Lucien in the course of duty as he had just questioned Jacques Collin, employing all the ruses which a conscientious magistrate may properly employ. The favour to be done, his own advancement, everything for Camusot was subordinate to a desire to learn the truth, however much this had to be done by guesswork and even if it could not then be published. He drummed with his fingers on the panes of the window abandoning himself to a flow of conjecture, for at such moments thought is like a river passing through many countries. Lovers of truth, magistrates are like jealous women, they give way to endless suppositions and probe them with the dagger of suspicion as the sacrificing priests of antiquity eviscerated their victims; then they come to a halt not at the true, but at the probable, and they end by glimpsing the truth. A woman questions a man she loves as the judge interrogates a criminal. In such situations, a flash, a word, an inflexion of the voice, a moment of hesitation suffice to point to the hidden fact, the betrayal or the crime.
‘The way he described his devotion to his son (if it is his son), makes me fancy that he was in that tart’s house to keep an eye open for squalls; and, not realizing that there was a will under the dead woman’s pillow, he took those seven hundred and fifty thousand francs for his son, on account!… That’s why he promised to see that the money was found. Monsieur de Rubempré owes it to himself and to the Law to throw some light on the social position of his father… And to promise me the protection of his Order (his Order!) if I don’t question Lucien!…’
He continued to think about this.
As we have just seen, an examining magistrate will conduct an inquiry as he pleases. He is free to be devious or straightforward. An interrogation is everything and nothing. That is where the possibility of showing favour lies. Camusot rang, the usher was there. He gave orders for Monsieur Lucien de Rubempré to be brought, with strict instructions that he should not communicate with anybody on the way. It was then two o’clock in the afternoon.
‘There is something mysterious,’ said the judge to himself, ‘and it must be important. The reasoning of my amphibious customer, who is neither priest nor layman, neither convict nor Spaniard, but who is anxious that his young favourite’s lips shall not utter some fatal word, is this : ‘The poet is weak, he is a woman; he isn’t like me, who am a positive Hercules of diplomacy, and you will easily wrest our secret from him!” Well! we are going to learn everything this innocent can tell us!…’
And he went on tapping the edge of his table with an ivory paper-knife, while his clerk copied Esther’s letter. What oddities we betray in the use of our faculties! Camusot considered all the crimes he could think of, but quite failed to think of the one the prisoner had in fact committed, the forging of a will in Lucien’s favour. Let those who attack the magistracy’s position out of envy reflect on those lives spent in a state of continual suspicion, on the torture these people inflict on their own minds, for civil cases are no less complicated than criminal inquiries, and they may well come to the conclusion that the priest and the judge are in equally heavy, equally galling harness. But every profession has its hair shirt and its Chinese puzzles.
Dangers courted by innocence at the Palais de Justice
AT a little after two, Monsieur Camusot saw Lucien de Rubempré enter, pale, unkempt, his eyes red and swollen, in short in a state of collapse which allowed him to compare nature with art, true prostration with play-acting. The way taken from the Conciergerie to the magistrate’s office between two constables preceded by an usher had brought despair to its height in Lucien. A poet’s mind prefers torture to judgment. Seeing this nature so utterly devoid of the moral courage which made the judge himself hesitate and which had just been so powerfully manifested by the other prisoner, Monsieur Camusot felt both contempt and pity before so cheap a victory, in which his most decisive blows would be registered with the ease of a marksman picking off dolls in a fairground.
‘Pull yourself together, Monsieur de Rubempré, you are in the presence of a magistrate anxious to repair the harm which the Law does without wishing to when it places a man in preventive detention without good cause. I believe you to be innocent, and you will be set at liberty immediately. The proof of your innocence is here. It is a letter kept by your caretaker in your absence, which she has just brought. In the disturbance caused by the appearance of the police and the news of your arrest at Fontainebleau, the woman forgot this letter which comes from Mademoiselle Esther Gobseck… Read it!’
Lucien took the letter, read it and burst into tears. He sobbed without being able to utter a word. After a quarter of an hour, during which Lucien remained deprived of all strength, the clerk presented him with the copy and asked him to sign f
or this as being in conformity with the original and to be presented immediately on demand during the judicial inquiry, inviting him to collate the copy with the original; but naturally Lucien took Coquart’s word as to its accuracy.
‘Sir,’ said the judge with an air of great good will, ‘it is difficult, nevertheless, to set you at liberty without going through certain formalities and asking you a few questions.… It is rather as a witness that I require you to answer. To a man like yourself, I hardly need to say that swearing to tell the whole truth is not simply an appeal to your conscience, but for the moment a necessity of your position here, which remains a little ambiguous. The truth cannot hurt you whatever it may be; but a lie could bring you before the Court of Assize, and would compel me to send you back to the Conciergerie; whereas if you answer my questions frankly you will sleep at home tonight, and your reputation will be restored by an item in the newspapers which says: “Monsieur de Rubempré, arrested yesterday at Fontainebleau, was at once discharged after a short interrogation.” ’
This discourse produced a lively impression on Lucien, and observing his prisoner’s change of mood, the judge added: ‘I repeat, you were suspected of complicity in the murder by poisoning of Demoiselle Esther, there is now proof of suicide, that is all; but a sum of seven hundred and fifty thousand francs which form part of the inheritance has been removed, and you are the sole heir; there, unfortunately, we have a crime. This crime preceded the discovery of the will. Now, the Law has reason to think that a person who loves you, as much as you loved this Demoiselle Esther, allowed himself to commit this crime to your profit… Don’t interrupt me,’ said Camusot imposing silence on Lucien who made as if to speak, ‘I am not questioning you yet. I want to make you understand to what extent your honour is involved in this matter. Give up the false, the wretched point of honour which binds accomplices together, and speak the whole truth.’
A Harlot High and Low Page 41