Conscience Part 14

Caffie's fate was decided.

BOOK 2.

CHAPTER XI. THE INSTRUMENT OF DEATH

When, after two hours' sleep, Saniel woke, he did not at first think of this knife; he was tired and dull. Mechanically he walked about his room without paying attention to what he was doing, as if he were in a state of somnambulism, and it astonished him, because he never felt weariness of mind any more than of body, no matter how little he had slept, nor how hard he had worked.

But suddenly, catching a glimpse of the knife that he had placed on the mantel, he received a shock that annihilated his torpor and his fatigue.

It dazzled him like a flash of lightning.

He took it, and, going to the window, he examined it by the pale light of early morning. It was a strong instrument that, in a firm hand, would be a terrible arm; newly sharpened, it had the edge of a razor.

Then the idea, the vision that had come to him two hours before, came back to him, clear and complete at nightfall, that is, at the moment when the concierge was in the second wing of the building, he mounted to Caffie's apartment without being seen, and with this knife he cut his throat. It was as simple as it was easy, and this knife left beside the corpse, and the nature of the wound, would lead the police to look for a butcher, or at least a man who was in the habit of using a knife of this kind.

The evening before, when he had discussed Caffie's death, the how and the when still remained vague and uncertain. But now the day and the means were definitely settled: it should be with this knife, and this evening.

This shook him out of his torpor and made him shudder.

He was angry with himself for this weakness. Did he know or did he not know what he wished? Was he irresolute or cowardly?

Then, going from one idea to another, he thought of an observation that he had made, which appeared to prove that with many subjects there is less firmness in the morning than in the evening. Was this the result of dualism of the nervous centres, and was the human personality double like the brain? Were there hours when the right hemisphere is master of our will, and were there other hours when the left is master? Did one of these hemispheres possess what the other lacked, and is it according to the activity of this or that one, that one has such a character or such a temperament? This would be curious, and would amount to saying that, a lamb in the morning, one might be a tiger at evening. With him it was a lamb that woke in the morning to be devoured by a tiger during the day. To which hemisphere belonged the one and the other of these personalities?

He was angry with himself for yielding to these reflections; it was a time, truly, to study this psychological question! It was of Caffie that he should think, and of the plan which in an instant flashed through his mind in the street, before he decided to pick up this knife.

Evidently things were neither so simple nor so easy as they at first appeared, and to insure the success of his plan a combination of circ.u.mstances was necessary, which might be difficult to bring about.

Would not the concierge see him pa.s.s? Would no one go up or down the stairs? Would Caffie be alone? Would he open the door? Might not some one ring after he had entered?

Here was a series of questions that he had not thought of before, but which now presented itself.

He must examine them, weigh them, and not throw himself giddily into an adventure that presented such risks.

He was alone all day, fortunately, and, as in the state of agitation in which he found himself he could not think of work, he gave himself up to this examination. The stakes were worth the trouble--his honor and his life.

As soon as he was dressed he went out, and walked straight before him through the streets that were already filled with people.

It was only when he had left the heart of Paris that he could reflect as he wished, without being disturbed each instant by people in a hurry, for whom he must make way, or by others who, reading the newspapers, did not look before them, and so jostled against him.

Evidently the risks were more serious than he had imagined; and, as they loomed up before him, he asked himself whether he should go on. To suppress Caffie, yes; to give himself up, no.

"If it is impossible--"

He was not the man to set himself wildly against the impossible: he should have had a dream, a bad dream, and that would be all.

He stopped, and, after a moment of hesitation, turning on his heel, he retraced his steps. Of what use was it to go farther? He had no need to reflect nor to weigh the pro and con; he must give up this plan; decidedly it was too dangerous.

He had gone but a short distance when he asked himself whether these dangers were such as he saw them, and whether he were face to face with a radically demonstrated impossibility.

Without doubt, the concierge might observe him when he pa.s.sed her lodge, either on going up-stairs or coming down; and, also, she might not observe him. This, in reality, depended much upon himself, and on his method of proceeding.

Every evening this lame old concierge lighted the gas in the two wings of the building, one on the street and one on the court. She began by lighting that on the street, and, with the difficulty that she found in walking, it should take her some time to climb the five stories and to descend. If one watched from the street when, at dusk, she left her lodge with a wax taper in her hand, and mounted the stairs behind her, at a little distance, in such a way as to be on the landing of the first story when she should reach the second, there would be time, the deed done, to regain the street before she returned to her lodge, after having lighted the gas on the two staircases. It was important to proceed methodically, without hurry, but, also, without loitering.

Was this impossible?

Here, exactly, was the delicate point which he must examine with composure, without permitting himself to be influenced by any other consideration than that which sprang from the deed itself.

He was wrong, then, not to continue his route, and it was better, a.s.suredly, to get out of Paris. In the country, in the fields or woods, he could find the calm that was indispensable to his over-excited brain, in which ideas clashed like the waves of a disturbed sea.

He was at this moment in the middle of the Faubourg Saint Honore; he followed a street that would bring him to the Champs Elysees, a desert at this early hour.

It took him some time to examine all the hypotheses that might present themselves, and he reached the conclusion that what had appeared impossible to him was not so. If he preserved his calmness, and did not lose perception of the pa.s.sing time, he could very well escape the concierge, which was the main point.

To tell the truth, the danger of the concierge removed, all was not easy. There was the possibility of meeting one of the lodgers on the stairs; there was a chance of not finding Caffie at home, or, at least, not alone; or the bell might ring at the decisive moment. But, as everything depended upon chance, these circ.u.mstances could not be decided beforehand. It was a risk. If one of them happened, he would wait until the next day; it would be one more day of agitation to live through.

But one question that should be decided in advance, because, surely, it presented serious dangers, was how he should justify the coming into his hands of a sum of money which, providentially and in the nick of time, relieved him from the embarra.s.sments against which he struggled.

He had reached the Bois de Boulogne and still continued his walk. In pa.s.sing a fountain the rippling of the water attracted his attention, and he stopped. Although the weather was damp and cold under the influence of a strong west wind charged with rain, his tongue was dry; he drank two goblets of water, and then pursued his way, indifferent where he went.

Then he built up an arrangement which appeared ingenious to him, when it occurred to him to remember that he had gone to Caffie to borrow three thousand francs. Why would he not lend it to him, if not the first day, at least the second? With this loan he paid his debts, if he were questioned on this point. To prove this loan he need only to sign a receipt which he could place in the safe, and which would be found there. Would not the first thought of those who had signed a paper of this kind be to take it when an occasion presented itself? As he would not seize this occasion to carry off his note, it would be the proof that he had not opened the safe.

Among other advantages, this arrangement did away with robbery; it was only a loan. Later he would return these three thousand francs to Caffies heirs. So much the worse for him if it were a forced loan.

On returning to Paris he would buy a sheet of stamped paper, and as he had asked the price the previous evening, he knew that he could afford the expense.

When he reached Saint Cloud he entered a tavern and ordered some bread and cheese and wine. But if he drank little, he ate less, his parched throat refusing to swallow bread.

He took up his march in the clayey streets on the slope of Mont Valerian, but he was insensible to the unpleasantness of slipping on the soft soil, and walked hither and thither, his only care being not to get too far away from the Seine, so that he might enter Paris before night.

He was delighted since he had made up his mind to make out and sign a receipt for the money. But on giving it further consideration, he perceived that it was not so ingenious as he had at first supposed. Do not the dealers of stamped paper often number their paper? With this number it would be easy to find the dealer and him who had bought it.

And then, was it not likely that a scrupulous business man like Caffie would keep a record of the loans he made, and would not the absence of this one and the note be sufficient to awaken suspicion and to direct it to him?

Decidedly, he only escaped one danger to fall into another.

For a moment he was discouraged, but it did not go so far as weakness.

His error had been in imagining that the execution of the idea that had come to him while picking up the knife was as plain as it was easy. But complicated and perilous as it was, it was not impossible.

The question which finally stood before him was, to know whether he possessed the force needed to cope with these dangers, and on this ground hesitation was not possible; to wish to foresee everything was folly; that which he would not have expected, would come to pa.s.s.

He returned toward Paris, and by the Pont de Suresnes reentered the Bois de Boulogne. As it was not yet three o'clock, he had plenty of time to reach the Rue Sainte-Anne before night; but, on the way, a heavy shower forced him to take shelter, and he watched the falling rain, asking himself if this accident, which he had not foreseen, would not upset his plan. A man who had received the force of this shower could not appear in the street before Caffie's door without attracting the attention of the pa.s.sers-by, and it was important for him that he should not attract the attention of any one.

At length the rain ceased, and at twenty minutes of five he reached his home. There remained fifteen or twenty minutes of daylight, which was more than he needed.