Mysteries of Paris Volume III Part 46

"Hush, be quiet, unhappy man!"

"Oh! there, there!"

"Jacques, it is death."

"Oh! I see her," added Ferrand, his teeth set. "There she is! how handsome she is; how handsome! See her long black hair; it floats in disorder upon her shoulders! And her small teeth, which are seen through her half-opened lips: her lips so red and humid! What pearls! Oh! her large eyes seem in turn to sparkle and die. Cecily! Cecily! I adore you!"

"Jacques," cried Polidori, alarmed, "do not excite yourself by these phantoms."

"It is not a phantom."

"Take care; a short time ago, you know, you imagined also that you heard the songs of this woman, and your hearing was suddenly affected by fearful sufferings--take care!"

"Leave me," cried the notary, with impatience, "leave me! Of what use is hearing, except to listen to her?--sight, except to see her?"

"But the tortures which ensue, miserable fool!"

The notary did not finish. He uttered a sharp cry of pain, throwing himself backward on the bed.

"What is the matter?" asked Polidori, with astonishment.

"Put out that light; its glare is too vivid. I cannot support it; it blinds me!"

"How?" said Polidori, more and more surprised.

"There is but one lamp with a shade, and its light is very feeble."

"I tell you that the light increases here. Hold! more! more! Oh! it is too much! it becomes intolerable!" raved on Jacques Ferrand, shutting his eyes with an expression of increasing pain.

"You are mad! This chamber is hardly light, I tell you. I have just turned down the lamps; open your eyes, you will see."

"Open my eyes! But I shall be blinded by the torrents of dazzling light which flood this apartment. Here, there, everywhere, sheets of fire--thousands of s.h.i.+ning atoms," cried the notary, raising himself; then, uttering a cry of pain, he placed his hands on his eyes. "But I am blinded!

the burning light pierces my eyelids! it consumes me! Put out that light!

it casts an infernal flame."

"No more doubt," said Polidori; "his sight is stricken in the same manner as his hearing was just now. He is lost! To bleed him anew in this state would be fatal. He is lost!"

Another sharp, terrible yell from Jacques Ferrand resounded throughout the chamber.

"Executioner! put out the lamp! Its burning splendor penetrates through my hands; they are transparent! I see the blood! it circulates in my veins! I did well to close my eyelids! this fiery lava would have entered! Oh, what torture! It is as if my eyes were pierced with red-hot needles! Help!

help!" cried he, struggling in his bed, a prey to horrible convulsions.

Polidori, alarmed at the violence of this attack, extinguished the light.

And both were left in utter darkness. At this moment was heard the noise of a carriage, which stopped at the street door. When the chamber became darkened, Ferrand's agony ceased by degrees, and he said to Polidori, "Why did you wait so long before you put out this lamp? Was it to make me endure all the torments of the d.a.m.ned? Oh, what I have suffered! Oh, heaven! how I have suffered!"

"Now do you suffer less?"

"I still experience a violent irritation, but it is nothing to what I felt just now. I cling to life because the memory of Cecily is all my life."

"But this memory kills, exhausts, consumes you." The notary did not hear his accomplice, who foresaw a new hallucination. In effect, Ferrand resumed, with a burst of convulsive and sardonic laughter:

"To take Cecily from me! But they do not know that, by concentrating all the power of one's faculties on a single object, the impracticable is gained. Thus, directly, I am going to the chamber of Cecily, where I have not dared to go since her departure. Oh, to see, to touch the vestments which have belonged to her; the gla.s.s before which she dressed--it will be to see herself! Yes; by fixing my eyes on this gla.s.s, soon shall I see Cecily appear. It will not be an illusion--a mist; it will be she; I shall find her there, as the sculptor finds the statue in the block of marble."

"Where are you going to?" said Polidori, hearing Jacques Ferrand getting up from his bed, for the most profound obscurity still reigned in the apartment.

"I go to find Cecily."

"You shall not go. The sight of her chamber will kill you."

"Cecily awaits me there."

"You shall not go--I hold you," said Polidori, seizing the notary by the arm.

Jacques Ferrand, arrived at the last stage of weakness, could not struggle against Polidori, who held him with a vigorous hand.

"You wish to prevent me from going to find Cecily?"

"Yes; and, besides, there is a lamp lighted in the next room; you know what effect the light produced just now upon your sight!"

"Cecily is there; she awaits me. I would traverse a blazing furnace to join her. Let me go. She told me I was her old tiger. Take care, my claws are sharp."

"You shall not go. I will rather tie you on your bed as a madman."

"Polidori, listen; I am not mad--I have all my reason. I know very well that Cecily is not materially there; but for me, the phantoms of my imagination are worth more than realities."

"Silence!" cried Polidori, suddenly, listening; "just now I thought I heard a carriage stop at the door. I was not mistaken. I hear now the sound of voices in the court."

"You wish to distract my thoughts. The trick is too plain."

"I hear some one speak, I tell you, and I think I recognize---"

"You wish to deceive me," said Ferrand, interrupting Polidori; "I am not your dupe."

"But, wretch, listen then--listen. Ah! do you not hear?"

"Let me go--Cecily is there--she calls me. Do not make me angry, in my turn, I tell you. Take care--do you understand? take care."

"You shall not go out."

"Take care---"

"You shall not go out from here; it is my interest that you should remain."

"You prevent me from going to find Cecily; my interest wills that you should die. Hold then!" said the notary, in a hollow voice.

Polidori uttered a cry.