You cherish no ill will for any one but me alone! Oh! what a fatality!"He hid his face in his hands. The young girl heard him weeping. It was for the first time. Thus erect and shaken by sobs, he was more miserable and more suppliant than when on his knees. He wept thus for a considerable time.
"Come!" he said, these first tears passed, "I have no more words. I had, however, thought well as to what you would say. Now I tremble and shiver and break down at the decisive moment, I feel conscious of something supreme enveloping us, and I stammer. Oh! I shall fall upon the pavement if you do not take pity on me, pity on yourself. Do not condemn us both. If you only knew how much I love you!
What a heart is mine! Oh! what desertion of all virtue!
What desperate abandonment of myself! A doctor, I mock at science; a gentleman, I tarnish my own name; a priest, Imake of the missal a pillow of sensuality, I spit in the face of my God! all this for thee, enchantress! to be more worthy of thy hell! And you will not have the apostate! Oh! let me tell you all! more still, something more horrible, oh! Yet more horrible!...."As he uttered these last words, his air became utterly distracted. He was silent for a moment, and resumed, as though speaking to himself, and in a strong voice,--"Cain, what hast thou done with thy brother?"There was another silence, and he went on--
"What have I done with him, Lord? I received him, Ireared him, I nourished him, I loved him, I idolized him, and I have slain him! Yes, Lord, they have just dashed his head before my eyes on the stone of thine house, and it is because of me, because of this woman, because of her."His eye was wild. His voice grew ever weaker; he repeated many times, yet, mechanically, at tolerably long intervals, like a bell prolonging its last vibration: "Because of her.--Because of her."Then his tongue no longer articulated any perceptible sound; but his lips still moved. All at once he sank together, like something crumbling, and lay motionless on the earth, with his head on his knees.
A touch from the young girl, as she drew her foot from under him, brought him to himself. He passed his hand slowly over his hollow cheeks, and gazed for several moments at his fingers, which were wet, "What!" he murmured, "I have wept!"And turning suddenly to the gypsy with unspeakable anguish,--"Alas! you have looked coldly on at my tears! Child, do you know that those tears are of lava? Is it indeed true?
Nothing touches when it comes from the man whom one does not love. If you were to see me die, you would laugh. Oh!
I do not wish to see you die! One word! A single word of pardon! Say not that you love me, say only that you will do it; that will suffice; I will save you. If not--oh! the hour is passing. I entreat you by all that is sacred, do not wait until I shall have turned to stone again, like that gibbet which also claims you! Reflect that I hold the destinies of both of us in my hand, that I am mad,--it is terrible,--that I may let all go to destruction, and that there is beneath us a bottomless abyss, unhappy girl, whither my fall will follow yours to all eternity! One word of kindness! Say one word! only one word!"
She opened her mouth to answer him. He flung himself on his knees to receive with adoration the word, possibly a tender one, which was on the point of issuing from her lips.
She said to him, "You are an assassin!"
The priest clasped her in his arms with fury, and began to laugh with an abominable laugh.
"Well, yes, an assassin!" he said, "and I will have you.
You will not have me for your slave, you shall have me for your master. I will have you! I have a den, whither I will drag you. You will follow me, you will be obliged to follow me, or I will deliver you up! You must die, my beauty, or be mine! belong to the priest! belong to the apostate! belong to the assassin! this very night, do you hear? Come! joy;kiss me, mad girl! The tomb or my bed!"
His eyes sparkled with impurity and rage. His lewd lips reddened the young girl's neck. She struggled in his arms.
He covered her with furious kisses.
"Do not bite me, monster!" she cried. "Oh! the foul, odious monk! leave me! I will tear out thy ugly gray hair and fling it in thy face by the handful!"He reddened, turned pale, then released her and gazed at her with a gloomy air. She thought herself victorious, and continued,--"I tell you that I belong to my Phoebus, that 'tis Phoebus whom I love, that 'tis Phoebus who is handsome! you are old, priest! you are ugly! Begone!"He gave vent to a horrible cry, like the wretch to whom a hot iron is applied. "Die, then!" he said, gnashing his teeth.
She saw his terrible look and tried to fly. He caught her once more, he shook her, he flung her on the ground, and walked with rapid strides towards the corner of the Tour-Roland, dragging her after him along the pavement by her beautiful hands.
On arriving there, he turned to her,--
"For the last time, will you be mine?"
She replied with emphasis,--
"No!"
Then he cried in a loud voice,--
"Gudule! Gudule! here is the gypsy! take your vengeance!"The young girl felt herself seized suddenly by the elbow.
She looked. A fleshless arm was stretched from an opening in the wall, and held her like a hand of iron.
"Hold her well," said the priest; "'tis the gypsy escaped.
Release her not. I will go in search of the sergeants. You shall see her hanged."A guttural laugh replied from the interior of the wall to these bloody words--"Hah! hah! hah!"--The gypsy watched the priest retire in the direction of the Pont Notre-Dame.
A cavalcade was heard in that direction.
The young girl had recognized the spiteful recluse. Panting with terror, she tried to disengage herself. She writhed, she made many starts of agony and despair, but the other held her with incredible strength. The lean and bony fingers which bruised her, clenched on her flesh and met around it.
One would have said that this hand was riveted to her arm.
