XXVII
The Count François stopped and looked at his father who still sat, or lay, motionless as a corpse in that singular dormeuse, half chair, half couch. Had there appeared on those utterly blank features some expression which I had not perceived? The count, at any rate, turned at once toward me, and said:
“Monsieur, we are almost ready. Think again, I beg of you. Is there really nothing you would like before the operation begins? Is there anything we can do for you within the limits you now know? Our earnest wish is to satisfy your slightest desire, if possible; and we hope you will enable us to demonstrate our best good will!”
I was about to shake my head from right to left, in sign of refusal, when an idea flashed across my mind, setting my whole being afire with a sudden glow. I checked myself, my eyes fixed upon my interlocutor, one hand raised, my lips opening to form a word.
“Do not hesitate, Monsieur,” the count encouraged.
“Gentlemen,” said I, with decision, and sweeping all three of them with a rapid glance, “Gentlemen, there is one favor you could do me, a favor which I trust you will have no difficulty in according, such immense store do I set upon it. Grant me this boon I ask, and I am ready to repay you not with my passive consent merely, but with my most active and sincere assistance in whatever you intend to do with me—be it even against my life. Look, gentlemen: some time ago you allowed me, did you not, to visit the room where my friend Madame de X.... is sleeping, perhaps in an hypnotic trance. My desire, my fervent prayer is to see her ... once more ... for one last time; but I must see her natural self, awake, that is, conscious, living, so that I may speak to her and hear her speak to me, that I may bid her farewell, forever, and spend one short hour alone, alone, with her. An hour, yes, just one hour. Then ... I shall be at your service, your man, your chattel, anything you wish, for as long a time as you wish.”
I fell silent, crossing my arms upon my chest. Neither the count nor the vicomte replied for a moment; and I could see them consulting each other out of the corners of their eyes. Then, as they had so often done before, they turned toward their respective father and grandfather, and questioned him in silence. Again there was no change that I could see on that inert and expressionless countenance; and the old man’s eyelids remained firmly closed. But the Count François must have seen something that I did not see; for he addressed me straightway and without the shadow of incertitude:
“Monsieur,” said he, “your wish shall be granted. We will do as you propose.”
A thrill of undescribable emotion swept over me. The count meanwhile held his gaze intently fixed upon his father’s face, interpreting to me the decision he found written there:
“Monsieur,” he repeated, “we shall do as you propose. We shall have the honor of escorting you to the room where Madame de X.... is sleeping. We shall leave you alone with her. As soon as we are gone, she, according to your request, will regain consciousness, and you will be free to converse with her on any subject without any restriction whatsoever. Do not be surprised, Monsieur. During your visit Madame de X.... will be her material self, awake, conscious, living, as you have asked. She will know that you are there, and she will be glad to see you. But of course she will still have over her eyes the invisible blinder that we have placed upon them. She will not know where she is, and will not find it extraordinary to be meeting you in a strange room. Indeed it will not be strange to her. She will take it for her own or for yours. She will, in short, be unaware of everything which the vital interest of the Ever-living Men requires her not to know. Supposing, for example, you were to spend your time and pains in trying to enlighten this beneficent unconsciousness of hers. You will not succeed, I warn you in advance, for, at the end of the sixtieth minute, Madame de X.... will fall asleep again, as we have bargained, and will lose all memory of this talk with you, which memory will be erased from her mind, rendered absolutely null and nil forever ... Monsieur, will you be so kind as to step this way?...”
He was already on the threshold, and, with the younger man leading, he crossed the same anteroom again. I followed close behind him. I am sure I staggered as I walked along.
Outside the badly jointed door, the familiar perfume that I loved came to my nostrils in warm subtle waves of fragrance. I thought I was fainting as I breathed it in.
“Monsieur,” the Count François was now saying in a low voice, “Monsieur, for the duration of one hour, please consider this your house!”