XXXIV
Thereafter ... I know not what ... I knew nothing more....
Morning ... morning, and raining still. Through the grated window of my bedroom-prison, a sticky viscous light was making its way. I was lying on the bed. When I awakened, I tried to rise on my elbow to look around me. I could not: I had not the strength.
But suddenly I could see ... I could see, in another place....
Rushing water ... tall green reeds ... moss ... a lofty, vertical wall of rock ... white cobblestones washed by a tumbling stream ... and, on the jagged point of a boulder, a corpse, my corpse, me....
I could see that my clothing was soaked, the water covering my breast and shoulders, and filling my wide opened eyes.... But I did not feel the cold liquid contact of the stream, nor the chilling north wind, laden with rain, that was beating upon my back and legs which were out of water on the narrow bank of the torrent there. I could feel nothing. I was dead. I mean to say that the Man was dead, that Man who was, and still is, I. I could see a large red hole in the back of his head—the wound made by the rock He struck, the wound through which his life had spurted away.... The back of my head ... of me who was lying there on that bed in that chamber ... pained me terribly.
* * * * * * * * *
So I lay there, inert. Several times I tried to move. Move I could not; nor was there anything I could do. Through the half-opened window the resinous fragrance of rain-soaked fir-trees came. For a moment, they entered the room—the Count François and the Vicomte Antoine, I mean. They examined me, felt my pulse, my legs and arms, the back of my head. But soon they went out again. I was left alone.
* * * * * * * * *
All that I have just been telling even then belonged to the distant past, a past fabulously remote.
I was lying on the bed, inert, watching my dead body awash in the stream. I tried to remember what had happened....
Yes ... I fell.... I was bending over the edge to peer into the depths of the chasm ... and a heavy blow struck me between the shoulders ... one of those blows such as I had several times received between the shoulders ... and on the back of my head ... blows from the overwhelming gaze of those old men ... of the old marquis ... which had pounded me to pulp.
So then, I was watching the dead body ... my dead body.... Carrion already old! Flies swarming on and over it. The torrent foaming around and against it—and running water erodes, dissolves, disintegrates!... Yes, carrion indeed!... The coffin maker must come soon, or little will be left for him!...
* * * * * * * * *
Carrion already old!
But not so old as my living body—that too was old, limitlessly aged!
Was I as old as this, a little while before? Or had the sun merely stopped in the heavens? And if so, how long? For many many years? I could not say....
* * * * * * * * *
I remember, yes ... I fainted.... I lost consciousness completely. When I fell over the cliff ... my head and my hands struck hard on the tiled floor ... the Ever-living Men probably brought me to the room and put me on that bed.... Perhaps the rushing water of the stream, or the rain, or the winter wind turned me so old.... One cannot help but change ... lying out in the weather!...
Old! old, old! And older, older, every minute, every second!
My hand went to my chin.... A beard was beginning to appear there.... It was growing rapidly ... a gray beard.... As I passed a hand over my temples, I could feel deep wrinkles there.
Three times the door of my chamber opened partly, and I could see the faces of the Ever-living Men peering in at me attentively. On each occasion I feigned sleep, closing my eyes.... But not entirely.... My eyelids were far enough apart for me to spy on what they did.... They did nothing.... But this I saw ... I saw that they were astounded ... plainly, evidently astounded at the age, the sudden age that had come over me....
* * * * * * * * *
I lay there inert....
What time was it, I wondered? What day of the week? What month of the year? And the year—was it of the era of our Lord?
My beard was gray at first. Now it had whitened. It had grown broad and long.... Thus do beards and hair grow on the bodies of the dead, I thought. The flesh seemed to have left my hands. Through the dry darkened skin that covered them I could feel brittle knotted bones....
Was the sun setting? It was growing dark in my bedroom-prison. Only a faltering light was now making its way through the grated window. And the water rushed foaming, whirling along, black and green, around my corpse ... softened the latter seemed ... mushy, gluey, loathesome....
* * * * * * * * *
Yes, night was coming on.... Again the Living Men entered to visit me ... the father and the son I mean.... The grandfather was not with them.... He was out of sight and hearing.... They came and stood at my bedside, looking at me for a long time, visibly preoccupied, visibly alarmed....
They went away again, and still without a word. On the tripod candlestick, the candelabrum of the three crossed lances, three candles were burning brightly now ... three points of flame for the three long shafts.... Darkness was creeping down the chasm.... The water was moaning black in the on-coming night.
* * * * * * * * *
Ho! Ho-ho! What was that? Torches in my chamber! And voices shouting! Ah no! Not in my chamber ... down there, along the stream ... up on the cliffs, above the chasm.... Down there, of course! What could I have been thinking of?
Torches on the brink of the abyss.... Faces peering into the black void.... Uniforms! Red trousers, blue coats.... And a stretcher.... A good idea! A good idea!... Of course! Of course! For me, for me!
Voices calling. An oath or two. A voice louder than the others bidding these be silent. I heard everything distinctly. Yes, every word.
“But I see him, I tell you! Look, there he is! Down in that hole! Gotta get down there someway!”
“Watch your step, boy! What a hole!”
“What the hell! I done worse places than this before.... The Devil roast my soul! Stinks a bit, this fellow! Whew!”
“Aw go on, what are you giving us!”
“But I say, Sergeant, he’s rotten!”
“What do you mean, rotten! Can’t have been there more than twelve hours!”
“All right.... I can’t say how long he’s been here.... But I know rotten beef when I smell it.... Guess it’s from being in the water! Say, just chuck that piece of canvas down.... We’ll pass it under him and draw up the four corners.... This is no man ... just soup! Easier to spoon him up with a ladle!”
“Damn it, man ... what have you found? Somebody else? Take a squint at him.... We’ve got to get the right man! What’s he got in his pockets?”
“Sticky damn mess! Whew! But here we are! Our man, all right! Yes! Identification card! Other stuff with his name on it! And here’s his revolver! Our man, Sergeant, no doubt of that. How about that rag! Sending it down?”
“When you get him ready, you give the word and we’ll haul up!”
“Righto! One, two, three, and you pull!... Well, I’ll be damned!”
“What’s worrying you now?”
“Why this here corpse! Weighs about an ounce and a half!”
“What’s that? Lord, if he’s as far gone as that.... Say, give a look around! Maybe you’ve left some on the rocks, a leg or an arm, or something!”
“No! Got everything, Sergeant, head and all! All right at the other end?”
“All right here!”
“Well then up she goes!” ...
“And now we’re off....”
* * * * * * * * *
“Hey, don’t shake the thing so much when you walk!”
“Oh rats! Hell of a lot this bird cares whether there’s springs on his hearse!” ...
* * * * * * * * *
I lay there inert....
I could feel the pressure and the scrape of the canvas on my head, and legs and arms.... The litter went along jostling me.... I could see everything, clearly ... the flickering of the torches there, and the gleaming of the candles at the points of the three crossed lances....
Total darkness outside!... Not a ray of light coming through the grated window. Not one last trace of twilight on the mountain trail....
The canvas tightened, and closed my eyes. There on the heath a shroud of canvas! There in my room a shroud of slumber! Sleep! Another death!...