Bonnaire had not intervened, but he had kept his eyes on Ragu, watching for the change that he expected after that day of surprises which, one by one, had shaken the wanderer until at last he was terrified and transported by that final blaze of glory. At last realising that he was sorely stricken, and tottering, Bonnaire gave him his hand. 'Come, let us walk a little,' he said, 'the evening air is so mild. And tell me, do you now believe in our happiness? Surely you must now see that one may work and at the same time be happy. Indeed, joy and health and perfect life are to be found in work. To work is to live. And only a religion of suffering and death could have made work a curse, and eternal sloth the happiness of heaven! Work is not our master, it is the breath of our lungs, the blood of our veins, the one sole reason why we love and create and form immortal humanity!
But Ragu, as if exhausted by fatigue, weary unto death amidst his defeat, ceased arguing: 'Oh, leave me, leave me,' said he. 'I am only a coward, a child would have had more courage, and I hold myself in contempt.' Then in a whisper he went on: 'I came to kill them both. Ah! that never-ending journey, the roads that followed the roads, the years of roaming through unknown lands with one rageful thought in my heart—that of returning to Beauclair, of finding that man and that woman once more, and of planting in their flesh the knife I had used so clumsily! But you met me, amused me, and just now I trembled before them, and retreated like a coward, when I saw them looking so beautiful, so great, so radiant!'
Bonnaire shuddered on hearing that confession. Already on the previous night he had apprehended a crime. But now, at the sight of the woeful wretch's collapse, he felt stirred by pity. 'Come, come, you unhappy being,' he exclaimed, 'come and sleep again to-night at my house. To-morrow we'll see——'
'Sleep again at your house! Oh! no, no! I'm going, I'm going at once!'
'But you cannot start off at this hour—you are too tired, too weak. Why won't you stay with us? You will become calmer, you will know our happiness.'
'No, no! I must start at once, at once. The potter said the truth, I'm not of the sort to make one of you.' And like some damned and tortured wretch full of suppressed wrath Ragu added: 'Your happiness—why, I can't bear the sight of it! It would make me suffer too much!'
Bonnaire then ceased to insist; secret horror and uneasiness had come over him also. In silence he led Ragu to his house again, and the other, unwilling even to wait till the end of the meal, took up his wallet and his staff. Not a word was exchanged between them, not even a gesture of farewell. Bonnaire watched the miserable old man go off with tottering steps, and vanish at last, far away in the night, which was gradually falling.
It was impossible, however, for Ragu to lose sight of festive Beauclair in a moment. He slowly went up the Brias gorge, and at each step climbed higher and higher among the rocks of the Bleuse Mountains. Before long he was above the town, the whole of which on turning round he once more beheld. The sky, of a dark yet pure blue, was glittering with stars. And, beneath the sweetness of the lovely June night, the town spread out like another stretch of sky, swarming, as it were, with innumerable little planets—the thousands and thousands of electric lamps which had just been lighted on the banquet tables and amidst the greenery. Once more then Ragu beheld those tables, outlined, so to say, with fire, and thus emerging victoriously from the darkness. They spread along without end till they filled the whole space below him. And he could hear laughter and singing arising, and still and ever behold that giant festival of a whole people, gathered together at table in one sole brotherly family.
Then he once more sought to flee the sight, and ascended still higher; but when he next turned round, he again saw the city glowing yet more brightly than before. He went higher still, he ever and ever climbed upward, but at each further ascent, each time that he turned round the city seemed to have grown, till at last it spread over the entire plain, becoming like the very heavens with its infinite expanse of sombre blue and glittering stars. The sounds of laughter and of song reached him more and more distinctly; it was as if the whole great human family were celebrating the joy of work, upon the fruitful earth. Then, for the last time, he again set out, and walked for hours and for hours until he became lost in the darkness.
V