"Anastasie; I do not feel myself comfortable to-day; strange and mysterious things are going on in this house."
"What! Are you going to break out again? What an old fool you are! Why, strange things happen in every house. What has come over you? Come, let's look at you! Well, I declare, you are all of a sweat, just as if you had been dragged out of the water! What have you been doing since I left you? Overexerting yourself, I am sure, and I forbid you ever doing so. La! Look how the great drops pour from him, poor old chick!"
"And well they may!" exclaimed M. Pipelet, passing his hand over his face, bathed in its own dew; "well may I sweat,—ay, even blood and water,—for there are facts connected with this house past belief or comprehension. First, you summon me up-stairs, and, at the same moment, I find you waiting below! Oh, it is too, too much for my poor brain!"
"Deuce take me, if I can comprehend one word of all you are saying! Lord, help us! It is to be hoped your poor old brain is not cracked. I tell you what, if you go on so, I shall just set you down for cracked; and all through that scamp of a Cabrion,—the devil take him! Ever since that last trick he played the other day, I declare you have not been yourself, so flustered and bewildered! Do you mean to live in fear and dread of that abominable painter all your days?"
But scarcely had Anastasie uttered these words than a fearful thing occurred. Alfred continued sitting, with his face turned towards the bed, while the lodge was dimly illumined by the faint glimmer of a winter's afternoon and a lamp that stood burning on the table, near Alfred's work. By these doubtful lights, M. Pipelet, just as his wife pronounced the name of Cabrion, imagined he saw, in the shadow of the recess, the half stolid, half chuckling features of his enemy. Alas! Too truly, there he was. His steeple-crowned hat, his flowing locks, thin countenance, sardonic smile, pointed beard, and look of fiendish malice, all were there, past all mistake. For a moment, M. Pipelet believed himself under the influence of a dream, and passed his hand across his eyes, in hopes that the illusion might disperse; but no; there was nothing illusive in what his eyes glared so fearfully upon,—nothing could be more real or positive. Yet, horror of horrors! This object seemed merely to possess a head, which, without allowing any part of the body to appear, grinned a satanic smile from the dark draperies of the recess in which stood the bed. At this horrific vision M. Pipelet fell back, without uttering a word. With uplifted arm he pointed towards the source of his terrors, but with so strong a manifestation of intense alarm that Madame Pipelet, spite of her usual courage and self-possession, could not help feeling a dread of—she knew not what. She staggered back a few steps, then, seizing Alfred by the hand, exclaimed:
"Cabrion!"
"I know it!" groaned forth M. Pipelet, in a deep, hollow voice, shutting his eyes to exclude the frightful spectre.
Nothing could have borne more flattering tribute to the talent which had so admirably delineated the features of Cabrion than the overwhelming terror his pasteboard likeness occasioned to the worthy couple in the lodge; but the first surprise of Anastasie over, she, bold as a lioness, rushed to the bed, sprang upon it, and, though not without some trepidation, tore the painting from the wall, against which it had been nailed; then, crowning her valiant deed by her accustomed favourite expression, the amazon triumphantly exclaimed:
"Get along with you!"
Alfred, on the contrary, remained with closed eyes and extended hands, fixed and motionless, according to his wont during the most critical passages of his life; the continued oscillation of his bell-crowned hat alone revealing, from time to time, the violence of his internal emotions.