"Have pity on me, and I will—"
The Chouette was unable to conclude. Again there was a profound silence. The little cripple again began to beat time on the stone staircase on which he was seated, accompanying the noise of his feet with the repeated cry:
"Why don't you begin? Up with the curtain! Music! Music!"
"In this way, Chouette, you can no longer disturb me with your cries," said the Schoolmaster, after a few minutes, during which he had, no doubt, gagged the old woman. "You know very well," he continued, in a slow, hollow voice, "that I do not wish to end this all at once; torture for torture! You have made me suffer enough, and I must speak at length to you before I kill you,—yes, at length. It will be very terrible for you, agonising!"
"Come, no stuff and nonsense, old parson," said Tortillard, raising himself half up from his seat; "punish her, but don't do her any harm. You say you'll kill her,—that's only a hum; I am very fond of my Chouette; I have only lent her to you, and you must give her back again. Don't spoil her,—I won't have my Chouette spoiled,—if you do, I'll go and fetch pa!"
"Be quiet, and she shall only have what she deserves, a profitable lesson," said the Schoolmaster, in order to assure Tortillard, and for fear the cripple should go and fetch assistance.
"All right! Bravo! Now the play's going to begin!" said Bras-Rouge's son, who did not seriously believe that the Schoolmaster intended to kill the Chouette.
"Let us discourse a little, Chouette," continued the Schoolmaster, in a calm voice. "In the first place, you see, since that dream at the Bouqueval farm, which brought all my crimes before my eyes, since that dream, which did all but drive me mad,—which will drive me mad, for, in my solitude, in the deep isolation in which I live, all my thoughts dwell on this dream, in spite of myself,—a strange change has come over me; yes, I have a horror of my past ferocity. In the first place, I would not allow you to make a martyr of La Goualeuse, though that was nothing. Chaining me here in the cellar, making me suffer from cold and hunger, and detaining me for your wicked suggestions, you have left me to all the fear of my own reflections. Oh, you do not know what it is to be left alone,—always alone,—with a dark veil over your eyes, as the pitiless man said who punished me. Oh, it is horrid! It was in this very cavern that I flung him, in order to kill him; and this cavern is the place of my punishment, it may be my grave. I repeat that this is horrid! All that that man predicted to me has come to pass; he said to me, 'You have abused your strength,—you will be the plaything, the sport of the most weak.' And it has been so. He said to me, 'Henceforward separated from the exterior world, face to face with the eternal remembrance of your crimes, one day you will repent those crimes.' And that day has come; the loneliness has purified me; I could not have believed it possible. Another proof that I am perhaps less wicked than formerly, is that I feel inexpressible joy in holding you here, monster! Not to avenge myself, but to avenge your victims,—yes, I shall have accomplished a duty when, with my own hands, I shall have punished my accomplice. A voice says to me, that, if you had fallen into my power earlier, much blood, much blood would have been spared. I have now a horror of my past murders; and yet, is it not strange? It is without fear, it is even with security, that I am now about to perpetrate on you a fearful murder, with most fearful refinements. Say, say! Do you understand that?"
"Bravo! Well played, old No-Eyes! He gets on," exclaimed Tortillard, applauding. "It is really something to laugh at."
"To laugh at?" continued the Schoolmaster, in a hollow voice. "Keep still, Chouette; I must complete my explanation as to how I gradually came to repentance. This revelation will be hateful to you, heart of stone, and will prove to you also how remorseless I ought to be in the vengeance which I should wreak on you in the name of our victims. I must be quick. My delight at grasping you thus makes my blood throb in my veins,—my temples beat with violence, just as when, by thinking of my dream, my reason wanders. Perhaps one of my crises will come on; but I shall have time to make the approaches of death frightful to you by compelling you to hear me."