"Finally the repentant sinner, the mystic.
"He is a mass of contradictions and excesses. Viewing his life as a whole one finds each of his vices compensated by a contradictory virtue, but there is no key characteristic which reconciles them.
"He is of an overweening arrogance, but when contrition takes possession of him, he falls on his knees in front of the people of low estate, and has the tears, the humility of a saint.
"His ferocity passes the limits of the human scale, and yet he is generous and sincerely devoted to his friends, whom he cares for like a brother when the Demon has mauled them.
"Impetuous in his desires, and nevertheless patient; brave in battle, a coward confronting eternity; he is despotic and violent, yet he is putty in the hands of his flatterers. He is now in the clouds, now in the abyss, never on the trodden plain, the lowlands of the soul. His confessions do not throw any light on his invariable tendency to extremes. When asked who suggested to him the idea of such crimes, he answers, 'No one. The thought came to me only from myself, from my reveries, my daily pleasures, my taste for debauchery.' And he arraigns his indolence and constantly asserts that delicate repasts and strong drink have helped uncage the wild animal in him.
"Unresponsive to mediocre passions, he is carried away alternately by good as well as evil, and he bounds from spiritual pole to spiritual pole. He dies at the age of thirty-six, but he has completely exhausted the possibilities of joy and grief. He has adored death, loved as a vampire, kissed inimitable expressions of suffering and terror, and has, himself, been racked by implacable remorse, insatiable fear. He has nothing more to try, nothing more to learn, here below.
"Let's see," said Durtal, running over his notes. "I left him at the moment when the expiation begins. As I had written in one of my preceding chapters, the inhabitants of the region dominated by the châteaux of the Marshal know now who the inconceivable monster is who carries children
off and cuts their throats. But no one dare speak. When, at a turn in the road, the tall figure of the butcher is seen approaching, all flee, huddle behind the hedges, or shut themselves up in the cottages.
"And Gilles passes, haughty and sombre, in the solitude of villages where no one dares venture abroad. Impunity seems assured him, for what peasant would be mad enough to attack a master who could have him gibbeted at a word?
"Again, if the humble give up the idea of bringing Gilles de Rais to justice, his peers have no intention of combating him for the benefit of peasants whom they disdain, and his liege, the duke of Brittany, Jean V, burdens him with favours and blandishments in order to extort his lands from him at a low price.