One could not mistake its spreading antlers, the height of its neck and the delicacy of its ears; it was a stag of ten. But hardly had I perceived it than it made off in a sudden volte-face. Then—had it gathered itself in to spring?—its body seemed to me strangely low and paltry, and was it a mere reflection?—seemed to me to be of a white color. The animal disappeared in a twinkling, and its little galloping steps died quickly away.
Had I at the first glance taken a goat for a stag? Or had I at the second glance taken a stag for a goat? To tell the truth, I was much interested and puzzled; so much so that I asked myself whether I were not going to resume the soul of the child I had been at Fonval.
But a little reflection made me realize that hunger, fatigue and sleepiness, helped out by moonshine, may easily cause one’s eyes to be deceived, and that a ray falling on an object and transforming it is no unwonted phenomenon.
I rather regretted it; for, having lost my terror of the mysterious, I had still kept my love for it. I am one of those who are sorry that “Philosophy has clipped an angel’s wings,” and yet I cannot let a mystery remain a mystery for me.
Now this beast was really a very extraordinary beast.
Wandering as it was through the incomprehensible labyrinth of the wood, it seemed to me an elusive riddle in a problem, and my curiosity was aroused.
But utterly wearied as I was, I soon fell asleep pondering detective ruses and subtle logical methods of investigation.
I awoke at dawn, and immediately I had a glimpse of a possible end to my imprisonment.
Not far from where I was, some men, hidden by the underwood, were walking and talking. Their steps came and went like those of the stag(?) treading, doubtless the same winding ways. At one moment they passed, still hidden, a few paces away from my car, but I could not understand their conversation—it seemed to be in German.