"I had loved her madly!
"Why does one love? Why does one love? How queer it is to see only one
being in the world, to have only one thought in one's mind, only one desire in
the heart, and only one name on the lips--a name which comes up continually,
rising, like the water in a spring, from the depths of the soul to the lips, a
name which one repeats over and over again, which one whispers ceaselessly,
everywhere, like a prayer.
"I am going to tell you our story, for love only has one, whichis always
the same. I met her and loved her; that is all. And fora whole year I have
lived on her tenderness, on her caresses, in her arms, in her dresses, on her
words, so completely wrapped up, bound, and absorbed in everything which came
from her, that I no longer cared whether it was day or night, or whether I was
dead or alive, on this old earth of ours.
"And then she died. How? I do not know; I no longer know anything. But one
evening she came home wet, for it was raining heavily, and the next day she
coughed, and she coughed for about a week, and took to her bed. What happened I
do not remember now, but doctors came, wrote, and went away. Medicines were
brought, and some women made her drink them. Her hands were hot, her forehead
was burning, and her eyes bright and sad. When I spoke to her, she answered me,
but I do not remember what we said. I have forgotten everything, everything,
everything! She died, and I very well remember her slight, feeble sigh. The
nurse said: 'Ah!' and I understood, I understood!
"I knew nothing more, nothing. I saw a priest, who said: 'Your mistress?'
and it seemed to me as if he were insulting her. As she was dead, nobody had
the right to say that any longer, and I turned him out. Another came who was
very kind and tender, and I shed tears when he spoke to me about her.
"They consulted me about the funeral, but I do not remember anything that
they said, though I recollected the coffin, and the sound of the hammer when
they nailed her down in it. Oh! God, God!
"She was buried! Buried! She! In that hole! Some people came--female
friends. I made my escape and ran away. I ran, and then walked through the
streets, went home, and the next day started on a journey.
* * * * * * *
"Yesterday I returned to Paris, and when I saw my room again--our room,
our bed, our furniture, everything that remains of the life of a human being
after death--I was seized by such a violent attack of fresh grief, that I felt
like opening the window and throwing myself out into the street. I could not
remain any longer among these things, between these walls which had inclosed
and sheltered her, which retained a thousand atoms of her, of her skin and of
her breath, in their imperceptible crevices. I took up my hat to make my escape,
and just as I reached the door, I passed the large glass in the hall, which she
had put there so that she might look at herself every day from head to foot as
she went out, to see if her toilette looked well, and was correct and pretty,
from her little boots to her bonnet.
"I stopped short in front of that looking-glass in which she had so often
been reflected--so often, so often, that it must have retained her reflection.
I was standing there. trembling, with my eyes fixed on the glass--on that flat,
profound, empty glass--which had contained her entirely, and had possessed her
as much as I, as my passionate looks had. I felt as if I loved that glass. I
touched it; it was cold. Oh! the recollection! sorrowful mirror, burning
mirror, horrible mirror, to make men suffer such torments! Happy is the man
whose heart forgets everything that it has contained, everything that has
passed before it, everything that has looked at itself in it, or has been
reflected in its affection, in its love! How I suffer!
"I went out without knowing it, without wishing it, and toward the
cemetery. I found her simple grave, a white marble cross, with these few words:
" 'She loved, was loved, and died.'
"She is there, below, decayed! How horrible! I sobbed with my forehead on
the ground, and I stopped there for a long time, a long time. Then I saw that
it was getting dark, and a strange, mad wish, the wish of a despairing lover,
seized me. I wished to pass the night, the last night, in weeping on her grave.
But I should be seen and driven out. How was I to manage? I was cunning, and
got up and began to roam about in that city of the dead. I walked and walked.
How small this city is, in comparison with the other, the city in which we
live. And yet, how much more numerous the dead are than the living. We want
high houses, wide streets, and much room for the four generations who see the
daylight at the same time, drink water from the spring, and wine from the
vines, and eat bread from the plains.
"And for all the generations of the dead, for all that ladder of humanity
that has descended down to us, there is scarcely anything, scarcely anything!
The earth takes them back, and oblivion effaces them. Adieu!
"At the end of the cemetery, I suddenly perceived that I was in its oldest
part, where those who had been dead a long time are mingling with the soil,
where the crosses themselves are decayed, where possibly newcomers will be put
to-morrow. It is full of untended roses, of strong and dark cypress-trees, a
sad and beautiful garden, nourished on human flesh.
"I was alone, perfectly alone. So I crouched in a green tree and hid
myself there completely amid the thick and somber branches. I waited, clinging
to the stem, like a shipwrecked man does to a plank.
"When it was quite dark, I left my refuge and began to walk softly,
slowly, inaudibly, through that ground full of dead people. I wandered about
for a long time, but could not find her tomb again. I went on with extended
arms, knocking against the tombs with my hands, my feet, my knees, my chest,
even with my head, without being able to find her. I groped about like a blind
man finding his way, I felt the stones, the crosses, the iron railings, the
metal wreaths, and the wreaths of faded flowers! I read the names with my fingers,
by passing them over the letters. What a night! What a night! I could not find
her again!
"There was no moon. What a night! I was frightened, horribly frightened in
these narrow paths, between two rows of graves. Graves! graves! graves! nothing
but graves! On my right, on my left, in front of me, around me, everywhere
there were graves! I sat down on one of them, for I could not walk any longer,
my knees were so weak. I could hear my heart beat! And I heard something else
as well. What? A confused, nameless noise. Was the noise in my head, in the
impenetrable night, or beneath the mysterious earth, the earth sown with human
corpses? I looked all around me, but I cannot say how long I remained there; I
was paralyzed with terror, cold with fright, ready to shout out, ready to die.
"Suddenly, it seemed to me that the slab of marble on which I was sitting,
was moving. Certainly it was moving, as if it were being raised. With a bound,
I sprang on to the neighboring tomb, and I saw, yes, I distinctly saw the stone
which I had just quitted rise upright. Then the dead person appeared, a naked
skeleton, pushing the stone back with its bent back. I saw it quite clearly,
although the night was so dark. On the cross I could read:
" 'Here lies Jacques Olivant, who died at the age of fifty-one. He loved
his family, was kind and honorable, and died in the grace of the Lord.'
"The dead man also read what was inscribed on his tombstone; then he
picked up a stone off the path, a little, pointed stone and began to scrape the
letters carefully. He slowly effaced them, and with the hollows of his eyes he
looked at the places where they had been engraved. Then with the tip of the
bone that had been his forefinger, he wrote in luminous letters, like those
lines which boys trace on walls with the tip of a lucifer match:
" 'Here reposes Jacques Olivant, who died at the age of fifty-one. He
hastened his father's death by his unkindness, as he wished to inherit his
fortune, he tortured his wife, tormented his children, deceived his neighbors,
robbed everyone he could, and died wretched.'
"When he had finished writing, the dead man stood motionless, looking at
his work. On turning round I saw that all the graves were open, that all the
dead bodies had emerged from them, and that all had effaced the lies inscribed
on the gravestones by their relations, substituting the truth instead. And I
saw that all had been the tormentors of their neighbors--malicious, dishonest,
hypocrites, liars, rogues, calumniators, envious; that they had stolen,
deceived, performed every disgraceful, every abominable action, these good
fathers, these faithful wives, these devoted sons, these chaste daughters,
these honest tradesmen, these men and women who were called irreproachable.
They were all writing at the same time, on the threshold of their eternal
abode, the truth, the terrible and the holy truth of which everybody was
ignorant, or pretended to be ignorant, while they were alive.
"I thought that SHE also must have written something on her tombstone, and
now running without any fear among the half-open coffins, among the corpses and
skeletons, I went toward her, sure that I should find her immediately. I
recognized her at once, without seeing her face, which was covered by the
winding-sheet, and on the marble cross, where shortly before I had read:
" 'She loved, was loved, and died.'
I now saw:
" 'Having gone out in the rain one day, in order to deceive her lover, she
caught cold and died.'
* * * * * * *
"It appears that they found me at daybreak, lying on the grave
unconscious."
