Kitabı oku: «The Wolf-Leader», sayfa 6

Thibault felt appalled as he realised with what scrupulous exactness the black wolf had fulfilled his part of the contract, and not without a shudder did he think of the right Master Isengrin now had to claim an equal punctuality of payment in return. He began to wonder uneasily whether the wolf, after all, was the kind of being that would continue to be satisfied with a few hairs – and this the more that both at the moment of his wish and during the succeeding minutes during which it was being accomplished, he had not been conscious of the slightest sensation anywhere about the roots of his hair, not even of the least little tickling. He was far from being pleasantly affected by the sight of poor Marcotte’s corpse; he had not loved him, it was true, and he had felt that he had good reason for not doing so; but his dislike to the defunct had never gone so far as to make him wish for his death, and the wolf had certainly gone far beyond his desires. At the same time, Thibault had never precisely said what he did wish, and had left the wolf a wide margin for the exercise of his malice; evidently he would have to be more careful in future in stating exactly what he wanted, and above all, more circumspect as regards any wish he might formulate.

As to the Baron, although still alive, he was almost as good as dead. From the moment when, as the result of Thibault’s wish, he had been struck down as it were by lightning, he had remained unconscious. His men had laid him on the heap of heather which the shoe-maker had piled up to hide the door of the shed, and troubled and frightened, were ransacking the place to try and find some restorative which might bring their master back to life. One asked for vinegar to put on his temples, another for a key to put down his back, this one for a bit of board to slap his hands with, that for some sulphur to burn under his nose. In the midst of all this confusion was heard the voice of little Engoulevent, calling out: “In the name of all that’s good, we don’t want all this truck, we want a goat. Ah! if only we had a goat!”

“A goat?” cried Thibault, who would have rejoiced to see the Baron recover, for it would lift at least part of the burden now weighing on his conscience, and would also rid his dwelling of these marauders. “A goat? I have a goat!”

“Really! you have a goat?” cried Engoulevent, “oh! my friends! now our dear master is saved!”

And so overcome with joy was he, that he flung his arms round Thibault’s neck, saying, “Bring out your goat, my friend! bring out your goat!”

Thibault went to the shed and led out the goat, which ran after him bleating.

“Hold it firmly by the horns,” said the huntsman, “and lift up one of its front feet.” And as he gave the word, the second huntsman drew from its sheath a little knife which he carried in his belt, and began carefully sharpening it on the grindstone which Thibault used for his tools. “What are you going to do?” asked the shoe-maker, feeling somewhat uneasy about these preparations.

“What! don’t you know,” said Engoulevent, “that there is a little bone in the shape of a cross inside a goat’s heart, which, if crushed into powder, is a sovereign remedy for apoplexy?”

“You intend to kill my goat?” exclaimed Thibault, at the same time leaving hold of the goat’s horns, and dropping its foot, “but I will not have it killed.”

“Fie, fie!” said Engoulevent, “that is not at all a becoming speech, Monsieur Thibault, would you value the life of our good master as of no more worth than that of your wretched goat? I am truly ashamed for you.”

“It’s easy for you to talk. This goat is all I have to depend upon, the only thing I possess. She gives me milk, and I am fond of her.”

“Ah! Monsieur Thibault, you cannot be thinking of what you are saying – it is fortunate that the Baron does not hear you – for he would be broken-hearted to know that his precious life was being bargained for in that miserly way.”

“And besides,” said one of the prickers with a sneering laugh, “if Master Thibault values his goat at a price which he thinks only my lord can pay, there is nothing to prevent him coming to the castle of Vez to claim this payment. The account can be settled with what was left over as due to him yesterday.”

Thibault knew that he could not get the better of these men, unless he again called the devil to his aid; but he had just received such a lesson from Satan, that there was no fear of his exposing himself, at all events for a second time the same day, to similar good offices. His one desire for the time being was not to wish any sort of ill to anyone of those present.

One man dead, another nearly so – Thibault found this lesson enough. Consequently, he kept his eyes turned away from the menacing and jeering countenances around him, for fear of being aggravated beyond control. While his back was turned, the poor goat’s throat was cut, her piteous cry alone informing him of the fact; and it was no sooner killed than its heart, which had hardly ceased throbbing, was opened in search of the little bone of which Engoulevent had spoken. This found, it was ground into powder, mixed with vinegar diluted with thirteen drops of gall from the bladder containing it, the whole stirred together in a glass with the cross of a rosary, and then poured gently down the Baron’s throat, after his teeth had been forced apart with the blade of a dagger.

The effect of the draught was immediate and truly miraculous. The Lord of Vez sneezed, sat up, and said in a voice, intelligible though still a little husky: “Give me something to drink.”

Engoulevent handed him some water in a wooden drinking-cup, a family possession, of which Thibault was very proud. But the Baron had no sooner put his lips to it and become aware of what the vile, abominable liquid was, which they had had the impudence to offer him, than, with an exclamation of disgust, he flung the vessel and its contents violently against the wall, and the cup fell, smashed into a thousand pieces. Then in a loud and sonorous voice, which left no doubt of his perfect recovery, he called out: “Bring me some wine.” One of the prickers mounted and rode at full speed to the castle of Oigny, and there requested the lord of the place to give him a flask or two of sound old Burgundy; ten minutes after he was back again. Two bottles were uncorked, and there being no glasses at hand, the Baron put them in turn to his mouth, draining each at a single draught.

Then he turned himself round with his face to the wall, and murmuring – Mâcon, 1743 – fell into a profound slumber.

CHAPTER VI
THE BEDEVILLED HAIR

THE huntsmen, being reassured with regard to their master’s health, now went in search of the dogs, which had been left to carry on the chase alone. They were found lying asleep, the ground around them stained with blood. It was evident that they had run down the buck and eaten it; if any doubt on the matter remained, it was done away with by the sight of the antlers, and a portion of the jaw bone, the only parts of the animal which they could not crunch up, and which had therefore not disappeared. In short, they were the only ones who had cause to be satisfied with the day’s work. The huntsmen, after shutting up the hounds in Thibault’s shed, seeing that their master was still sleeping, began to turn their thoughts to getting some supper. They laid hands on everything they could find in the poor wretch’s cupboard, and roasted the goat, politely inviting Thibault to take a share in the meal towards the cost of which he had not a little contributed. He refused, giving as a plausible excuse, the great agitation he still was under, owing to Marcotte’s death and the Baron’s accident.

He gathered up the fragments of his beloved drinking-cup, and seeing that it was useless to think of ever being able to put it together again, he began turning over in his mind what it might be possible for him to do, so as to free himself from the miserable existence which the events of the last two days had rendered more insupportable than ever. The first image that appeared to him, was that of Agnelette. Like the beautiful angels that pass before the eyes of children in their dreams, he saw her figure, dressed all in white, with large white wings, floating across a blue sky. She seemed happy and beckoned to him to follow, saying the while “Those who come with me will be very happy.” But the only answer which Thibault vouchsafed to this charming vision was a movement of the head and shoulders, which interpreted, meant, “Yes, yes, Agnelette, I see you, and recognise you; yesterday, it would have been all very well to follow you; but to-day I am, like a king, the arbiter of life and death, and I am not the man to make foolish concessions to a love only born a day ago, and which has hardly learnt to stammer out its first words. To marry you, my poor child, far from lessening the bitter hardships of our lives, would only double or treble the burden under which we are both borne down. No, Agnelette, no! You would make a charming mistress; but, a wife – she must be in a position to bring money to support the household, equal in proportion to the power which I should contribute.”

His conscience told him plainly that he was engaged to marry Agnelette; but he quieted it with the assurance that if he broke the engagement, it would be for the good of that gentle creature.

“I am an upright man,” he murmured to himself, “and it is my duty to sacrifice my personal pleasure to the welfare of the dear child. And more than that, she is sufficiently young and pretty and good, to find a better fate than what would await her as the wife of a plain sabot maker.” And the end of all these fine reflections was, that Thibault felt himself bound to allow his foolish promises of the day before to melt away into air, and to forget the betrothal, of which the only witnesses had been the quivering leaves of the birch trees, and the pink blossom of the heather. It should be added that there was another mental vision, not wholly irresponsible for the resolution at which Thibault had arrived, – the vision of a certain young widow, owner of the mill at Croyolles, a woman between twenty-six and twenty-eight, fresh and plump, with fine, rolling eyes, not devoid of mischief. Moreover, she was credibly supposed to be the richest match in all the country side, for her mill was never idle, and so, for all reasons, as one can clearly see, it was the very thing for Thibault.

Formerly, it would never have occurred to Thibault to aspire to anyone in the position of the rich and beautiful Madame Polet, for such was the name of the owner of the mill; and this will explain why her name is introduced here for the first time. And, in truth, it was the first time that she had ever occurred as a subject of serious consideration to our hero. He was astonished at himself for not having thought of her before, but then, as he said to himself, he had often thought about her, but without hope, while now, seeing that he was under the protection of the wolf, and that he had been endowed with a supernatural power, which he had already had occasion to exercise, it seemed to him an easy matter to get rid of all his rivals and achieve his purpose. True there were evil tongues that spoke of the owner of the mill as having something of an ill-temper and a hard heart; but the shoe-maker came to the conclusion that, with the devil up his sleeve, he need not trouble himself about any wicked spirit, any petty little second-class demon that might find a corner in Widow Polet’s disposition. And so, by the time the day broke, he had decided to go to Croyolles, for all these visions had of course visited him during the night.

The Lord of Vez awoke with the first song of the birds; he had entirely recovered from his indisposition of the day before, and woke up his followers with loud slashings of his whip. Having sent off Marcotte’s body to Vez, he decided that he would not return home without having killed something, but that he would hunt the boar, just as if nothing out of the way had taken place on the previous day. At last, about six o’clock in the morning, they all went off, the Baron assuring Thibault that he was most grateful to him for the hospitality that he himself and his men and dogs had met with under his poor roof, in consideration of which he was quite willing, he swore, to forget all the grievances which he had against the shoe-maker.

It will be easily guessed that Thibault experienced little regret at the departure of lord, dogs, and huntsmen. All these having at last disappeared, he stood a few moments contemplating his ransacked home, his empty cupboard, his broken furniture, his empty shed, the ground scattered with fragments of his belongings. But, as he told himself, all this was the ordinary thing to happen whenever one of the great lords went through a place, and the future, as it appeared to him, was far too brilliant to allow him to dwell long on this spectacle. He dressed himself in his Sunday attire, smartening himself as best he could, ate his last bit of bread with the last morsel left of his goat, went to the spring and drank a large glass of water, and started off for Croyolles. Thibault was determined to try his fortune with Madame Polet before the day was over, and therefore set out about nine o’clock in the morning.

The shortest way to Croyolles was round by the rear of Oigny and Pisseleu. Now Thibault knew every in and out of the forest of Villers-Cotterets as well as any tailor knows the pockets he has made; why, therefore, did he take the Chrétiennelle track, seeing that it lengthened his journey by a good mile and a half? Reader, it was because this lane would bring him near to the spot where he had first seen Agnelette, for, although practical considerations were carrying him in the direction of Croyolles Mill, his heart was drawing him towards Préciamont. And there, as fate would have it, just after crossing the road that runs to La Ferté-Milou, he came upon Agnelette, cutting grass by the way-side for her goats. He might easily have passed her without being seen, for her back was turned towards him; but the evil spirit prompted him, and he went straight up to her. She was stooping to cut the grass with her sickle, but hearing someone approaching she lifted her head, and blushed as she recognised that it was Thibault. With the blush a happy smile rose to her face, which showed that the rising colour was not due to any feeling of hostility towards him.

“Ah! there you are,” she said. “I dreamt much of you last night, and prayed many prayers for you also.” And as she spoke, the vision of Agnelette passing along the sky, with the dress and wings of an Angel, and her hands joined in supplication, as he had seen her the previous night, returned to him.

“And what made you dream of me and pray for me, my pretty child?” asked Thibault with as unconcerned an air as a young lord at Court. Agnelette looked at him with her large eyes of heavenly blue.

“I dreamed of you, Thibault, because I love you,” she said, “and I prayed for you, because I saw the accident that happened to the Baron and his huntsmen, and all the trouble that you were put to in consequence… Ah! if I had been able to obey the dictates of my heart, I should have run to you at once to give you help.”

“It is a pity you did not come; you would have found a merry company, I can tell you.”

“Oh! it was not for that I should have liked to be with you, but to be of use to you in receiving the Baron and his train. Oh! what a beautiful ring you have, Monsieur Thibault, where did you get it?”

And the girl pointed to the ring which had been given to Thibault by the wolf. Thibault felt his blood run cold. “This ring?” he said.

“Yes, that ring,” and seeing that Thibault appeared unwilling to answer her, Agnelette turned her head aside, and sighed. “A present from some fine lady, I suppose,” she said in a low voice.

“There you are mistaken, Agnelette,” replied Thibault with all the assurance of a consummate liar, “it is our betrothal ring, the one I have bought to put on your finger the day we are married.”

“Why not tell me the truth, Monsieur Thibault?” said Agnelette, shaking her head sadly.

“I am speaking the truth, Agnelette.”

“No,” and she shook her head more sadly than before.

“And what makes you think that I am telling a lie?”

“Because the ring is large enough to go over two of my fingers.” And Thibault’s finger would certainly have made two of Agnelette’s.

“If it is too large, Agnelette,” he said, “we can have it made smaller.”

“Good-bye, Monsieur Thibault.”

“What! Good-bye?”

“Yes.”

“You are going to leave me?”

“Yes, I am going.”

“And why, Agnelette?”

“Because I do not love liars.”

Thibault tried to think of some vow he could make to reassure Agnelette, but in vain.

“Listen,” said Agnelette, with tears in her eyes, for it was not without a great effort of self-control that she was turning away, “if that ring is really meant for me…”

“Agnelette, I swear to you that it is.”

“Well then, give it me to keep till our wedding day, and on that day I will give it back to you, that you may have it blessed.”

“I will give it you with all my heart,” replied Thibault, “but I want to see it on your pretty hand. You were right in saying that it was too large for you, and I am going into Villers-Cotterets to-day, we will take the measure of your finger, and I will get Monsieur Dugué, the goldsmith there, to alter it for us.”

The smile returned to Agnelette’s face and her tears were dried up at once. She put out her little hand; Thibault took it between his own, turned it over and looked at it, first on the back and then on the palm, and stooping, kissed it.

“Oh!” said Agnelette “you should not kiss my hand, Monsieur Thibault, it is not pretty enough.”

“Give me something else then to kiss.” And Agnelette lifted her face that he might kiss her on the forehead.

“And now,” she said joyously, and with childish eagerness, “let me see the ring.”

Thibault drew off the ring, and laughing, tried to put it on Agnelette’s thumb; but, to his great astonishment, he could not get it over the joint. “Well, well,” he exclaimed “who would ever have thought such a thing?”

Agnelette began to laugh. “It is funny, isn’t it!” she said.

Then Thibault tried to pass it over the first finger, but with the same result as when he put it on the thumb. He next tried the middle finger, but the ring seemed to grow smaller and smaller, as if fearing to sully this virgin hand; then the third finger, the same on which he wore it himself, but it was equally impossible to get it on. And as he made these vain attempts to fit the ring, Thibault felt Agnelette’s hand trembling more and more violently within his own, while the sweat fell from his own brow, as if he were engaged in the most arduous work; there was something diabolic at the bottom of it, as he knew quite well. At last he came to the little finger and endeavoured to pass the ring over it. This little finger, so small and transparent, that the ring should have hung as loosely upon it as a bracelet on one of Thibault’s, this little finger, in spite of all Agnelette’s efforts, refused to pass through the ring. “Ah! my God, Monsieur Thibault,” cried the child “what does this mean?”

“Ring of the Devil, return to the Devil!” cried Thibault, flinging the ring against a rock, in the hope that it would be broken. As it struck the rock, it emitted flame; then it rebounded, and in rebounding, fitted itself on to Thibault’s finger. Agnelette who saw this strange evolution of the ring, looked at Thibault in horrified amazement. “Well,” he said, trying to brave it out, “what is the matter?”

Agnelette did not answer, but as she continued to look at Thibault, her eye grew more and more wild and frightened. Thibault could not think what she was looking at, but slowly lifting her hand and pointing with her finger at Thibault’s head, she said, “Oh! Monsieur Thibault, Monsieur Thibault, what have you got there?”

“Where?” asked Thibault.

“There! there!” cried Agnelette, growing paler and paler.

“Well, but where?” cried the shoe-maker, stamping with his foot. “Tell me what you see.”

But instead of replying, Agnelette covered her face with her hands, and uttering a cry of terror, turned and fled with all her might.

Thibault, stunned by what had happened, did not even attempt to follow her; he stood rooted to the spot, unable to move or speak, as if thunderstruck.

What had Agnelette seen that had alarmed her so? What was it that she pointed to with her finger? Had God branded him, as He branded the first murderer? And why not? Had not he, like Cain, killed a man? and in the last sermon he had heard at Oigny had not the preacher said that all men were brothers? Thibault felt wild with misgivings; what had so terrified Agnelette? That he must find out without delay. At first he thought he would go into the town of Bourg-Fontaine and look at himself in a glass. But then, supposing the fatal mark was upon him, and others, besides Agnelette, were to see it! No, he must think of some other way of finding out. He could, of course, pull his hat over his brow, and run back to Oigny, where he had a fragment of mirror in which he could see himself; but Oigny was a long way off. Then he remembered that only a few paces from where he stood, there was a spring as transparent as crystal, which fed the pond near Baisemont, and those at Bourg; he would be able to see himself in that as clearly as in the finest mirror from Saint-Gobain. So Thibault went to the side of the stream and, kneeling down, looked at himself. He saw the same eyes, the same nose, and the same mouth, and not even the slightest little mark upon the forehead – he drew a breath of relief. But still, there must have been something. Agnelette had certainly not taken fright as she had, for nothing. Thibault bent over closer to the crystal water; and now he saw there was something bright that shone amid the dark curls on his head and fell over his forehead. He leaned closer still – it was a red hair. A red hair, but of a most peculiar red – not sandy coloured or carrotty; neither of a light shade nor a dark; but a red of the colour of blood, with a brightness of the most vivid flame. Without stopping to consider how a hair of such a phenomenal colour could possibly have grown there, he began trying to pull it out. He drew forward the curl where gleamed the terrible red hair, that it might hang over the water, and then taking hold of it carefully between his finger and thumb gave it a violent pull; but the hair refused to come away. Thinking that he had not got sufficient hold of it, he tried another way, winding the hair round his finger and again giving it a vigorous jerk – the hair cut into his fingers but remained as firmly rooted as ever. Thibault then turned it round two of his fingers and pulled again; the hair lifted a little bit of his scalp, but as to moving, Thibault might as well have tried to move the oak that threw its shady branches across the stream. Thibault began to think that he would do better to continue his walk to Croyolles; after all, as he remarked to himself, the questionable colour of a single hair would not hardly upset his plans of marriage. Neverthetheless, the wretched hair caused him a great deal of worry; he could not get it out of his mind, it seemed to dance before his eyes, dazzling him like flames of running fire, until at last, out of all patience, he stamped his foot, exclaiming, “By all the devils in hell! I am not far from home yet, and I’ll get the better of this confounded hair somehow.” Whereupon he set off running back towards his hut, went in and found his fragment of mirror, got hold of his hair again, seized a carpenter’s chisel, placed it so as to cut off the hair as close to the head as possible, and keeping hair and tool in this position, leant over his bench, and dug the chisel down with as much force as possible. The tool cut deeply into the wood of the bench, but the hair remained intact. He tried the same plan again, only this time he armed himself with a mallet, which he swung over his head and brought down with redoubled blows on the handle of the chisel – but he was as far as ever from carrying out his purpose. He noticed, however, that there was a little notch in the sharp edge of the chisel, just the width of a hair. Thibault sighed; he understood now that this hair, the price he had paid in return for his wish, belonged to the black wolf, and he gave up all further attempts to get rid of it.