Collected Works of Eugène Sue

by Eugène Sue

  “Did you see a rider enter town this night?”

  “About a quarter of an hour ago,” the soldier answered, “a rider wrapped in a hooded mantle went by at a gallop. He rode towards the camp.”

  “It is he,” I said to myself, and resumed my course at the risk of seeing Tom-Bras expire under me. There could be no doubt; my traveling companion made a short cut through the forest, but why did he proceed to the camp, instead of entering the town? A few moments later I arrived before my house. I leaped down from my horse that neighed gladly as he recognized the place. I ran to the door and knocked hard. No one opened to me, but I heard muffled cries within. Again I knocked with the handle of my sword, but in vain. The cries grew louder; I thought I heard Sampso’s voice — I tried to break down the door — impossible. Suddenly the window of my wife’s room was thrown open. I ran thither sword in hand. At the instant when I arrived at the casement, the shutters were pulled open from within. I rushed through the passage and found myself face to face with a man. The darkness prevented me from recognizing him. He was in the act of fleeing from Ellen’s room, whose heartrending cries then reached my ears. To seize the man by the throat at the moment when he put his foot upon the window sill in order to escape, to throw him back into the pitch dark room, and to strike him several times with my sword while I cried: ‘Ellen, here I am!’ — all this happened with the swiftness of thought. I drew my sword from the body that lay at my feet and was about to plunge it again into the carcass — my rage was uncontrollable — when I felt two arms clasp me convulsively. I thought myself attacked by a second adversary and forthwith ran the other body through. The arms that had been thrown around my neck immediately loosened their hold, and at the same time I heard these words pronounced by an expiring voice:

  “Schanvoch — you have killed me — thanks, my friend — it is sweet to me to die at your hands — I would not have been able to survive my shame—”

  It was Ellen’s voice.

  My wife had run, dumb with terror, to place herself under my protection. It was her arms that had clasped me. I heard her fall upon the floor. I remained thunder-struck. My sword dropped from my hand; for several seconds the silence of death reigned in the room that was perfectly dark except for a beam of pale light that fell from the moon through the lattice of one of the shutters that the wind had blown to. The shutter was suddenly thrown open again from without, and by the light of the moon I saw a tall and slender woman, clad in a short red skirt and a silvery corsage, resting with her knee upon the outer window sill and leaning her head into the room say:

  “Victorin, handsome Tarquin of a new Lucretia, quit the house; the night is far advanced. I saw you enter the door at midnight, the hour agreed upon, the husband being away. You shall now leave your charmer’s house by the window, the passage of lovers. You kept your promise — now I am yours. Come, my cart awaits us. Venus will protect us!”

  “Victorin!” I cried horrified, believing myself the sport of a frightful nightmare. “It was he — I killed him!”

  “The husband!” exclaimed Kidda, the Bohemian, leaping back. “It must be the devil that brought him back!”

  And she vanished.

  Immediately afterwards I heard the sound of a cart’s wheels and the clinking of the bell of the mule that drew it rapidly away, while from another direction, from the quarter of the camp, I heard a distant roar that drew steadily nearer and resembled the hubbub of a tumultuous mob. My stupor was followed by a distressful agony lighted by a faint ray of hope — perhaps Ellen was not dead. I ran to the inside chamber; it was closed from within. I knocked and called Sampso at the top of my voice. She answered me from another room, in which she had been locked up. I set her free, crying aloud:

  “I struck Ellen with my sword in the dark — the wound may not be mortal; — run for the druid Omer—”

  “I shall run to him on the spot,” answered Sampso without asking me any questions.

  She rushed to the house door which was bolted from within. As she opened it I saw a mob of soldiers advancing over the square where my house was situated and which was close to the entrance of the camp. Several soldiers carried torches; all uttered loud and threatening cries in which the name of Victorin constantly recurred.

  I recognized the veteran Douarnek at the head of the mob. He was brandishing his sword.

  “Schanvoch,” he cried the moment he recognized me, “the rumor has just run over the camp that a shocking crime was committed in your house!”

  “And the criminal is Victorin!” cried several voices drowning mine. “Death to the infamous fellow!”

  “Death to the infamous fellow, who violated the wife of his friend!”

  “Just as he violated the wife of the tavern-keeper on the Rhine, who killed herself in despair.”

  “The cowardly hypocrite pretended to have mended his ways!”

  “To dishonor a soldier’s wife! The wife of Schanvoch, who loved the debauché as if he were his own son!”

  “And who, moreover, saved his life in battle!”

  “Death! Death to the wretch!”

  I found it impossible to dominate the furious cries with my voice; Sampso vainly sought to cross the crowd.

  “For pity’s sake, let me pass!” Sampso implored them. “I wish to fetch a physician druid. Ellen still breathes; her wound may not be mortal! Let me bring her help!”

  Her words only served to redouble the indignation and fury of the soldiers. Instead of opening a passage for my wife’s sister, they drove her back as they crowded towards the door. A compact and enraged mass stood there brandishing their swords, shaking their fists and vociferating:

  “Death! Death to Victorin!”

  “He slew Schanvoch’s wife after doing violence to her!”

  “She has died as the tavern-keeper’s wife on the Rhine!”

  “Victorin!” thundered Douarnek. “You will not this time escape punishment for your crimes!”

  “We shall be your executioners!”

  “Death! Death to Victorin!”

  “It is impossible to break through the crowd and fetch a physician for my sister — she is lost!” Sampso cried out to me wringing her hands, while I vainly strove to make myself heard by the delirious crowd.

  “I shall try to get out by the window,” said Sampso.

  Saying this the distracted girl rushed into the mortuary chamber, and I, making superhuman efforts to prevent the infuriated soldiers from invading my house in search of the general, for whose blood they thirsted, cried out to them:

  “Withdraw! Leave me alone in this house of mourning! Justice has been done! Withdraw, comrades, withdraw!”

  An ever heightening tumult drowned my words. I saw Sampso issuing from your mother’s room carrying you, my son, in her arms. She was sobbing aloud and said:

  “Brother, there is no hope! Ellen is rigid — her heart has stopped beating — she is dead!”

  “Dead! Oh, dead! Hesus, have pity upon me!” I moaned and leaned against the wall of the vestibule; I felt my strength leaving me. Suddenly, however, a thrill ran through my frame. From mouth to mouth these words began to circulate among the soldiers:

  “Here is Victoria! Here comes our mother!”

  As the words were uttered the crowd swayed back from the entrance of my house to make room for my foster-sister. Such was the respect that the august woman inspired in the army, that silence speedily succeeded the tumultuous clamors of the soldiers. They realized the terrible position of that mother, who, attracted by the cries for justice and vengeance uttered against her own son, accused of an infamous crime, approached the scene in all the majesty of her maternal grief.

  As to me, my heart felt like breaking. Victoria, my foster-sister, the woman in whose behalf my life had been but one continuous day of devotion — Victoria was about to find in my house the corpse of her son, slain by me — by me who knew him since his birth, and who loved him like my own! The thought of fleeing flashed through my mind — I lacked the ph
ysical strength. I remained where I was, supporting myself against the wall — distracted — vaguely looking before me, unable to stir.

  The crowd of soldiers parted; they formed a long passage; and by the light of the moon and the torches I saw Victoria, clad in her long black robe and her little grandson in her arms, advancing slowly. She doubtlessly hoped to soothe the exasperation of the soldiers by presenting the innocent creature to their sight. Tetrik, Captain Marion and several other officers, who had notified Victoria of the tumult and its cause, followed behind her. They seemed to succeed in calming the seething fury of the troops. The silence grew solemn. The Mother of the Camps was only a few steps from my house when Douarnek approached her, and bending his knee said:

  “Mother, your son has committed a great crime — we pity you from the bottom of our hearts. But you will see to it that justice is rendered us — we demand justice—”

  “Yes, yes, justice!” cried the soldiers, whose irritation, after being checked for a moment, now broke out with renewed violence. The cry broke forth from all parts: “Justice! Or we will do justice ourselves!”

  “Death to the infamous wretch!”

  “Death to the man who dishonored his friend’s wife!”

  “Cursed be the name of Victorin!”

  “Yes, cursed — cursed!” repeated a thousand threatening voices. “Cursed be his name forever!”

  Pale, calm and imposing, Victoria stopped for a moment before Douarnek, who bent his knee as he addressed her. But when the cries of: “Death to Victorin!” “Cursed be his name!” exploded anew, my foster-sister, whose virile and beautiful countenance betrayed mortal anguish, stretched out her arms with the little child in them, as if the innocent creature implored mercy for its father.

  It was then that the cries broke forth with fiercest violence:

  “Death to Victorin! Cursed be his name!”

  And immediately I perceived my recent traveling companion, recognizable by his cloak and hood, in which he still kept himself closely wrapped, push himself with a menacing air toward Victoria, and shaking his fist at her, cry:

  “Yes, cursed be the name of Victorin! Let his stock be uprooted!”

  Saying this the man violently tore the child from Victoria’s arms, took it by the two feet, and dashed it with such fury upon the cobble-stones that its head was instantly shattered. The deed of ferocity was done with such brutality and swiftness that, although it aroused instant indignation, neither Douarnek nor any of the soldiers who precipitated themselves upon the hooded man to save the child were in time. The innocent child lay dead and bleeding upon the ground. I heard a heartrending cry escape Victoria, but immediately lost sight of her; fearing that some sort of danger threatened her life, the soldiers speedily surrounded and built with their breasts a wall around their mother. The rumor also reached my ears that, thanks to the tumult which ensued, the perpetrator of the horrible murder had succeeded in making his escape. Presently the ranks of the soldiers opened anew amid mournful silence, and again I perceived Victoria, her face bathed in tears, holding in her arms the now lifeless and bleeding body of Victorin’s son. At the sight, I cried out from the threshold of my house to the crowd that was now dumb and in consternation:

  “You demand justice? Justice has been done. I, Schanvoch, I have killed Victorin myself. He is innocent of my wife’s death. Now, withdraw. Allow the Mother of the Camps to enter my house that she may weep over the bodies of her son and grandson.”

  Victoria thereupon said to me in a firm voice as she stood at the threshold of my house:

  “You killed my son; you were right to avenge the outrage done to you.”

  “Yes,” I answered her in a hollow voice, “yes, and in the dark I also killed my wife.”

  “Come, Schanvoch, join me in closing the eyelids of Ellen and Victorin.”

  CHAPTER III.

  THE MORTUARY CHAMBER.

  VICTORIA ENTERED THE house amidst the religious silence of the soldiers who stood grouped without. Captain Marion and Tetrik followed her in. She motioned to them to remain outside of the death room, where she wished to be left alone with me and Sampso.

  At the sight of my wife, lying dead upon the floor, I fell upon my knees sobbing beside her. I raised her beautiful head, now pale and cold; closed her eyes; and taking the beloved body in my arms I laid it on my bed. Again I knelt down, and with my head resting upon the pillow on which hers reclined, I could no longer restrain my grief. I sobbed and moaned. I remained there long weeping and disconsolate; I could hear the suppressed sobs of Victoria.

  Finally her voice recalled me to myself; I thought of what she must be suffering; I looked around. She was seated on the floor near the corpse of Victorin, whose head rested on her maternal knees.

  “Schanvoch,” said my foster-sister as she gently brushed back with her hands the hair that fell over Victorin’s forehead, “my son is no more; I may weep over him, despite his crime. Here he lies dead — dead — dead and not yet twenty-three years old!”

  “Dead — and killed by me — who loved him as my son!”

  “Brother, you avenged your honor — you have my pardon and pity—”

  “Alas! I struck Victorin in the dark — I struck him in a fit of blind rage — I struck him without knowing that it was he! Hesus is my witness! Had I recognized your son, Oh, sister! I would have cursed him, but my sword would have dropped at my feet—”

  Victoria gazed at me in silence. My words seemed to lift a heavy weight from her heart. She looked relieved at learning that I had killed her son without knowing him. She reached out her hand to me feelingly, and I carried it respectfully to my lips. For several minutes we remained silent. She then said to Ellen’s sister:

  “Sampso, were you here this fatal night? Speak, I pray you. What happened?”

  “It was midnight,” Sampso answered in a voice broken with sobs. “Schanvoch had left the house two hours before on his journey. I was lying here beside my sister — I heard a rap at the house door — I threw a cloak over my shoulders and went to the door to ask who it was. A woman’s voice with a foreign accent answered—”

  “A woman’s voice?” I asked in a tone of surprise shared by Victoria. “Are you sure it was a woman’s voice that answered you, Sampso?”

  “Yes; that was the snare. The voice said to me: ‘I come from Victoria with a very important message for Ellen, the wife of Schanvoch, who left on a journey two hours ago.’”

  At these words of Sampso’s, Victoria and I exchanged looks of increasing astonishment. Sampso proceeded:

  “As I could in no way suspect a messenger from Victoria, I opened the door. Immediately, instead of a woman, a man rushed at me; he violently pushed me back — and immediately bolted the street door. By the light of the lamp, which I had placed on the floor, I recognized Victorin. He was pale — frightful to behold — he seemed to be intoxicated, and could hardly stand on his feet—”

  “Oh! The unhappy boy! The unhappy boy!” I cried. “He was not in his senses! Only so! Oh, only so! He never could otherwise have attempted such a crime!”

  “Proceed, Sampso,” said Victoria with a profound sigh; “proceed with your account—”

  “Without saying a word to me, Victorin pointed to the door of my own room, the room I always occupied when I did not share my sister’s room during the absence of Schanvoch. In my terror I guessed all. I cried to Ellen: ‘Sister, lock your door!’ and I began to call for help as loud as I could. My cries exasperated Victorin. He seized and threw me into my room. Just as he was about to lock me in I saw Ellen hurrying out of her room. She looked pale and frightened; she was almost naked. I afterwards heard the distressing cries of my sister calling for help — I heard them struggle — I fainted away. I know not how long I remained in that state. I regained consciousness when someone knocked at my door and called me by name. It was Schanvoch. I answered him. He must have opened it for me — I saw him—”

  “And you,” Victoria said, turning to me. “How was
it that you returned so suddenly?”

  “At about four leagues from Mayence, I was notified that a crime was being committed in my house.”

  “And who could have notified you?”

  “A soldier; my escort.”

  “And who was that soldier?” asked Victoria with heightening intensity. “How did he know of the crime?”

  “I know not — he vanished across the forest the instant that he gave me the sinister information. That soldier got back to town before me — he was the same man who tore your grandchild from your arms and killed it at your feet—”

  “Schanvoch,” resumed Victoria with a shudder and carrying both her hands to her forehead, “my son is dead — I shall neither accuse nor excuse him — but a horrible mystery underlies this crime—”

  “Listen,” I replied, as several circumstances that had slipped my memory at the first pangs of my grief now came back to my mind. “When I arrived before the door of my house, I knocked; only the distant sound of Sampso’s cries answered me. A moment later the lower window of my wife’s room was opened. I ran thither. The shutters were being pushed aside to give passage to a man, while Ellen cried for help. I pushed the man back into the room, which was dark as a tomb — in the darkness I struck and killed your son. Almost immediately after I felt two arms thrown around my neck — I imagined myself attacked by a new assailant — I made another thrust in the dark — it was Ellen, my beloved wife, whom I killed—”