Doctor Lerne

by Maurice Renard

  That was untrue. The professor was not treating them. He was racing through life in pursuit of his chimera, with no more heed for his skin than for an old work-jacket that was to be thrown away as soon as the task at hand was finished.

  “You ought to go outside,” Emma advised him. “Fresh air would do you good.”

  He went out. We saw him heading for the poplar, smoking his pipe. The blows of the axe were falling faster. The tree tilted, and fell…its collapse sounded like an earthquake. The branches whipped my uncle, who had not stepped aside.

  Now, deprived of its natural bell-tower, Fonval sank even lower into the bottom of the valley, and I sought to repair the void left in the devastated sky by the tree, already forgotten, and its height, already legendary.

  Lerne came back in. He had no suspicion that he had committed an imprudence. His recklessness sent a shiver down my spine when I thought that he might be undertaking experiments of the most hazardous sort—to wit, the transfusions of the soul he had mentioned in the notebook…

  Was it one of those attempts that I had just witnessed? I thought about it with a measure of apprehension, with the bizarre sensation I had experienced so frequently at Fonval, like that engendered by groping one’s way through unfamiliar surroundings in the dark. Was there more than mere coincidence between Lerne’s fainting fit and the tree’s agitation, or did some mysterious link unite them as the axe fell? The arrival of the woodcutters at the foot of the poplar would certainly have been sufficient to put the birds to flight. As for the tremor, why should the tree-feller not have produced it by climbing the far side of the trunk in order to fix the traditional rope to it?

  Once again, the crossroads of possibility offered me different answers, like so many alternative paths. But my intelligence lacked perspicacity: the deleterious effect of the Circean operations persisted, and the regimen of intensive love-making demanded by my mistress and fostered by my uncle was no tonic.

  Lust being my drug of choice, I could no more deprive myself of Emma than an opium-smoker of his pipe or a morphine addict of her syringe—I beg the latter delightful creature to forgive me the impoliteness of such a comparison, in view of its accuracy. I had even become bold enough to join the inspirer of my ecstasy in her bedroom on a frequent basis. Lerne had caught us there one evening, and had taken the opportunity the following day to restate the terms of our contract: “She has free license to love you, on condition that she does not leave me; otherwise you’ll get nothing from me.” Having said that, he said the equivalent to Emma, for he knew it to be an irresistible argument so far as she was concerned.

  It was a matter of astonishment—which plunged me into a gulf of perplexity—that I had accepted that shameful arrangement so easily…but a woman surpasses the most adept enchanter: a wink, a roll of the hips, and there we are, transformed in our most intimate personality more radically than any magic wand or skillful scalpel could contrive. What was Lerne by comparison with Emma?

  Emma! I had had her every night, in spite of the scientist’s proximity. He would be breathing there, on the other side of the partition wall; he could hear us in his imagination, see us through the keyhole…God forgive me! I found an excitement in that, a wicked spice for our orgiastic scenes—and yet, what feasts they already were, every night more sumptuous than the one before!

  Emma, an ingenuous woman and an ingenious lover, was able to contrive an infinite variety in the antique nuptial ritual, whose foundation is immutable, by means of new rites that parodied them until their outcome. She always did honor to her desire differently, not by means of those classical arrangements that are numbered, catalogued and fastidiously calculated, but by grace of an indescribable, unexpected and charming originality. She multiplied herself in love, and was, without being aware of it, knowledgeable by instinct, making herself a tyrannical mistress and a docile victim by turns. Her body, it’s true, her insidious and versatile body, was admirably prepared for the caprices of these diverse physiognomies, for if it became, in action and by natural gesture, that of a frantic courtesan, some sudden willful modest grace, or its immobility, would render my lover into a simulacrum of a young girl already perfect in her form. Oh, the body of a crazed virgin, with a strange pre-pubescent nudity!

  I have gone on long enough, it seems to me, about our amusements to establish the value I placed on them, and to demonstrate that, if I were obliged to interrupt them, the motive for doing so would have to be irresistible.

  That motive I discovered in the following humiliation, which I would doubtless have attributed to my nervous condition had it not been for my acquaintance with the notebook. I would then have dismissed it as “a pathological consequence of the operations” and Lerne would have made a fool of me until the end. Fortunately, I divined his stratagem at the first assault.

  One evening, as I was going through the rooms on the ground floor, as usual, on my way from my own bedroom to Emma’s, I heard a chair being dragged across the floor in the room above the dining-room—my uncle’s. At that late hour, he was accustomed to rest, but that tiny detail left me quite indifferent. Without muffling the sound of my footsteps, I continued an expedition that was authorized, not clandestine.

  Emma had just finished curling her hair for the night. Amid the coquettish aromas of the bedroom, the odor of the scorched paper with which the heat of the tongs is measured was floating, a symbolic mingling of the Devil’s scent with the perfume of scantily-clad pretty girls.

  To the side, all noise had ceased. As an extra precaution, I drew the small interior bolt that locked Lerne’s door, so that we need have no fear of an unexpected entrance on my uncle’s part—not dangerous, of course, but untimely. There was no light showing through the keyhole. I had never taken so many precautions.

  All a-tremble, her nightdress silky and her flesh even silkier, Emma drew me toward the bed.

  Two bright lamps were burning on the mantelpiece, for the delight that we were about to enjoy is a fine spectacle, not to be scorned, and it is appropriate to thank Nature, which dictates that each of our senses has a part to play in her wild games, and that, on this occasion alone, their number is six.

  Emma gradually activated them all. My joys lit up with hers, and stoked up their increasing flame. With her, the divine comedy became a complete plot. Nothing was lacking therein—prologue, dramatic twists, coups de théâtre, dénouement—just as in the most excellent plays, in which the events that one desires to happen always do, but in an unexpected fashion.

  To begin with, Emma liked to allow herself to be caressed…

  Then, judging that the introduction had lasted long enough, she adopted the position of a heroine, and wanted, on that particular evening as on so many others, to go for a fantastic nuptial ride, at the gallop.

  But then, as she raced toward the abysm of satisfactions like an expert Valkyrie, something surprising and terrible occurred. Instead of climbing the voluptuous slope towards the implored paroxysm, it seemed to me, on the contrary, that I was descending it, passing from one pleasure to a lesser one, sliding by degrees towards indifference. I was still conducting myself valiantly, an increasing ardor animating the fury of my body, but the harder it played the game, the less contentment my mind experienced…

  This poor result distressed me. And that distress, too, diminished…

  I tried to stop my diabolically-possessed physique. Pffft! Hopeless! My will diminished to the point of being powerless, I sensed my faculties being continuously reduced, closing down and my soul, having become Lilliputian, was as impotent to govern my muscles as to receive the sensation of their maneuvers. I could scarcely take account of my body’s actions, and register that it was giving evidence of an entirely exceptional zest, for which Emma was visibly grateful.

  In the hope of cutting the phenomenon short, I concentrated the force of my authority. It was in vain. One might have thought that another soul had invaded the seat of my own, directing my conduct in its stead and savoring the reward of the r
esultant delights via my nerves. That personality had driven my own ego back into a corner of my brain. An intruder was cheating me with my mistress, who was deceived herself, by means of a detestable trick!

  These microscopic reflections agitated my dwarf soul. It became so meager at the instant of the couple’s apotheosis that I was afraid I might feel it vanish.

  Then it expanded, grew, blossomed, and progressively reoccupied its domain. My ideas resumed their former proportions. I was able to feel the great joyful fatigue that is Eros’ rear-guard, and a cramp in my right calf. A pressure on my shoulder became gradually heavier: Emma’s head was supported there, and her inevitable swoon was pressing down on my bosom the double pain of her extended throat.

  I completed my self-repossession. It took a long time. My eyes had not yet blinked; they were fixed on a particular point, and I realized that, throughout those extravagant minutes, they had never ceased staring at Lerne’s keyhole. Even now, they could not detach themselves from it.

  They were suddenly able to do it. I detached myself from my lover’s grip and, unexpectedly…a chair creaked in the next room, behind my uncle’s door—the sound of someone getting up from a sitting position and moving away on tiptoe….

  The keyhole had the appearance of a tiny dark window, opening in to the very heart of the mystery…

  Emma sighed. “You’ve never reached such heights, Nicolas, except for once…shall we go again? Say the word…”

  I fled, without making any reply.

  I could see clearly now. Had the professor not as good as told me: I’m thinking of assuming your appearance, in order to be loved in your stead? His eagerness to save my stricken body, the methodology explained in the notebook, and the incident of the poplar all came together in my mind to form a belief. The apparent fainting fits took on the aspect of experiments, in which Lerne, by means of a sort of hypnotism, was injecting his soul into various other beings. With his eye at the keyhole, he had transfused his ego into my brain, using the power that his incomplete discovery gave him to effect the substitution of the most implausible personalities! It might be argued that that very quality of implausibility should have made me hesitate as to the accuracy of my reasoning, but at Fonval, incoherence was the rule, an explanation having a proportionately greater chance of being correct the closer it approached the absurd!

  Oh, that eye of Lerne’s at the keyhole! It was pursuing me, as all-powerful as the eye of Jehovah that struck Cain down from the height of its triangular peephole!

  Although I can joke about it now, I had perceived the new danger, and my only thought was how to avoid it. After a rather long deliberation, I reached the only reasonable decision, which I should have taken long before: to leave. To leave with Emma, of course, for now, nothing in the world would have persuade me to leave her to my uncle, who could assume a man’s lust for a woman along with his anatomy.

  But Emma was not one of those women who can be abducted against their will. Would she consent to abandon Lerne and the promised wealth just like that? Certainly not. The poor girl could not see the disagreeably-modernized fairy tale unfolding around her; her mind was fully-occupied by future splendors; she was foolish and avaricious. In order to convince her to go with me, it would be necessary to assure her that she wouldn’t lose a centime…and Lerne alone could make a valid declaration to that effect.

  It was, therefore, the professor’s consent that had to be obtained!

  There could be no question of a consent obtained by force, of course—but intimidation might do the job admirably. If I could make skillful use of the murders of MacBell and Klotz, my fearful uncle might talk to Emma in accordance with my wishes, and I would be able to take my lover away…at the expense of depriving Monsieur Nicolas Vermont of an inheritance that as doubtless considerably eroded, and Mademoiselle Bourdichet of riches that were probably chimerical in any case.

  The details of my plan were soon complete.

  XIV. Death and the Mask

  But the plan was never put into action.

  That was not because I hesitated to put it into action. I was still determined to do it, and if any doubt arose with regard to the peril to be run, it was only after my projects were no longer practicable. While they seemed so, on the other hand, I waited impatiently for an opportunity to accomplish them, and will even admit that my haste to activate them was motivated by an ever-increasing fear…

  Danger presented itself to my hallucinated eyes on all sides, all the more perfidious and mysterious because there was often nothing to fear. Emma spent her nights in my room. The keyholes, the cracks in the doors, and every other issue by which the redoubtable voyeur might infiltrate his line of sight, were blocked. In spite of the security of the location, Emma complained about my coldness; I dared not allow myself to be distracted. On the one occasion I tried, her strange terminal swoon was provoked more rapidly than usual; I suspect today that that was caused by the preliminary abstinence, but at the time, that precipitate absence made me suspect a new misfortune; might it not be Emma that the foreign soul had just possessed momentarily? And the horror of having sated old Lerne’s sadism under the auspices of my companion robbed me conclusively of her accolade.

  I no longer took the risk of looking my uncle in the face. Vanquished by fear, I lowered my eyes and avoided those of others—even those of portraits, whose gaze follows us everywhere. The slightest thing made me jump. I was fearful of any creature with a white head, of any plant swayed by a breath of wind, of any voice lent by a bird to a tree…

  You will understand that it was high time to leave, and that I wanted to do so with all my heart—but I had resolved to choose a moment when Lerne might listen to my proposition with an accommodating ear, in order only to use threats as a last resort. And that moment was slow in coming. The discovery did not want to hatch out; continued failure preyed upon the professor’s mind. His fits—or, rather, his experiments—hastened his deterioration considerably…and his temper reflected it.

  Only our excursions retained the prerogative of reviving him; he still sang “Rum ti tum” as we walked and stopped every ten meters to pronounce some scientific verity—but the automobile enchanted the enchanter more than anything else.

  So, in spite of the poor result obtained in the same conditions several months before, I had to take the decision to talk to him during an outing in the eighty horse-power machine.

  And I would have done so, had it not been for the accident.

  I happened in the woods at Lourq, three kilometers from Grey, as we were returning to Fonval from an automobile trip to Vouziers. We were going up a shallow slope at high speed. My uncle was driving. I was mentally rehearsing the speech I was going to make, repeating the long-prepared sentences for the hundredth time, and apprehension was drying up my tongue. Since our departure, I had been continually putting off the moment when I would have to speak to my tyrant in the firm tone that would intimidate him. Before every village, every turning, I told myself: That’s where you must speak; but we had passed through all the villages and rounded all the beds without my pronouncing a syllable. Scarcely ten minutes remained to me. Come on! I would open fire at the top of the hill. No more delay!

  My first sentence was ready at the entrance to my memory, awaiting expression, when the car made a sharp swerve to the right, then swerved again to the left, skidding sideways. We were going to turn over!

  I grabbed the steering-wheel, braked as hard as I could with the footbrake and the handbrake…

  Gradually, the automobile’s lurching leased, and it slowed down, stopping just short of the crest of the rise.

  Then I looked at Lerne.

  He was leaning out of his bucket-seat, his head swaying and his eyes haggard behind his goggles; one of his arms was hanging down. A dizzy spell! We’d had a narrow escape! In that case, though, these fainting fits must be genuine syncopes. What had I been thinking, with my stupid ideas?

  He was not recovering, however. Having taken off his safe
ty-helmet, I saw that his clean-shaven face was as pale as candle-wax. His hands, once his gloves were off, had the same waxen tint. Knowing nothing about medicine, I slapped them vigorously, as people do to actresses in the theater suffering from the vapors. The sound of applause broke out in the quiet countryside. Sonorous and funereal, it welcomed the exit of the great ham.

  Frédéric Lerne had, in fact, ceased living. I deduced that from the chill in his fingers and the lividity of his cheeks, his soulless eyes and his stopped heart. The cardiac disease in which I had refused to believe had killed him, according to the custom of such maladies, without warning.

  Stupefaction, and the nervous reaction to the crash that I had just avoided, nailed me to the spot. So, within a second, nothing remained of Lerne but vermin fare and a name to be forgotten—nothing! In spite of my hatred for the noxious man and my relief in the knowledge that he was harmless, the swiftness of his death, spiriting away that monstrous intelligence like a conjuring trick, was inevitably frightening.

  Like a puppet deprived of the hand that gives it life, a marionette prostrate on the edge of the stage, Lerne was limp, his arm hanging slackly down toward the ground, and death added further whiteness to his funereal clown’s face. As the liberated genius drew further away into the unknown, however, my uncle’s corpse seemed to me to become more beautiful. The soul is so lauded by comparison with the flesh that it is astonishing to see the latter adorned at the latter’s expense. I followed the progress of the phenomenon in Lerne’s features. The great mystery illuminated his forehead with a divine serenity, as if life had been a cloud whose complete passing unmasked some unknown sun—and the face took on the sheen of white marble; the mannequin became a statue.

  A tear blurred my vision. I took off my helmet. If my uncle had perished fifteen years before, in the fullness of his happiness and his wisdom, the Lerne of yesteryear could not have been more handsome…