In A Thousand Years

by Emile Calvet

  At that moment a tapestry curtain was raised, and a dazzling vision struck every gaze.

  A young woman of sovereign beauty, bearing in her visage the imprint of grace, generosity and intelligence, advanced toward the visitors and bowed to them gracefully.

  “My Daughter Éva,” said Guillaume Dryon to the travelers, not without a hint of parental pride.

  Then he introduced the strangers to the young woman. Mademoiselle Dryon greeted them with a charming smile.

  Gédéon seemed momentarily petrified by admiration. Suddenly, he gripped Terrier’s arm. “That divine creature’s large phosphorescent eyes have struck me like a thunderbolt,” he whispered.

  The professor who had only ever gazed tenderly at his scientific instruments, shrugged his shoulders.

  At the request of the master of the house, the doctor and the physicist came to offer their arms, the former to Mademoiselle Éva and the latter to one of the young ladies in front of him, and the guests set off for the dining room. The two scientists marched at the head of the column with an entirely academic dignity.

  The table, decked with rare flowers, sparkled with the glitter of crystal and gold.

  The splendor of the feast could not tear the young man away from the thoughts that were agitating him. Seated next to his uncle, he could not take his eyes off the charming young woman. Nevertheless, the meal continued in the midst of a general animation and gaiety.

  When all the culinary marvels had disappeared in their turn from the sumptuous table of the modern Lucullus, a magnificent dessert, in which the most admirable fruits of the five continents were grouped in pyramids, was set out before the guests.

  A few moments later, in response to the host’s invitation, he guests went into a vast and magnificent drawing-room, whose high windows opened on to a terrace from which the gaze embraced the marvelous panorama of the garden.

  The young woman served everyone a damascened platinum cup full of exquisite coffee.

  “Would the ladies like to hear a little music?” asked Dryon, amicably.

  “Certainly,” the young women replied, in unison. “For a week, no one in Paris has been talking about anything except the marvelous instrument you’ve had constructed.”

  The other guests approved the proposal.

  Terrier pulled a face. The sincere antipathy that they experienced for music bound the professor and his former pupil together; they retired to the furthest corner of the room.

  At a signal from Éva, a rectangular box of medium dimensions was placed on the table.

  “A simple spinet,” said Gédéon to the physicist. “It’s more annoying than injurious. I’m astonished, by the way, that you, who have such a highly-developed observational temperament, haven’t been struck by a very apparent singularity.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “You observed the doubtless insincere delight with which the guests welcomed our host’s artful proposition. Well, look at them now. They’ve all prudently drawn as far away from the instrument as possible. They’re all lined up along the wall; none of them has remained in the middle of the room to swallow the pill requested with so much enthusiasm.”

  Eva approached the box, applied a slight pressure to an ivory disk, and returned to sit down with the young ladies.

  All gazes turned toward the mysterious apparatus.

  Suddenly, a long and profound chord, such as might result from the simultaneous vibration of thirty sonorous harps, filled the room. Soon, an imposing group of violins and cellos came to participate in the symphony, embroidering a suave melody over the bass accompaniment.

  Gradually, all the brass, woodwind and percussion instruments of the orchestra irrupted into the concert, and in the midst of a magisterial forte, everyone experienced precisely the impression that an orchestra of a hundred musicians might make, functioning with an irreproachable regularity and mastery.

  Admiration was painted on all faces, and when the principal melody had been drawn energetically into a triumphant scherzo, all hands clapped frantically.

  “That,” said the physicist, “is the cleverest thing I’ve ever heard, in this world and the next.”

  “As we’re alone,” Gédéon added, “you can say the most extraordinary and the most admirable.”

  “I agree—but what movements can be engendering such vibrations?” The professor became pensive.

  Several guests got up and came to surround Dryon, asking him for an explanation of the marvelous instrument.

  “Messieurs,” the host said, in a loud voice, “I’d already seen an instrument similar to that, although much less complete, at Ujiji. I had the idea of seeking a few distractions in the construction of an apparatus that would produce the maximum sonority in the minimum volume. After a few days of study I gave a skillful technologist a detailed plan, which was executed with the greatest perfection.”

  “As a generator, I adopted electricity. Some of the strings are moved by plucking, activated by electromagnets, others by short bows, solid wires acting at the same time on tightly-packed rows of the same pitch. The woodwind and brass instruments owe their vibration to the expansion of compressed air contained in receptacles of various caliber. Finally, the percussion instruments are controlled by clockwork. The whole functions under the direction of a cylinder rotating about its axis, on which the music is engraved in metallic studs that regulate the action of the current.”

  Everyone congratulated the inventor, and the compliments of the three strangers were as enthusiastic as they were sincere.

  Darkness was beginning to fall. Mademoiselle Dryon got up and went to the central table. After parting the cloth slightly she pressed an ivory button controlling a metallic contact. Suddenly, six luminous globes in the ceiling lit up.

  By popular demand, the electric organ played a second symphony, which had the same success as the first.

  A few moments later, two young women came into the drawing room carrying large gilded trays laden with perfumed ices.

  Gédéon, intoxicated for the first time by music, had fallen back under the empire of his reverie and had his head in the clouds again. He went out on the terrace.

  The scene he had before his eyes was striking. At the back of the park, the cascade was unrolling a sheet of molten silver. In the midst of warm vapors the moon was rising slowly over the horizon. The evening breeze was gently agitating the foliage.

  The young man’s thoughts, stimulated by the magnificence of nature, underwent an abrupt explosion. “My God, how beautiful she is!” he exclaimed, raising his arms toward the heavens.

  Antius, who had noticed his absence, had set out to look for him and had soon caught up with him. At that moment he was standing still behind his nephew. Surprised by the exclamation he had just heard, he looked upwards and, fixing his eyes on the moon, replied: “That’s not my opinion—I think she looks rather shabby.”

  “Shabby! Do you hear that, heavens?”

  “Yes, she’s rather dull.”

  “Dull! O sacrilege!”

  Is he mad? Antius though, anxiously Does the night star really have a pernicious influence on sick minds? “Are you in love?” he asked, ironically.

  “Yes, I love her! I can no longer keep within my heart the secret that’s stifling it.”

  “Oh, you fool!” said the doctor, putting his hands over his eyes.

  “Yes, I love her, and I’m dying of it. You’re the only one who can save my life.”

  “What can I do, my poor child?” asked the scientist, emotionally.

  “Ask for her hand on my behalf,” said the young man, in an oppressed voice, without ceasing to stare at the sky.

  “My God, have pity on us! But to who am I to address a request for her hand?”

  “To her father, who is so good, so great and so generous.”

  “What, you triple idiot!” exclaimed Antius seizing his nephew by the arm angrily. “You want me to make a marriage request to the father of the moon for you?”

&nbs
p; “Who mentioned the moon, you gutless individual? It’s a matter of the adorable and the adored Éva.”

  “In that case, my lad,” the doctor replied, coldly, “you’re even madder than I thought.” And he went back into the drawing room.

  XXX. Fatal Resolutions. A Thunderbolt

  An hour later, after having bid farewell to their host, the guests left the sumptuous dwelling. As the strangers were leaving, the agronomist had asked them to come back the following morning to sit down at his table, for, the departure being imminent, he needed to make a few urgent arrangements with them.

  Herber took his friends back to the school. During the return journey the doctor was somber and pensive. Gédéon was walking like a body devoid of a soul. Only the schoolmaster and the physicist exchanged a few reflections regarding the future.

  As the clocks were striking midnight, they arrived in the main courtyard. The schoolmaster shook the strangers’ hands emotionally, wished them good night and headed for his apartment.

  Scarcely had the door closed on their generous host than the doctor, his arms folded, planted himself in front of the physicist. “Do you know, Terrier, what terrible danger threatens us just as we’re about to come into harbor?” he said, dully.

  “No,” said the professor, anxiously.

  You shall. This evening, I surprised this great imbecile gazing at the sky and moaning as if he were being led to the scaffold.”

  “Was he ill?”

  “I wish to God he were! I’d a thousand times rather see him prey to all the maladies catalogued in a textbook of pathology, ancient as well as modern, than have to observe the frightful case of aberration in which he finds himself. In a word, he’s presently under the influence of the infection that’s not only the most stupid and the most inadmissible, but the most dangerous for him and for us. He’s in love.”

  “Uh oh, my former pupil,” said the professor, in a tone of profound commiseration, looking his disciple up and down.

  “And who do you think has turned his poor head? I could give you ten years to guess it, but I prefer to tell you right away: Mademoiselle Dryon!”

  “Antius,” the physicist replied, with imperturbable calm, “I wouldn’t have taken ten years to guess that. And in truth, she is charming.”

  “You’re supporting him?” exclaimed the exasperated doctor. “Are you going to be his accomplice. Or has the young woman turned your head upside down as well?”

  “If such a dementia ever took possession of me,” Terriier replied, “the principal cataract of Niagara Falls wouldn’t be an adequate shower to treat my madness. I could say the same of you, Antius, and a fortiori, for you’re older than me. But I think you’re wrong to be alarmed. Without being an expert in such matters, I’d gladly believe that our young man will be the first to laugh at this nonsense tomorrow. Let’s go to bed.”

  Gédéon follow them mechanically.

  Half an hour later, the two scientists were sleeping the sleep of the just, while the young man, lying on a divan, was devoting himself to the laborious construction of castles in Spain. Gradually, however, his head became heavy and he ended up falling asleep.

  His slumber was continually agitated by a sequence of visions, sometimes delightful and sometimes terrible.

  At one moment, he saw himself, after overcoming a thousand difficulties, leading young Éva to the church, holding her respectfully by the hand. The future spouses were followed by an imposing cortege, formed of members of the Institut and delegates to the European parliament, invited in their entirety by his father-in-law.

  Fifty paces in front of them, the electric organ, carried by a compressed-air-driven locomotive, was playing a triumphal march.

  Suddenly, a monstrous crocodile, which was somehow reminiscent of his uncle, precipitated itself between the bride and groom, and everything vanished into thin air.

  Bathed in a cold sweat, the young man sat up on his elbow. His features expressed suffering and despair.

  He remained motionless and pensive for a long time.

  Suddenly, he raised his head sharply. “If I have to continue to live like yesterday and sleep like last night,” he said, aloud, “I’d rather put an end to it.”

  After a moment’s reflection, he continued: “That’s decided. I have to cut the thread of my days myself. Why hesitate? Have I not lived long enough? There are only two men in the world who will have had a longer life than mine, and I’ll occupy a very honorable rank in Deparcieux’s tables.39 Alas, if only I’d had the foresight to invest my wealth in an annuity way back when, I could have ruined thirty insurance companies—which would be rather meritorious.

  “As for my funeral oration, I’m tranquil. Monsieur Terrier is here, and I know, for having seen him at work, how good he is at expanding on the real or imaginary virtues of deceased individuals.

  “Of course, for the last day of my life, I need a certain method. I’ll go to the Necropolis to choose my place. I don’t want to be eternally lodged between a poet and a man of law. As for the cause of death, I’m spoiled for choice.”

  Proud of his determination and comparing himself to Brutus, he went to the window and activated a spring that caused the shutters to fly open. It was broad daylight. At that moment, the clock struck five. The weather was magnificent.

  “The first time I salute the dawn, the situation lacks gaiety,” he said, in a bitter tone. And he reflected for a quarter of an hour, his eyes lost in space.

  “No hesitation!” he exclaimed, suddenly, straightening up. “I shan’t walk, I shall run toward death.”

  He went to the door, put his hand on the knob, and stopped. It would be extremely impolite, he thought, to make the final voyage without leaving my companions a few well-chosen words.

  And he marched straight to an encrusted ebony writing-desk, took out two large sheets of paper ornamented with academic symbols, and, after reflecting momentarily, filled them both, one after the other, with letters half an inch high.

  He went out into the corridor quietly and, with the aid of two golden pins, fixed one to the physicist’s door and the other to the doctor’s.

  The first read:

  Adieu, my dear professor. I am departing for a better world. If you say a few words over my coffin, don’t forget to mention that I once won a silver medal in the boat races at Le Havre.

  The second bore the following sentence in a feverish hand:

  Uncle, it’s you who have cast me into the tomb, or rather the urn. I bequeath you eternal remorse. If ghost is anything but a vain word, I’ll save you a few nights, on which you can give me news.

  Having cast a final glance of satisfaction over the manuscripts, he went down to the courtyard and into the square.

  The immense plaza was absolutely deserted. The silence was only troubled by the murmur of fountains and morning bird-song.

  “How beautiful nature is!” he said, with a sigh.

  Fearing that his resolve might be weakened by the spectacle that he had before him, he hastened his step. Having arrived in front of the palace of death he shivered.

  That happens to the bravest, he thought.

  In the vestibule he was surprised by the profound silence that reigned in the edifice.

  Suddenly, he slapped her forehead. “I swore to visit the uppermost floor, in order to see whether I could find any acquaintances there,” he said. And he started climbing the great staircase at a measured pace.

  Having arrived at the very top, he found himself facing a door above which the words 20th century were painted in gold letters.

  “This is it!” he murmured, and went in.

  Following the order of the dates with his gaze, he went slowly along the gallery, reading the inscriptions.

  Suddenly, he uttered a loud cry, and nearly fell over. Before his eyes, on the enamel of an urn set at shoulder height, shone the two words: GÉDÉON CAHUSAC.

  “O Providence,” he said, “You’ve reserved a spectacle for me that no other mortal has ever been ab
le to enjoy. I may shed a few tears over my mortal remains.” And his eyelids became moist.

  He drew nearer to the vase.

  “It’s made of gold like all the rest,” he said. “That’s a consolation. Great God, what’s this? A Notice!”

  And he read avidly, on the pedestal of the urn, the following information: Genealogy of the Cahusacs. Hall of Records, Section K2, page 1237.

  Gédéon turned round, shot through the gallery like an arrow and ran downstairs, taking the steps four at a time. He crossed the vestibule in two bounds, violently shoved back the door to the hall that he had visited the previous day with the two scientists, and, marching hesitantly, ran his eyes over the indications engraved on the spines of the enormous registers.

  “There it is!” he cried, and launched himself toward a folio marked with a magisterial K.

  The book, snatched out violently, fell heavily into his arms, nearly knocking him over. The young man ran to the table, deposited his treasure thereon, and turned the pages rapidly.

  When he arrived at page 1237 he read, dazedly, the name:

  NICOLAS PLATEAU, Maître des requêtes au Conseil d’État.

  “They’re mistaken,” he said, in a pained tone. “And to think that I wept over the ashes of a jurisconsultant. Oh, bureaucracy!”

  And he pushed the enormous volume away angrily.

  The closed folio displayed to his eye the number 1, an inch high, which he had not noticed in his haste.

  A ray of hope illuminated his face, and he launched himself toward the wall again. “Finally, I have it!” he cried, coming back carrying another register—and he consulted the book, feverishly.

  When the indicated page was displayed before his eyes, he shuddered as he read his own name, framed within a cartouche ornamented by elegant vignettes.

  Below it was written, in a fine slanted and rounded hand, the following genealogy:

  ACHILLE-GÉDÉON CAHHUSAC, son of PIERRE-ANDRÉ CAHUSAC and JULIE-ANTOINETTE ANTIUS, honorable notary, born 22 September 1856, died 25 October 1928.