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Albert scarcely noticed his removal from home to the seclusion of the prison. Snatched away from his painful thoughts by the harsh voice of the commissary, saying. “In the name of the law I arrest you,” his mind, completely upset, was a long time in recovering its equilibrium, Everything that followed appeared to him to float indistinctly in a thick mist, like those dream-scenes represented on the stage behind a quadruple curtain of gauze.
To the questions put to him he replied, without knowing what he said. Two police agents took hold of his arms, and helped him down the stairs. He could not have walked down alone. His limbs, which bent beneath him, refused their support. The only thing he understood of all that was said around him was that the count had been struck with apoplexy; but even that he soon forgot.
They lifted him into the cab, which was waiting in the court-yard at the foot of the steps, rather ashamed at finding itself in such a place; and they placed him on the back seat. Two police agents installed themselves in front of him while a third mounted the box by the side of the driver. During the drive, he did not at all realize his situation. He lay perfectly motionless in the dirty, greasy vehicle. His body, which followed every jolt, scarcely allayed by the worn-out springs, rolled from one side to the other and his head oscillated on his shoulders, as if the muse of his neck were broken. He thought of Widow Lerouge. He recalled her as she was when he went with his father to La Jonchere. It was in the spring-time; and the hawthorn blossoms scented the air. The old woman, in a white cap, stood at her garden gate: she spoke beseechingly. The count looked sternly at her as he listened, then, taking some gold from his purse, he gave it to her.
On arriving at their destination they lifted him out of the cab, the same way as they had lifted him in at starting.
During the formality of entering his name in the jail-book in the dingy, stinking record office, and whilst replying mechanically to everything, he gave himself up with delight to recollections of Claire. He went back to the time of the early days of their love, when he doubted whether he would ever have the happiness of being loved by her in return; when they used to meet at Mademoiselle Goello’s.
This old maid had a house on the left bank of the Seine furnished in the most eccentric manner. On all the dining-room furniture, and on the mantel-piece, were placed a dozen or fifteen stuffed dogs, of various breeds, which together or successively had helped to cheer the maiden’s lonely hours. She loved to relate stories of these pets whose affection had never failed her. Some were grotesque, others horrible. One especially, outrageously stuffed seemed ready to burst. How many times he and Claire had laughed at it until the tears came!
The officials next began to search him. This crowning humiliation, these rough hands passing all over his body brought him somewhat to himself, and roused his anger. But it was already over; and they at once dragged him along the dark corridors, over the filthy, slippery floor. They opened a door, and pushed him into a small cell. He then heard them lock and bolt the door.
He was a prisoner, and, in accordance with special orders, in solitary confinement. He immediately felt a marked sensation of comfort. He was alone.
No more stifled whispers, harsh voices, implacable questions, sounded in his ears. A profound silence reigned around. It seemed to him that he had forever escaped from society; and he rejoiced at it. He would have felt relieved, had this even been the silence of the grave. His body, as well as his mind, was weighed down with weariness. He wanted to sit down, when he perceived a small bed, to the right, in front of the grated window, which let in the little light there was. This bed was as welcome to him as a plank would be to a drowning man. He threw himself upon it, and lay down with delight; but he felt cold, so he unfolded the coarse woollen coverlid, and wrapping it about him, was soon sound asleep.
In the corridor, two detectives, one still young, the other rather old, applied alternately their eyes and ears to the peep-hole in the door, watching every movement of the prisoner; “What a fellow he is!” murmured the younger officer. “If a man has no more nerve than that, he ought to remain honest. He won’t care much about his looks the morning of his execution, eh, M. Balan?”
“That depends,” replied the other. “We must wait and see. Lecoq told me that he was a terrible rascal.”
“Ah! look he arranges his bed, and lies down. Can he be going to sleep? That’s good! It’s the first time I ever saw such a thing.”
“It is because, comrade, you have only had dealings with the smaller rogues. All rascals of position — and I have had to do with more than one — are this sort. At the moment of arrest, they are incapable of anything; their heart fails them; but they recover themselves next day.”
“Upon my word, one would say he has gone to sleep! What a joke!”
“I tell you, my friend,” added the old man, pointedly, “that nothing is more natural. I am sure that, since the blow was struck, this young fellow has hardly lived: his body has been all on fire. Now he knows that his secret is out; and that quiets him.”
“Ha, ha! M. Balan, you are joking: you say that that quiets him?”
“Certainly. There is no greater punishment, remember, than anxiety; everything is preferable. If you only possessed an income of ten thousand francs, I would show you a way to prove this. I would tell you to go to Hamburg and risk your entire fortune on one chance at rouge et noir. You could relate to me, afterwards, what your feelings were while the ball was rolling. It is, my boy, as though your brain was being torn with pincers, as though molten lead was being poured into your bones, in place of marrow. This anxiety is so strong, that one feels relieved, one breathes again, even when one has lost. It is ruin; but then the anxiety is over.”
“Really, M. Balan, one would think that you yourself had had just such an experience.”
“Alas!” sighed the old detective, “it is to my love for the queen of spades, my unhappy love, that you owe the honour of looking through this peephole in my company. But this fellow will sleep for a couple of hours, do not lose sight of him; I am going to smoke a cigarette in the courtyard.”
Albert slept four hours. On awaking his head seemed clearer than it had been ever since his interview with Noel. It was a terrible moment for him, when, for the first time he became fully aware of his situation.
“Now, indeed,” said he, “I require all my courage.”
He longed to see some one, to speak, to be questioned, to explain. He felt a desire to call out.
“But what good would that be?” he asked himself. “Some one will be coming soon.” He looked for his watch, to see what time it was, and found that they had taken it away. He felt this deeply; they were treating him like the most abandoned of villains. He felt in his pockets: they had all been carefully emptied. He thought now of his personal appearance; and, getting up, he repaired as much as possible the disorder of his toilet. He put his clothes in order, and dusted them; he straightened his collar, and re-tied his cravat. Then pouring a little water on his handkerchief, he passed it over his face, bathing his eyes which were greatly inflamed. Then he endeavoured to smooth his beard and hair. He had no idea that four lynx eyes were fixed upon him all the while.
“Good!” murmured the young detective: “see how our cock sticks up his comb, and smooths his feathers!
“I told you,” put in Balan, “that he was only staggered. Hush! he is speaking, I believe.”
But they neither surprised one of those disordered gestures nor one of those incoherent speeches, which almost always escape from the feeble when excited by fear, or from
