Home > Authors Index > Anatole France > Mummer's Tale > This page
A Mummer's Tale, a fiction by Anatole France |
||
Chapter 15 |
||
| < Previous |
Table of content |
Next > |
|
________________________________________________
_ CHAPTER XV They met daily at the theatre, and they went for walks together. Nanteuil was playing almost every night, and was eagerly working at her part of Cecile. She was gradually recovering her peace of mind; her nights were less disturbed; she no longer made her mother hold her hand while she fell asleep and no longer found herself suffocating in nightmares. A fortnight went by in this fashion. Then, one morning, while sitting at her dressing-table, combing her hairs she bent her head toward the glass, as the weather was overcast, and she saw in it, not her own face, but the face of the dead man. A thread of blood was trickling from one corner of his mouth; he was smiling and gazing at her. Thereupon she decided to do what she thought would be the proper and efficacious thing. She took a cab and drove off to see him. Going down the Boulevard Saint-Michel she bought a bunch of roses at her florist's. She took them to him. She went down on her knees before the tiny black cross which marked the spot where they had laid him. She spoke to him, she begged him to be reasonable, to leave her in peace. She asked his forgiveness for having treated him formerly with harshness. People did not always understand one another in life. But now he ought to understand and forgive her. What good did it do to him to torment her? She asked no better than to retain a kindly memory of him. She would come and see him from time to time. But he must cease to persecute and frighten her. She sought to flatter and soothe him with gentle phrases. "I can understand that you wanted to revenge yourself. It was natural. But you are not wicked at heart. Don't be angry any more. Don't frighten me any more. Don't come to see me any more. I'll come to you; I'll come often. I'll bring you flowers." She longed to deceive him, to soothe him with lying promises, to say to him "Stay where you are; do not be restless any longer; stay where you are, and I swear to you that I will never again do anything to offend you; I promise to submit to your will." But she dared not lie over a grave, and she was sure that it would be useless, that the dead know everything. A little wearied, she continued awhile, more indolently, her prayers and supplications, and she realized that she no longer felt the horror with which the tombs had formerly inspired her; that she had no fear of the dead man. She sought the reason for this, and discovered that he did not frighten her because he was not there. And she mused: "He is not there; he is never there; he is everywhere except where they laid him. He is in the streets, in the houses, in the rooms." And she rose to her feet in despair, feeling sure that henceforth she would meet him everywhere except in the cemetery. _ |
||