Complete Works of Emile Zola (1069 page)

“We would set out,” she resumed in her slow, deep voice, “and we should be so happy over there! I could get the II — frcs. by selling the property, and I should still have enough to enable us to settle down. You could turn the cash to account; I would arrange a little home, where we would love one another with all our might. Oh! it would be so nice, so nice!”

And she added, very low:

“Far from all recollection of the past, and only new times ahead of us!”

He felt deeply affected. Their two hands joined, and pressed one another instinctively. Then came a pause, both Séverine and Jacques being rapt in this hope. It was she who broke the silence.

“All the same, it would be best for you to see your friend again before his departure, and ask him not to take a partner without letting you know,” she suggested.

Once more he was surprised.

“What is the use of that?” he inquired.

“Good heavens! Who knows?” she answered. “The other day, with that locomotive! Another second and I was free. One is alive in the morning, and dead at night. Is it not true?”

Looking at him fixedly, she repeated:

“Ah! if he were only dead!”

“But you don’t want me to kill him, do you?” he inquired, trying to smile.

Thrice she answered no; but her eyes said yes — those eyes of a tender-hearted woman, who had abandoned herself to the inexorable cruelty of her passion. As he had killed another, why should not he be killed himself? This idea had abruptly begun to assert itself as a consequence of the crime, a necessary termination to the difficulty. Kill him and go away: nothing could be more simple. When he was once dead, everything would be over, and she could begin again. She saw no other solution possible, and her resolution was irrevocably taken; but, not having the courage of her violence, she continued, in slightly wavering tones, to say no.

Jacques, standing with his back to the sideboard, still affected to smile. He had just caught sight of the knife lying there.

“If you want me to kill him,” said he, his smile broadening into a laugh, “you must give me the knife. I already have the watch, and this will help to make me a small museum.”

“Take the knife,” she gravely answered.

And when he had put it in his pocket, as if to carry on the joke to the end, he kissed her.

“And now, good-night,” he said. “I shall go and see my friend at once, and tell him to wait. If it does not rain next Saturday, come and meet me behind the cottage of Sauvagnat, eh? Is that understood? And rest assured that we will kill no one. It’s only a joke.”

Nevertheless, in spite of the late hour, Jacques went down towards the port to find the comrade leaving on the morrow. He spoke to him of a legacy he might receive, and asked for a fortnight before giving a definite answer. Then, on his way back towards the station by the great dark avenues, he thought the matter over, and felt astonished at what he had just done. Had he then resolved to kill Roubaud, since he was disposing of his wife and money? No, indeed, he had come to no decision, and if he took these precautions, it was no doubt in case he should decide. But the recollection of Séverine entered his mind, the burning pressure of her hand, her fixed eyes saying yes, while her lips said no.

She evidently wanted him to kill her husband. He felt very much troubled. What should he do?

When Jacques returned to the Rue François-Mazeline and lay down in his bed, beside that of Pecqueux, who was snoring, he could not sleep. Do what he would, his brain set to work on this idea of murder, this web of a drama that he was arranging, and whose most far-reaching consequences he calculated. He thought. He weighed the reasons for, and the reasons against. Summing up calmly, without the least excitement, after reflection, everything was in favour of the crime. Was not Roubaud the sole obstacle to his happiness? With Roubaud dead, he would marry Séverine, whom he adored. Besides, there was the money — a fortune.

He would give up his hard handicraft, and in his turn become an employer of labour, in that America of which he heard his comrades talk as of a country where engine-men shovelled in the gold. His new existence, over there, would unfold like a dream: a wife who passionately loved him, millions to be earned at once, a grand style of living, unlimited scope for ambition; in fact, anything he pleased. And to realise this dream he had only to make a movement, only to suppress a man, the insect, the plant in your way on the path, and which you trample on. He was not even interesting, this man who had now grown fat and heavy, who was plunged in that stupid passion for cards, which had destroyed his former energy. Why spare him? There was nothing, absolutely nothing to plead in his favour. Everything condemned him, because in response to each question, came the answer that it was to the interest of others he should die. To hesitate would be idiotic and cowardly.

Jacques bounded in his bed, starting at a thought, at first vague, and then abruptly so piercing that he felt it like a prick in his skull. He, who from childhood desired to kill, who was ravaged to the point of torture by the horror of that fixed idea, why did he not kill Roubaud?

Perhaps, on this selected victim, he would for ever assuage his thirst for murder; and, in that way, he would not only do a good stroke of business, but he would be cured as well. Cured, great God! He became bathed in perspiration. He saw himself with the knife in his hand, striking at the throat of Roubaud as the latter had struck the President, and become satisfied and appeased in proportion as the wound bled upon his hands. He would kill him. He was resolved to do so, for that would give him his cure, as well as the woman he adored, and fortune. As he had to kill somebody, since he must kill, he would kill this man, with the knowledge at all events that what he did was done rationally, by interest and logic.

Three o’clock in the morning had just struck, when this decision was arrived at, and Jacques endeavoured to sleep. He was already dozing off when a violent start brought him up in his bed in a sitting posture, choking. Kill this man! Great God! had he the right? When a fly pestered him he crushed it with a smack. One day when a cat got between his legs he broke its spine by a kick, without wishing to do so, it is true. But this man, his fellow creature! He had to resume all his reasoning to prove to himself that he had a right to commit murder — the right of the strong who find the weak in their way and devour them. It was he whom the wife of the other one loved at this hour, and she wanted to be free to marry him and bring him what she possessed.

When two wolves met in the wood, and a she-wolf was there, did not the stronger rid himself of the other with his fangs? And in ancient times, when men found refuge in the caverns, like the wolves, did not the coveted woman belong to that man in the band who could win her in the blood of his rivals? Then, as this was the law of life, it should be obeyed, apart from the scruples invented later on to regulate existence in common.

Little by little his right appeared to him absolute, and he felt his resolution affirmed. On the morrow he would select the spot and hour, and make preparations for the deed. Doubtless it would be best to stab Roubaud at night on the station premises, during one of his rounds, so as to convey the impression that he had fallen a victim to some thieves he had surprised. He knew a good place, over there behind the coal heaps, if Roubaud could only be attracted to the spot. In spite of his desire to sleep, he could not help arranging the scene then, debating in his mind where he would place himself, how he would strike, so as to stretch his victim at his feet; and insensibly, invincibly, as he went into the smallest details, his repugnance returned, inner protestation gained the upper hand.

No, no, he would not deal the blow! It appeared to him monstrous, a thing that could not be done, impossible. The civilised man within him, influenced by the power acquired through education, by the slowly erected and indestructible edifice of ideas handed down to him, revolted. Kill not! He had taken in that law at the breast, with the milk of generations. His refined brain, furnished with scruples, repelled the thought of murder with horror, as soon as he began to reason about it. Yes, kill by necessity, instinctively, in a fit of passion; but kill deliberately, by calculation and interest, no, he could never, never do it!

Dawn was breaking when Jacques succeeded in dozing off, but his sleep was so light that the debate continued confusedly in his mind, causing him abominable suffering. The ensuing days were the most painful of his existence. He avoided Séverine. Dreading her look, he sent her word not to come to the appointment on the Saturday. But the following Monday he was obliged to meet her; and, as he had feared, her great blue eyes, so soft and deep, filled him with anguish. She did not refer to the subject, she did not make a sign, nor say a word to urge him on, only her eyes were full of the thing, questioning, imploring him. He hardly knew which way to turn to avoid their impatient and reproachful gaze. He always found them fixed on his own eyes, in an expression of astonishment that he could hesitate to be happy.

When he kissed her at parting, he abruptly strained her to him, to give her to understand that he had resolved to act. And so, indeed, he had, until he reached the bottom of the stairs and found himself struggling with his conscience again. When he saw her, two days later, he was pale with confusion, and had the furtive look of a coward who hesitates in face of a necessary action. She burst into sobs without saying a word, weeping with her arms round his neck, horribly unhappy; and he, quite unhinged, felt the utmost contempt for himself. He must put an end to it.

“On Thursday, over there, will you?” she inquired in a low voice.

“Yes, on Thursday I will wait for you,” he answered.

On that particular Thursday the night was very dark, a starless sky, opaque and heavy, loaded with mist from the sea. Jacques, as usual, arrived the first, and, standing behind the cottage of the Sauvagnats, watched for Séverine. But the gloom was so intense, and she hurried along so lightly, that she brushed against him before he caught sight of her, making him start. She was already in his arms, and alarmed at feeling him tremble, she murmured:

“Did I frighten you?” — .

“No, no,” he replied, “I was expecting you. Let us walk on; no one can see us.”

And with their arms round the waists of one another, they strolled slowly over the vacant ground. There were but few gas-lamps on this side of the dépôt. In some gloomy quarters there were none at all; whereas they swarmed in the distance, near the station, like a quantity of bright sparks.

Jacques and Séverine walked about for a long time without a word. She had rested her head on his shoulder, and raised it ever and anon to kiss him on the chin; while he, bending down, returned the kiss on her forehead at the roots of her hair. The grave, solitary stroke of one o’clock in the morning, had just resounded from all the distant churches. If they failed to speak, it was because they felt they were both thinking. They were thinking of nothing but that one subject. It was impossible for them to be together now without finding themselves beset by it. The mental debate continued. What was the use of saying useless words aloud, as it was necessary to act? When she raised herself against him for a caress, she felt the knife, which formed a lump in his pocket. Could it be possible that he had made up his mind?

But her thoughts were too much for her, and her lips parted in a murmur that was scarcely audible:

“Just now he came upstairs; I was wondering what for. Then I saw him take his revolver, which he had forgotten. He is certainly going to make a round.”

They resumed silence, and it was only twenty paces further on that he, in his turn, remarked:

“Last night some thieves took away the lead from here. He will come along presently for sure.”

She gave a little shudder; both became silent, and they walked on more slowly. Then she had a doubt: was it really the knife that formed the lump in his pocket? Twice she stooped down knocking against it to get a better idea. Then, being still uncertain, she let her hand drop, and felt It was the knife sure enough. And Jacques, understanding her thoughts, suddenly strained her to him stammering into her ear:

“He will come, and you shall be free.”

The murder was decided. They no longer seemed to be walking. It appeared to them that some strange force sent them along just above the ground. Their senses had, all at once, become extremely acute, particularly the touch, for their hands, resting one in the other, were in pain, and the slightest brush of the lips was like a scratch. They also heard sounds which were lost a moment before — the rumble, the distant puffs of the engines, the muffled shocks, footsteps wandering in the depth of the obscurity. And they could see into the night; they distinguished the black spots of objects as if a mist had been removed from their eyes, they were able to follow the sharp curves described in the air by a passing bat. They stopped, motionless, at the corner of a heap of coal, ears and eyes on the alert, and with all their beings in a state of tension; they now spoke in whispers.

“Did you hear that?” she inquired. “Over there, somebody calling.”

“No,” he replied, “they’re putting a carriage into the coach-house.”

“But there, someone is walking on our left,” said she. “I heard the sound on the gravel.”

“No, no,” he answered, “rats are running over the coal heaps, and some of the pieces rolled down.”

Several minutes passed. Suddenly it was she who strained him to her more closely.

“There he is!” she exclaimed.

“Where? I can’t see him,” said he.

“He has turned round the shed of the slow-train goods department,” she continued. “He is coming straight towards us. Look at his shadow, passing along the white wall!”

“Do you think it is? That dark spot? Then he must be alone,” he said.

“Yes, alone. He is alone,” she repeated.

And at this decisive moment she passionately threw herself on his neck, she pressed her burning lips to his. It was a prolonged embrace, in which she would have wished to have conveyed her own blood to him. How she loved him! and how she execrated the other! Ah! had she but dared, twenty times over she would have done the business herself, to spare him the horror; but her hands were unequal to the effort, she felt herself too feeble, it required the fist of a man. And this kiss, which was without end, was all she could breathe to him of her own courage.